Dec. 13
TEXAS:
Appeals court orders new punishment trial for man on Texas death row since 1986
An El Paso man convicted and condemned for the slaying of an elderly woman
almost 30 years ago has won a new punishment trial.
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals agreed Wednesday with a trial judge that
Angel Galvan Rivera had poor legal help at his 1986 trial in El Paso.
Rivera's appeals lawyers argued his trial attorneys didn't properly investigate
Rivera's background or present evidence that could have persuaded jurors to opt
for a sentence other than death.
The ex-cook was 27 when 88-year-old Jewell Haygood was found strangled to death
in the bathroom of her El Paso home in October 1984. He also was suspected in
the deaths of 62-year-old Iona Dikes and 82-year-old Julia Fleenor, both found
strangled at their El Paso home the same month.
(source: Associated Press)
FLORIDA----new death sentences
Michael Bargo sentenced; Now youngest man on Florida death row
An Ocala man is heading to death row for his part in the slaying of a
15-year-old boy.
During a 10-minute hearing on Friday, Circuit Judge David Eddy read 21-year-old
Michael Bargo's death sentence.
Bargo was the last of 5 defendants to be sentenced in the April 2011 murder of
Seath Jackson in Summerfield, near Ocala.
"It is the judgment of the law and the sentence of the court for the
premeditated murder of Seath Jackson, you Michael Shane Bargo are sentenced to
death," Eddy said.
Prosecutors said Jackson was lured to the home where he was beaten, shot and
tortured before his body was burned in a backyard fire pit. The teen's remains
were then placed into three paint buckets and dumped into a limerock pit.
In August, Bargo was convicted for his role in Jackson's murder. His
co-defendants are serving life sentences.
A jury had already recommended the death penalty by an overwhelming majority.
"By a vote of 10-2, we the jury recommend the court that it impose the death
penalty."
During a hearing last month, Bargo took the stand and maintained his innocence,
telling the judge he doesn't deserve to die.
"I don't want to die, man. I really don't. I was 18 years old, man," said
Bargo.
Bargo's father and other family members comforted his grandmother as she broke
down crying when the judge read the sentence.
At the age of 21, Bargo will now be the youngest inmate sitting on Florida's
death row.
(source: Associated Press)
*****************
Pasco man sentenced to death for murder, rape of Port Richey woman
A judge sentenced John Sexton Jr. to death Friday for the murder and rape 3
years ago of a 94-year-old Port Richey woman who hired him to mow her lawn.
In handing down the sentence, Circuit Judge Mary Handsel called the Sept. 22,
2010, murder of Ann Parlato a "senseless, pitiless" crime.
A jury convicted Sexton in April and recommended the death penalty, and the
judge agreed after reviewing the circumstances of the case.
A friend who went to Parlato's home the day after her murder found her brutally
beaten body covered by a sheet. She was raped with an object and her body was
mutilated and set afire.
Police quickly closed in on Sexton, the victim's yard man. 3 neighbors
testified they had seen him through the kitchen window the night of the murder
and recognized him. Police found knives in the kitchen sink, along with a white
ceramic vase that was used to bludgeon the woman beyond recognition.
Another witness noticed his truck parked in Parlato's driveway and wrote down
his license tag number.
Finally, when detectives arrived at Sexton's Port Richey home, about a mile
away from the murder scene, they found him wearing a gray USF T-shirt, khaki
shorts and flip flops. The shirt and shorts were stained with Parlato's blood.
A pair of Sexton's work boots found inside his home was also drenched in blood.
They found Parlato's DNA under Sexton's fingernails and cuticles.
Before the sentencing Friday, a relative and a friend of Parlato's addressed
the judge, painting a picture of a loving, trusting elderly woman whose trust
was betrayed by Sexton.
"He denied my aunt the ability to live her life through her natural years and I
would truly hope he is not able to live his life through his natural years,"
said Jeri Barr, Parlota's niece.
Barr also read a statement from Parlota's oldest daughter, Maryanne Parlota,
who does not live in the area and was unable to travel to Pasco for the
sentencing.
In the statement, Maryanne Parlota said that "no human being or even animal"
should have to endure the cruelty her mother did at the hands of Sexton.
