Oct. 19
GEORGIA----impending execution
Georgia execution would mark milestones in death penalty dealings
Should the state of Georgia execute Gregory Paul Lawler as planned Wednesday
night, it will mark a milestone in at least 2 different ways.
Lawler was sentenced to death for the 1997 killing of Atlanta police officer
John Sowa. His execution, set for 7 p.m. Wednesday, would be the 7th in Georgia
in 2016. That would make 2 more than in 2015 and make Georgia the only state in
the nation accelerating the rate of executions year over year. That's the 1st
milestone.
As for the 2nd, Lawler's execution would tie Georgia with Texas for the number
of executions this year. Texas generally leads the nation.
Richard Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center,
said this is because something new is happening in Texas that isn't happening
in Georgia.
"The state courts in Georgia are not granting hearings to consider evidence
that there was police misconduct or prosecutorial misconduct or junk science
that was being used," Dunham said.
State courts in Texas are considering those factors now that state law allows
for it. The law was changed after a number of high profile exonerations in
death row cases. Executions in Texas have been cut in half since 2015, as some
inmates have won stays of execution.
Lawler's attorneys argued for clemency to Georgia's parole board on the basis
of his recent autism diagnosis, according to court briefs. Were that evidence
presented in court, the resulting decision would be public record. The parole
board, appointed by the governor, is not bound by law to share details of its
findings. The board denied Lawler's clemency request Tuesday.
Despite the increase in the number of executions in Georgia, the handing of
down of death sentences by juries continues to slow. Lawler's conviction in
2000 came at the tail end of the peak for capital punishment in Georgia
following its reinstatement in the 1970s.
Until 2000, the state averaged 10 death sentences a year. Since 2000 that
number has been closer to 2 a year. There were no death sentences handed down
in 2015, which was the 6th year Georgia juries could choose life without the
possibility of parole instead of a death sentence.
(source: macon.com)
FLORIDA:
Lawmakers to deal again with death penalty sentencing
Florida lawmakers will attempt again to fix the state's death-penalty
sentencing due to to court rulings finding that the process is
unconstitutional.
Incoming Senate President Joe Negron, who will take over as head of the Senate
after the November elections, said on Tuesday that lawmakers will have to
redress the issue of jury unanimity when they reconvene next year.
"It's going to be a unanimous verdict requirement going forward," Negron,
R-Stuart, said.
The court on Friday ruled that a statute was unconstitutional "because it
requires that only 10 jurors recommend death as opposed to the constitutionally
required unanimous, 12-member jury."
Last week's rulings left unanswered questions about the impact of the court
decisions on Florida's 400 Death Row inmates. The state Supreme Court is
expected to address the issue of retroactivity in other cases.
But Friday's decisions in 2 seminal cases made clear that the Florida justices
believe a unanimous recommendation is required for the death penalty to be
imposed.
Of 31 states that have the death penalty, Florida until Friday was one of just
three that did not require unanimous jury recommendations for sentences of
death. Delaware's high court has put that state's death penalty on hold
following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in January in the Hurst case.
There was "no ambiguity" in the Florida Supreme Court's ruling regarding the
jury recommendation, Negron said.
"There's no gray area. There's no confusion. It's very clear. I think we should
pass a constitutional statute," he said.
Florida's death penalty has essentially been on hold since January's 8-1 U.S.
Supreme Court decision, which found that the state's system was an
unconstitutional violation of the Sixth Amendment right to trial by jury.
That decision said Florida's system gave too much power to judges, instead of
juries, in sentencing people to death.
The rulings Friday by the Florida Supreme Court dealt with an issue that the
U.S. Supreme Court did not directly address --- the issue of jury unanimity in
sentencing recommendations.
Negron said lawmakers do not need to rush to deal with the matter during a
special session but could resolve it during the 2017 regular legislative
session that begins in March.
But some lawyers were hoping that the Legislature would address the issue
earlier.
In Ocala on Monday, Circuit Judge Robert Hodges put on hold the penalty portion
of a murder trial, saying the court needed direction from the Legislature
before proceeding.