"I wish you could personally experience the pain you inflicted on her," the
daughter's statement said, addressing Sexton. "But the next best solution, so
to speak, is to condemn you to death. It seems the easy way out for you, but we
are after all civilized people."
Dori Cifelli, the friend who found Parlota's body, said for 3 years she has had
to live with the images of what she saw that day.
"Not only was she robbed of her remaining years, but her family is left with
her brutal murder," Cifelli said.
(source: Tampa Bay Tribune)
********************
High court to revisit death penalty for mentally disabled
How should states decide if someone convicted of a crime has an intellectual
disability, when the answer means life or death? This spring the Supreme Court
will wade back into these murky waters, 12 years after it took the death
penalty off the table for criminals with mental disabilities but left the
details to the states.
In its 6-3 decision in Atkins v. Virginia, authored by Justice John Paul
Stevens, the court prohibited states from executing anyone with "mental
retardation."
Mental health professionals define it as substantial limitations in
intellectual functions such as reasoning or problem-solving, limitations in
adaptive behavior or "street smarts," and evidence of the condition before age
18. (Mental retardation is the term used in law, but most clinicians and The
Associated Press refer to the condition as intellectual disability.)
After the decision, most states stuck with the three-pronged clinical
definition, but Florida, Georgia, Mississippi and Texas set their own
standards. Under Florida's law, if you have an IQ over 70, you???re eligible
for execution regardless of intellectual function or adaptive behavior.
Florida case
Freddie Lee Hall, who has been on Florida's death row for more than 30 years
and scored in the mid-70s on IQ tests, is arguing the state's standard amounts
to unconstitutional punishment.
Most likely, the case won't result in a dramatic shift in national criminal
justice policy, but will further clarify who should and should not be eligible
for execution, said Ronald Tabak, an attorney who has represented multiple
clients with intellectual disabilities and chairs the American Bar
Association's death penalty committee.
"There is no reason to think that the court is taking this case because the
court loves that Florida is going against the norms of the mental health
field," Tabak said. "The more likely reason they granted (judicial review) is
... to say there are certain basic things about intellectual disability that
you can't exclude from consideration."
March 3 arguments
That's not the way Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi sees it. The Atkins
decision, she wrote in her brief to the Supreme Court, "expressly left the task
of defining retardation to the states," and Florida is free to adopt its own
standard for determining who is intellectually disabled.
"Freddie Lee Hall faces a death sentence for the 1978 murder of Karol Hurst,
and Florida courts have found that he is not intellectually disabled," said
Bondi. "We will urge the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold Hall's sentence."
The court's makeup has shifted since the 2002 Atkins decision. But if the
justices split along ideological lines, the vote could favor Hall, assuming
that swing vote Justice Anthony Kennedy sides with Hall, as he did with Atkins
in 2002. Arguments are set for March 3.
Other cases
Similar cases are percolating beyond Florida. In Georgia, death row inmate
Warren Hill is fighting execution based on substantial evidence that he is
intellectually disabled. In Texas, where the courts use an anecdotal 7-part
test largely based on the characteristics of the fictional character Lennie
from John Steinbeck's novel "Of Mice and Men" to determine intellectual
disability, multiple prisoners have been executed in recent years even when
they've scored well below 70 on IQ tests.
Last year, Texas executed Marvin Wilson, who was convicted of murder in 1994,
even though he had an IQ of 61. In 2010, Virginia executed Teresa Lewis for her
role in a murder-for-hire scheme, even though she had an IQ of 72 and her
co-conspirators admitted Lewis did not plan the murder.
These are the types of cases advocates want the Supreme Court to revisit. "It's
our hope that the court will clarify that states must use the clinical
definition for intellectual disability - not only for current cases but for
future cases, too," said Margaret Nygren, executive director and CEO of the
American Association of Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities.
'Mind of a child' Freddie Lee Hall was convicted of co-planning and carrying
out the murder of 21-year-old Karol Hurst in Leesburg in 1978.
After spending the day scouting the parking lot of a local grocery store with
his partner, Mack Ruffin, Hall forced Hurst, who was 7 months pregnant, into
her car and drove her into the woods. There, Ruffin sexually assaulted and shot
Hurst. A jury convicted Hall of 1st-degree murder for his role in the murder
scheme.
Since Hall was sentenced to death in 1981, he has made multiple appeals based
on his low IQ, which varied from 71 to 80 depending on the tests and their
margins of error.
"He has been the same ever since I've known him, and he has the mind of a
child," said his attorney, Eric Pinkard, who has been working with Hall since
1999.
Borderline cases
In multiple hearings to prove his intellectual disability, Hall's family and
longtime friends testified about Hall's struggles with reading, writing and
caring for himself, and recounted how Hall experienced abuse, starvation and
torture as a child.
The Florida courts decided that even though Hall had limits in functioning and
adaptive behavior, because his IQ scores were not below 70, Hall was not
intellectually disabled and could be executed.
It's these borderline cases where the individual state implementations matter,
Nygren said. "Intellectual disability, like genius, is on a continuum," Nygren
said. "It's challenging for states to legislate that this person is 'in' or
'out.'"
Still, the court shouldn't wade too much into the specifics of setting
protocols to define intellectual disability, said Kent Scheidegger, legal
director of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, which advocates for victims
of crime.
If the Supreme Court gets into issues like these and declares them to be
federal constitutional mandates," Scheidegger said, "we will have a long
stretch of litigation as the high court resolves one issue after another, never
reaching the end."
Clinical judgment
Making that determination is generally subject to clinical judgment, Nygren
said.
"Clinicians must pick scientifically valid tests that are culturally relevant
and standardized, but also individualized," Nygren said.
"For instance, if someone's been in jail for last 5 years, it's hard to
evaluate if they're good at managing money since they don't have money to
manage. That's where clinical judgment comes in."
Beyond IQ tests, the disability manifests in limitations in learning and
reasoning, and difficulty with social skills, personal care and language. These
factors are just as relevant as an IQ test score, which, said Nygren, "is never
going to give you 100 % (certainty), even though that's the expectation placed
on the test."
Advocates like Nygren want the court to require states to pay more attention to
margins of error when determining intellectual disability. Leaving the
determination of mental disability to the states, "has given states a lot of
leeway to do mischief with the definition of intellectual disability," said
Brian Kammer, executive director of the Georgia Resource Center, which provides
free legal services for death row inmates.
High burden of proof
For instance, Georgia requires defendants to prove their intellectual
disability "beyond a reasonable doubt," the highest standard of proof in the
criminal justice system. Georgia is the only state that requires such a high
burden of proof, and the legislature is considering lowering the standard in
the next legislative session.
Still, the Atkins decision has had an impact on executions. At least 98 people
have had their death sentence changed since 2002 by proving that they were
intellectually disabled, according to data from the Death Penalty Information
Center. By their count, in the 18 years before the Atkins decision, at least 44
people who likely suffered from intellectual disabilities were executed.
Nationally, states are carrying out fewer death sentences than they have since
the penalty was reinstated in 1976. So far in 2013, 36 people have been
executed in 9 states. In 2012, 43 people were executed in 9 states.
(source: Florida Courier)
*********************
Jacksonville man convicted of murdering neighbor; could get death penalty
Prosecutors are seeking to put a Northwest Jacksonville man on death row after
a jury convicted him Thursday of strangling and stabbing his neighbor.
Dennis Thurnado Glover, 50, was convicted of the 1st-degree murder of
51-year-old Sandra Jean Allen Thursday afternoon. The jury was out for about 90
minutes before it convicted Glover.
The same jury will return on Dec. 19 to recommend whether Glover should be
sentenced to death or spend the rest of his life in prison without the
possibility of parole. Circuit Judge Mallory Cooper will make the final
sentencing decision sometime in 2014.
Glover originally claimed he found Allen dead in her mobile home and went to
get help from some of his neighbors. He claimed he saw 2 black men fleeing from
Allen's house, and then found her door cracked open with Allen's body inside.
According to police reports, Glover originally told police he never went into
Allen's home that day, and he knew her daughter but not Allen. He voluntarily
allowed his shoes to be photographed and tested for DNA.