"The effect of Perry is we have a bunch of cases that are now in limbo," said
5th Judicial Circuit Public Defender Mike Graves, whose office represents
Kelvin Lee Coleman and who argued Coleman's case Monday. A jury late last week
found Coleman guilty of 2 counts of 1st-degree murder.
Attorney General Pam Bondi is expected to ask the Florida Supreme Court for a
rehearing in either the Perry or Hurst cases. But court observers say it is
highly unlikely the justices will grant a rare rehearing, especially given the
5-2 rulings in both cases.
If the court does not act, the Legislature must, lawyers on both sides agree.
"Somebody's going to have to do something," said Brad King, state attorney in
the 5th Judicial Circuit.
Some judges are holding off on the sentencing phases of capital trials while
proceeding with the portions of the trials to determine guilt or innocence.
But Friday's ruling on unanimity changes the landscape regarding jury selection
because defense lawyers will now have to convince only a single juror to grant
what is known as "mercy," a shift that could have a significant impact. Defense
lawyers want the courts to pause until the unanimity issue is settled.
"While we don't know the final outcome of what the rules or laws will be, how
are we expected to question a jury about it?" Graves, the public defender,
said.
The issue of unanimity was a flashpoint during this year's legislative session
as lawmakers grappled with changing the sentencing scheme after the U.S.
Supreme Court decision. The Senate originally supported a proposal requiring
unanimous recommendations for death to be imposed, but ceded to a House plan
--- pushed by prosecutors, including Bondi --- favoring the 10-2
recommendations.
"Do we understand that we're responsible for that? Yes. We understand that. We
understood that when we made that decision. But we thought that it was a
position we should take in order to represent the victims' families and try to
do the best we could for that group of people," said prosecutor King, whose
circuit includes Citrus, Hernando, Marion, Lake and Sumter counties. "Yes.
We're responsible for that. As much as anybody else is, it was us."
(source: actionnewsjax.com)
CALIFORNIA:
California Attorney General's Office Lies To Appeals Court In OCDA Cover Up
Inadvertently underscoring the warped condition of our criminal justice system,
Deputy Attorney General Theodore M. Cropley entered a packed California Court
of Appeal hearing on Oct. 17 and lied in the pending death penalty case of
People v. Scott Dekraai.
According to Cropley, prosecutors in the Orange County district attorney's
office (OCDA) had "no knowledge" of a valuable, hidden sheriff's records system
at the core of the ongoing jailhouse informant scandal that's won national
embarrassment and calls for a U.S. Department of Justice probe.
Like a skilled CIA operative trained to beat a lie detector test, the deputy AG
casually repeated the falsehood at least 5 times during a 20-minute
presentation to a 3-justice panel - Kathleen O'Leary, Richard Fybel and Raymond
Ikola - in hopes of convincing them to overturn the historic recusal of Tony
Rackauckas and his OCDA from Dekraai.
In March 2015, Superior Court Judge Thomas M. Goethals, a former prosecutor,
booted OCDA from the case after watching law enforcement officials hide what
we'd eventually learn was the sheriff's TRED system documenting inmate
movements and commit perjury to cover up the existence of the records.
Sheriff Sandra Hutchens poses dumbfounded about why anybody would care about
the TRED evidence, but it doesn't just contain bureaucratic gobbledygook. As
we've documented on these pages during recent years, the contents provide proof
of illegal government operations designed to aid prosecutors win cases. In
1964, the U.S. Supreme Court banned law enforcement officials from questioning
pre-trial inmates after they've been charged with a crime and who have legal
representation. Trampling that constitutional prohibition, officials secretly
employed jailhouse informants, relocating them to cells near targets and
tasking the snitches with tricking inmates into making incriminating
statements. To introduce that information in court, prosecutors then claimed
the snitches accidentally obtained such evidence without government aid.
Dekraai's defense lawyer, Assistant Public Defender Scott Sanders, unraveled
the scam.
By ignoring key facts, Cropley sculpted a counter-reality to that undisputable
history. In one of his briefs to the appellate justices, the deputy AG insisted
there is "no evidence" that "even remotely demonstrates" OCDA prosecutors have
in the past or will in the future abandon their ethical obligation to seek
justice rather than merely stockpile wins. He also labeled the "possibility of
future misconduct" in Dekraai as nothing but "rank speculation." In his world,
prosecutors didn't know about TREDs and thus can't be expected to have demanded
their surrender or to have realized deputies were lying under oath about their
existence.