But Glover was arrested a month after the May 2012 murder when police found
Allen's blood on his shoes and his DNA on her face, neck and left hand.
Defense attorneys said the 2 were having an illicit sexual relationship, but
Glover didn't kill her. Glover lived with his girlfriend 2 doors down from
Allen on the 2300 block of Fourth Avenue just off of Lem Turner Road.
But prosecutors said witnesses saw Glover go to Allen's mobile home several
times that morning. And no one else saw 2 black men fleeing the home.
Assistant State Attorney Janeen Mira said Allen's murder was particularly
brutal, an argument that is likely to be made again as prosecutors seek death.
"The last moments of Sandra Jean Allen's life were spent lying in a pool of her
own blood in her own home, beaten, strangled and stabbed," Mira said.
(source: Florida Times-Union)
ALABAMA:
Stanford professor testifies Xanax given to Nick Acklin would have affected his
demeanor during Madison County 'cell phone murders' trial
A Stanford University professor testified this morning that Xanax given to Nick
Acklin during his 1998 capital murder trial would have likely affected his
demeanor, as the anti-anxiety drug is designed to "remove emotion."
The testimony from Dr. Pamela Sims, a pharmacology professor at Stanford, who
also teaches at the University of Alabama-Birmingham, came in the final day of
a hearing over Acklin's bid to overturn his conviction and death sentence for
the 1996 Madison County "cell phone murders."
A decision in the case won't come soon. Circuit Judge Chris Comer said that
once the two sides receive a transcript of the hearings they will have 60 days
to file any post-hearing briefs to support their arguments.
Acklin's attorneys have argued his lawyers did not adequately represent him at
trial and during the penalty phase of the case in which a jury voted to give
him the death penalty.
The 1996 murder case included the shooting deaths of four people and the
wounding of two others and included grim details. Acklin's demeanor during the
trial was noted in press accounts and Judge Jim Smith, who presided over the
trial, noted in his order sentencing Acklin to death that Acklin "glared at
every witness," according to a court document introduced this morning.
Acklin's attorneys have argued that the jury should have been informed by
Acklin's lawyers that he'd been prescribed Xanax. His lack of emotion during
the testimony and introduction of physical evidence and photos may have been
read by jurors as indifference to the crime, the attorneys have argued.
Acklin's mother testified earlier this week that he seemed "not himself" and
"spaced out" during the trial, but she also testified she didn't tell Acklin's
lawyers about her concern.
Sims testified that Acklin was given Xanax for about 10 days around the time of
his trial with a dosage of .5 milligrams, twice a day. She testified that the
drug is designed to treat anxiety and even in "highly emotional situations" a
person taking it would "react very little." Sims said the dosage given Acklin
was a little higher than a typical starting dose. She said that the effects of
Xanax and most other drugs are more pronounced when a person first starts
taking it.
She said the dosage would move Acklin beyond minimal sedation towards moderate
sedation. Sims said moderate sedation is the stage where a person will fall
asleep, but can be awakened.
The defense has also argued Acklin was abused by his father growing up and that
should have introduced to the jury during his trial, that his trial attorneys
were compromised because Acklin's father paid them some money to represent his
son but he did not want abuse testimony raised.
Alabama Assistant Attorney General Jon Hayden established that Nick Acklin had
signed a memo insisting that the abuse defense not be raised during the trial.
Acklin was charged, along with Joey Wilson and Corey Johnson, in the fatal
shooting of four people on Sept. 25, 1996 and the wounding of two others at a
home on University Drive. The shootings followed a previous incident where
someone in the home had reported to the Madison County Sheriff's Department
that Wilson had stolen his cell phone.
Acklin and Wilson were both convicted and received death sentences in 1998.
Johnson, who did not fire a shot, was released from prison in 2011 after
serving a 15-year sentence on a felony murder charge.
Acklin's post-conviction appeal was filed in 2001, but has languished in the
court system for most of the past decade.
Wilson also has a post-conviction appeal pending in Madison County Circuit
Court.
(source: al.com)
KANSAS:
Many appeals possible in Carr brothers case, says DA
Next week's appeals in the cases of convicted Wichita murderers Jonathan and
Reginald Carr are the 1st of many anticipated before their death penalties, if
upheld, could reasonably be imposed, Sedgwick County District Attorney Marc
Bennett said Thursday.
And it could be years before every appeal available to the brothers is
exhausted.
"This is the very 1st appeal in this case, even though it is now some 12 years
old," Bennett said of the Carrs' appeals, which are scheduled to be heard
Tuesday by the Kansas Supreme Court.
"It takes a long time for these things to get into court. This isn't the last
appeal. If we win or the defendants win, it's not over with next week."
Arguments in Reginald's case start at 9 a.m.; Jonathan's will be heard at 1:30
p.m. Live video of the hearings will be streamed at kscourt.org.
Attorneys for each man will ask that his convictions and death penalty sentence
be overturned based on dozens of issues, including the trial court's refusal to
try the brothers separately.
The Carrs are also challenging the constitutionality of Kansas' death penalty
law.
Prosecutors from the Sedgwick County District Attorney's Office will argue to
uphold the lower court's decision.
Bennett said Thursday he's confident that the Carrs' attorneys "have done an
admirable job of raising the issues" in preparation of the appeals.
"I won't hazard a guess on how they are going to handle these issues," he said.
"All I can tell folks is that ... we have given the full measure of the
(D.A.'s) office to ensure that the best possible result could happen."
Appeals filed in 2002
Tuesday's hearings come more than 10 years after the brothers 1st filed their
appeals in November 2002.
A Sedgwick County jury found the brothers guilty of killing Jason Befort, Brad
Heyka, Aaron Sander and Heather Muller on Dec. 15, 2000, in soccer field near
K-96 and Greenwich after a home invasion. A woman who survived the attack ran
through snow to a nearby house and called 911.
Reginald Carr also was convicted of fatally shooting Ann Walenta during a
carjacking on Dec. 11, 2000.
The killings are among Wichita's most notorious crimes.
One of the earliest delays to Tuesday's hearings came in December 2004 when the
Kansas Supreme Court declared the state's death penalty unconstitutional, a
little more than a year after the brothers' trial. The move halted seven
capital-murder cases, including the Carrs'. The U.S. Supreme Court overturned
the ruling nearly 2 years later.
Reginald Carr's attorneys were granted 23 extensions before filing their
written brief in October 2009, also stalling the appeal process. Jonathan's
lawyers filed for 20 extensions before filing their written brief.
The Sedgwick County's District Attorney's Office followed with 8 requests for
extensions before filing its brief in Reginald Carr's appeal in October. It
requested 9 prior to filing a brief in Jonathan Carr's case last July.
Asked when the public could expect an execution if the Carrs lose their
appeals, Bennett said: "It will be years, many years, before we can reasonable
expect to see a death penalty verdict imposed."
"We file so few death penalty cases, in the first place, here - so few get get
past just the vetting process, so few then get convicted in the appellate loop
- (that) I don't know."
He added: "In Texas and Virginia where they have a more, frankly, robust death
penalty practice ... we know what it takes" to get from conviction to
execution.
Kansas reinstated its death penalty in 1994. Since then, no death sentence has
withstood appeal.
The state's last execution took place in 1965.
Months for ruling
It could take weeks or months - possibly more than a year, Bennett said - for
the Kansas Supreme Court to deliver its ruling on the Carrs' appeals.
If the justices rule the brothers were denied a fair trial, their convictions
can be set aside and the case sent back to Wichita for retrial.
If just their sentences are overturned, prosecutors could seek the death
penalty again, Bennett said, provided the court does not rule it
unconstitutional.
If both the convictions and sentences are upheld, another phase of appeals
begins.
"(They will file appeals) to the federal side of things, to the 10th Circuit in
Denver," Bennett said. "Ultimately they have the right to go to the United
States Supreme Court."
After that "collateral attacks on the convictions," such as claims of
ineffective counsel, start, he added. Those also are subject to appeals through
state and federal courts.
"We are at the 1st step of what will be a very long process," Bennett said the
Carr brothers' appeals to the Kansas Supreme Court.