Oops: This week, the attorney general's office tried to absolve OC prosecutors
from the snitch scandal by claiming they were unaware of controversial TRED
jail records, but the DA's office entered the above TRED document into evidence
at a 2011 trial.
But the deputy AG's assertion is demonstratively false. Court records obtained
by the Weekly show that high-ranking prosecutors tied to the snitch scandal -
for example, Ebrahim Baytieh and Keith Bogardus - not only possessed TREDs in
the 2011 trial stemming from the gruesome jailhouse murder of inmate John Derek
Chamberlain, but also introduced them into evidence (see above, Exhibit 70) and
questioned a deputy on the record about the contents. (According to Sanders,
deputies shared TREDs in a few cases where an entry helped prosecutors win, an
ugly reality that he says means the local criminal justice system can't be
trusted.)
Denying knowledge of the TREDs is problematic for the DA and, of course,
Cropley. Rackauckas has sent Baytieh on public relations missions to
strenuously deny all OCDA culpability in the snitch scandal and to attack
critics like Sanders and Erwin Chemerinsky, the founding dean of UC Irvine's
School of Law. Bogardus appeared formally as an OCDA representative in Dekraai
where the deputies lied about the existence of TREDs. With Goethals observing,
Baytieh and Bogardus remained silent when colleagues Dan Wagner and Howard
Gundy mocked Sanders as a nut case who'd concocted a jailhouse snitch scandal
that was nothing more than a wild conspiracy theory.
Who else remained noticeably silent after it was clear that Seth Tunstall and
Ben Garcia, 2 of the key deputies running the jailhouse informant program,
committed perjury as Goethals detailed: Cropley, who sat in the front row
behind his prosecutorial pals as the scandal unfolded.
(Rackauckas, Hutchens and Cropley - all well-paid government employees sworn to
public service as a top priority - have refused to punish the offending
officers.)
In the past, law enforcement officials here have misled the appellate court by
taking advantage of the unwritten presumption that cops don't lie, but based on
their keen questions at this week's Dekraai hearing, the justices seem alert to
potential trickery.
Presiding Justice O'Leary, for example, observed it's puzzling that OCDA
officials benefited for years from the sheriff's jailhouse informant program
and simultaneously claim to be clueless about how they got so lucky.
Justice Richard Fybel rejected Cropley's contention that Goethals' recusal
order was a knee-jerk emotional response rather than a legally reasonable
conclusion that Rackauckas' office has proven it can't be independent from
cheating law enforcement partners inside the sheriff's department.
Fybel also asked the most penetratingly insightful question of the hearing: If
sheriff's deputies "deceived" prosecutors, too, where is the evidence that OCDA
pressed them for the TREDs when they realized they'd been duped?
"I didn't see any evidence in the record that the DA's office ever asked the
sheriff's department for the documents," the justice added.
Cropley stuck to his false narrative, responding, "It's difficult to ask for
something of which you had no knowledge of."
He insisted the recusal was unfair to Rackauckas' office because "the DA is now
in the best position to insure compliance" with Goethals' court orders.
On the other hand, Deputy Public Defender Scott Van Camp told the appellate
panel that the prosecutor's office "showed it would do nothing" in response to
cheating deputies, California Attorney General's Office Lies To Appeals Court
In OCDA Cover Up (3)
The underlying notion of Fybel's question annihilates the presentation that
OCDA officials have aggressively obeyed ethical rules.
As recently as a Sept. 22 hearing in Orange County's central justice center, a
stunned Goethals asked government officials why they continue to disobey his
January 2013 discovery order in Dekraai.
"When should I expect full compliance with my lawful orders?" the judge asked.
"3 1/2 years isn't enough time?"