"Even though 12 years have passed (since the killings) and people have come to
assume that the process has played itself out, we are at step one."
Public appellate defenders Sarah Ellen Johnson and Meryle Carver-Allmond are
representing Jonathan Carr on Tuesday. Debra Wilson and Reid Nelson will
represent Reginald Carr.
Sedgwick County Chief Deputy District Attorney Kim Parker and assistant D.A.
David Lowden will present the arguments for the state.
(source: The Wichita Eagle)
ARIZONA:
Arias wanted Milke as a neighbor in jail
They are maybe the 2 highest profile female criminals in Arizona. One of them
has been on death row. One of them may soon be going there -- and both of them
are going to be in court Friday.
Debra Milke was convicted of taking part in the murder of her young son more
than 20 years ago. She was recently released from prison and may be re-tried.
Jodi Arias is facing a re-trial in the sentencing phase of her murder case and
could take Milke's place on death row.
And there's another connection between the 2 women.
For a short time earlier this year, Milke was moved from Perryville Prison to
the Maricopa County Jail so she could attend court hearings in her case.
Arias found out about that and made efforts to get Milke in the cell right next
to her.
Milke was on Arizona's death row for over 2 decades. Arias may soon be headed
there, so maybe it's not that surprising to learn that when Milke was going
through new court hearings this year and was briefly put in the Maricopa County
Jail, Arias sent a request to jail administrators, according to the sheriff's
office. That request: Would they put Milke in the cell right next to her?
It's as close as you can get in this unit where women are housed one to a cell
and the only way to speak is through a small metal grate in the door.
The request was refused. A sheriff's office spokesperson releasing a statement
saying simply, "We don't allow inmates to pick their cellies.. this isn't a
hotel."
Why did Jodi want her so close?
"Maybe to get advice.. Debra has been through this before... What am I facing..
what are the lawyers going to do for me? Do I have any hope?" said Paul Huebl.
Huebl, a private investigator and former reporter who is set to testify in
Milke's case. Like Arias, Milke gave a controversial interview just after her
conviction.
"The day before she was sentenced to death, she gave me an exclusive interview
for Channel 10 right here, against her attorney's advice," he said.
But while Milke basically stayed silent in the decades since that interview,
Jodi continues to share her feelings, sell her artwork and respond to media
reports through her Twitter account.
Milke is now a free woman awaiting a new trial after a confession in her case
was thrown into doubt. The only way we've seen her is in this video on her
Facebook page, reuniting with her mother -- the 2 sharing a long embrace and
then posing for photos and a still picture inside the same house, holding a
flower.
She is not speaking publicly at all, but is happy she is free for now.
"She's enjoying her freedom.. she's enjoying learning about technology.. just
the changes that have happened in the last t decades since she's been locked
up," said Huebl.
And she's staying quiet until her case is settled. And even though she didn't
get to ask her in person, maybe it's advice Jodi might still take as she faces
the possibility of her own time on death row.
Both Arias and Milke will appear in court Friday. And both are crucial
hearings. We may find out if that questionable confession of Milke's will come
into a new trial and we may finally have a trial date for Arias' penalty phase.
(source: myfoxphoenix.com)
CALIFORNIA:
California Supreme Court Upholds Death Sentence, Rejects Challenge to
Felony-Murder Rule
The death sentence may be imposed in a case where the sole special circumstance
is that the defendant killed his victim during the course of a robbery, the
California Supreme Court ruled yesterday.
Justice Marvin Baxter, writing for a unanimous court, rejected all contentions
of error raised by George Lopez Contreras, sentenced to death in 1996 for the
murder of Saleh Ben Hassan in the market that Hassan and his wife owned near
Visalia. Among those was an argument that imposition of a death sentence based
on the robbery-murder special circumstance violates the Eighth Amendment
because it may result in the execution of someone who had no intent to kill.
Hassan was found shot to death, with two blasts from a shotgun, in late
December 1995. His wallet and handgun were missing.
Police and prosecutors put a case together against Contreras, based in large
part on the testimony of Artero Vallejo Jr. Vallejo was a friend of Contreras
and of Santos Pasillas, who was also implicated in the crime, and claimed that
within hours of the killings, the men admitted to him that they had committed
the robbery and that someone had been killed.
They also called Jose "Lupe" Valencia, who said he went to the market with
Contreras and Passilas and was waiting outside when he heard a gunshot.
Contreras, he said, later showed him the gun that had been taken from the
storekeeper and admitted being the shooter.
The defense attacked the witnesses' credibility and claimed that Contreras was
with his girlfriend, then Claudia Gutierrez - she and the defendant married
before the trial - and her sister and Contreras??? infant son close to the time
of the murder. They picked up the sister from the Visalia accounting firm where
she worked, Gutierrez and her sister testified.
In addition, Patricia Murillo - another sister of Gutierrez - and her husband
testified they were at the same office building, applying for a loan, and saw
Contreras and Gutierrez in the parking lot.
Prosecutors presented a rebuttal witness, Elisabeth Hernandez, the maternal
aunt of Contreras' child. She testified that Contreras' son could not have been
with him the day of the murder because he was living with his mother, the aunt,
and their mother at the time, and Contreras wasn't spending any time at all
with the child in that period.
Jurors found Contreras guilty of 1st degree murder with the robbery special
circumstance, and found that he personally used a firearm in the commission of
the crime. In the penalty phase, prosecutors presented evidence that he had
committed an armed assault, firing several shots, at the mother of his children
4 months before the murder.
The defense sought to portray Contreras as a dedicated husband and father whose
execution would devastate his wife. One of the witnesses was Tulare County
Sheriff Bill Wittman, who said he had known the Contreras family for about 10
years before the murder and that the defendant was a "good kid."
Jurors, however, returned a death penalty verdict, and Tulare Superior Court
Judge Patrick O'Hara pronounced the death sentence.
Baxter, writing for the high court, said the fact that a defendant may have
committed the underlying felony without intent to kill, or even without
"reckless indifference to human life," does not necessarily mean that capital
punishment is disproportionate to his personal culpability.
He distinguished Kennedy v. Louisiana (2008) 554 U.S. 407, in which the high
court held that the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments prohibited imposition of
the death penalty upon an adult male defendant for the violent rape of a child,
in a case where death neither resulted nor was intended.
"Contrary to what defendant claims, nothing in Kennedy...undermines any
decision of the United States Supreme Court or this court concerning the
circumstances under which a death sentence is allowed for felony murderers who
actually kill their victims," the justice wrote. "We discern no change in the
law supporting our conclusion that an actual killer need not, in defendant's
words, have 'a culpable state of mind with regard to the murder.'"
The evidence against Contreras, he noted, established that the defendant
obtained a shotgun the night before the murder, planned a robbery in which his
accomplices carried 2 other guns, shot the defendant twice - including once in
the back of the neck - and stole his wallet and gun.
The case is People v. Contreras, 13 S.O.S. 6290.
(source: Metropolitan News Company)
*****************
Death penalty decision looms in Forestville triple killing
A decision is expected soon on whether to seek the death penalty against a
Colorado man charged with killing 3 would-be business partners during a
marijuana deal near Forestville, prosecutors said Thursday. Detectives said
Mark Cappello, 46, of Central City, Colo., shot the 3 men execution-style Feb.
5 as they packaged marijuana for transport to the East Coast.
Cappello and 2 accomplices were later arrested and charged with murder, but
only Cappello is eligible for a death sentence if he's convicted at trial, now
set for April 4.
District Attorney Jill Ravitch, who has yet to pursue capital punishment in any
case since taking office in 2011, has not said what she plans to do.
But her decision is expected to be announced within the next month. A
preliminary hearing was completed in October and Cappello has retained a
permanent lawyer.
Judge Robert LaForge, who is overseeing the case, pressed prosecutors on the
issue Thursday. How the district attorney chooses to proceed will affect
defense strategies, trial scheduling and legal costs.
"A decision we're hoping is forthcoming within the next 30 days," Deputy
District Attorney Traci Carrillo said in court.
Ravitch is expected to consult her hand-picked death penalty committee as well
as the victims' families and defense attorneys in reaching a decision. The
process has been delayed in part because Cappello was deciding whether to
retain his private lawyer, Michael Meehan, or get a court-appointed attorney.
He announced Thursday he would keep Meehan.
Cappello and co-defendants Odin Dwyer, 38, also of Colorado, and Dwyer's
father, Francis Dwyer, 66, of New Mexico, face trial in one of the most violent
crimes to arise from the North Coast's lucrative marijuana trade.
According to preliminary hearing testimony, Cappello recruited the Dwyers to
drive with him to Sonoma County to pick up about 70 pounds of marijuana. The
plan was to drive it back across the country to New York, where it would be
sold at a profit.
But the plan unraveled at a house off Ross Station Road. Odin Dwyer told police
Cappello suddenly turned on two business partners and another man who was
supplying the pot, shooting them each once in the head.
Killed were Todd Klarkowski, 43, of Boulder, Colo., Richard Lewin, 46, of
Huntington, N.Y., and Raleigh Butler, 24, formerly of Sebastopol.
Odin Dwyer's statements to police could be used at trial, expected to run at
least 1 month. Also, Francis Dwyer could be asked to testify against Cappello
under a deal for reduced charges. The elder Dwyer was waiting at a Santa Rosa
hotel when the killings occurred, according to testimony.
Cappello's lawyer has called Odin Dwyer's account of the slayings "a fiction."
He said the Dwyers ultimately took the marijuana and were the only defendants
to profit from the killings.
(source: The Press Democrat)
*************************
Boulder man, 2 others in California set for April trial
The 3 men charged with murder in the February shooting deaths of 3 men --
including a Boulder resident -- in a pot deal gone wrong in California are set
to stand trial in April after their arraignments this morning.
According to officials with the Sonoma County District Attorney's Office, Mark
Cappello, 46, of Central City, Odin Dwyer, 38, of Black Hawk, and Francis
Dwyer, 66, of New Mexico are all scheduled for trial on April 4.
All 3 are facing 3 counts of murder, burglary and conspiracy for the shooting
deaths of Todd Klarkowski, 43, of Boulder; Richard Lewin, 46, of Huntington,
N.Y.; and Raleigh Butler, 24, or Sebastopol, Calif. on Feb. 5 at a house in
Forestville, Calif.
Police found the bodies of Klarkowski, Lewin and Butler each with a gunshot
wound to the head and investigators believe the three men were killed
execution-style in an alleged plot to move 70 to 80 pounds of pot from
California to Colorado.
Investigators believe Lewin and Klarkowski hired Cappello -- who, in turn,
brought in the Dwyers -- to drive to California, where the pot would be
purchased from Butler, and transport it back.
Police believe Cappello shot and killed Klarkowski, Lewin and Butler before he
and the Dwyers fled the state with the marijuana.
All three were later arrested in different states with help from surveillance
camera photos. Detectives recovered about 60 pounds of marijuana from the
Dwyers in a storage unit in Westminster, according to police.
Because he is believed to be the shooter, Cappello faces allegations of special
circumstances including lying in wait and multiple murders that could lead to
the death penalty if he is convicted at trial.
All 3 remain in custody in Sonoma County Jail.
(soruce: Daily Camera)
********
California Death Penalty Process Reform Advocates File Ballot Initiative
A coalition of California district attorneys, victims' rights groups and law
enforcement officials have submitted a ballot initiative to the state attorney
general's office that would overhaul the death row process.
Under the initiative, death penalty cases would no longer automatically be
appealed to the state supreme court - where they can sit unheard for years.
They would instead go first to state courts of appeal.
The measure's supporters say it would also end the housing of inmates in single
cells at San Quentin's death row.
"By allowing the department of corrections to place these inmates wherever is
best on an individual basis, we can avoid unnecessary expense," says Kent
Scheidegger with the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation.
But, opponents disagree. They say life sentences without parole are much less
wasteful and costly.
"Those people will never get out of prison," says Former Los Angeles District
Attorney Gil Garcetti. "And we can use those monies to both solve unsolved
murders and use the resources to prevent crimes by keeping kids in school."
If backers gather enough signatures, the measure could appear on next fall's
ballot.
(source: Capital Public Radio)
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