Deputy DA Wagner, the lead Dekraai prosecutor, and Elizabeth Pejeau, a deputy
county counsel representing Sheriff Hutchens, hemmed and hawed. Both admitted
additional records hidden from Sanders would be forthcoming but didn't give
themselves a deadline as they continue to demand that the state execute the
defendant. Goethals scheduled a follow-up hearing for next week.
Meanwhile, the appellate justices will determine within 90 days if Goethals'
recusal order was legally permissible and, if so, the AG's office then must
take over prosecution duties during the penalty phase of Dekraai.
(source: OC Weekly)
OREGON:
Pathologist alleges toddler died of infection in Roden death penalty trial
The defense of accused killer Randy Roden presented a key medical witness
Tuesday as it tries to prove a flesh-eating bacterial infection killed
2-year-old Evangelina Wing.
Roden, 28, has been charged with murdering his ex-girlfriend Dorothy Wing's
daughter and abusing her 2 sons, now 3 and 7, in a Seaside apartment the 2
shared 2 years ago. He faces the death penalty if convicted.
The couple called 911 on Dec. 20, 2014, after discovering Wing's daughter
unresponsive. Her 2 sons were also found injured and taken into protective
custody. Prosecutors believe the children were tortured, burned, bitten and
caged in the months before Evangelina Wing's death, in one of the worst cases
of child abuse in Clatsop County's history.
Wing, who pleaded guilty in January to 1st-degree manslaughter and 2 counts of
1st-degree criminal mistreatment, testified last week. In exchange for
testifying against Roden, she will receive a plea deal that brings her prison
sentence down from a life sentence to approximately 15 years.
An autopsy found the toddler died of battered child syndrome with blunt force
trauma to her head. But Roden's attorney, Conor Huseby, argues that Dorothy
Wing caused her daughter's death through abuse, along with complications from
the flesh-eating virus methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus infection,
which was found on the children. Huseby has sought to have the case dismissed
because signs of the infection were never investigated.
On Tuesday, Huseby called Dr. Janice Ophoven, a Minnesota-based pediatric
forensic pathologist hired by defense attorneys to provide expert testimony.
Ophoven argued that while Evangelina Wing sustained abuse and neglect, she
ultimately succumbed to septicemia, in which a bacterial infection enters the
blood stream.
Burns or lesions?
Ophoven disagreed with the state's autopsy, arguing that some of the marks on
Evangelina Wing and her brothers identified as burns were actually lesions from
impetigo, a highly contagious skin infection that causes red sores.
"In my opinion, these children were literally covered with these open sores
that were infected with bacteria," she said.
If bacteria enters the blood stream from such sores, she said, the toxins they
create can inhibit the body's ability to maintain blood pressure.
"Children will eventually get to a condition known as irreversible shock,"
Ophoven said.
The shock causes the body to lose consciousness, she said, and stops
circulation to the brain. "Once you enter irreversible shock, you're probably
going to be gone within a couple hours or so."
Ophoven said the autopsy should have considered infectious causes of death,
taking more samples from the lesions and the heart muscles, on which abscesses
were found.
Is this trauma?
Under questioning by Deputy District Attorney Ron Brown, who is leading the
prosecution, Ophoven said her last autopsy was in 2009. She said her last
autopsy in a suspected child homicide was in the 1990s. Brown also pointed to
an autopsy performed by Ophoven in the 1980s in which she concluded a child
died of natural causes, before the mother later admitted that her boyfriend
suffocated the child.
Brown led Ophoven through a series of photos showing the marks on the bodies of
Evangelina Wing and her 2 brothers, asking her if it looked like signs of
trauma. Ophoven said she agreed there was child abuse, and that trauma played a
part in Evangelina Wing's injuries and death. But she maintained that the toxic
bacteria entering the blood stream and leading to irreversible shock caused her
death.
There should have been an infectious autopsy performed, she said, looking at
things under a microscope instead of with the naked eye. "You have to look at
it scientifically. We (forensic pathologists) are not supposed to speculate."
(source: Daily Astorian)
USA:
Q&A: the Sampson murder trial
The death-penalty trial of admitted serial killer Gary Lee Sampson began Sept.
14 in federal court in Boston with the process of selecting a jury. Opening
statements could occur as soon as next week. Here's an explainer on the most
high-stakes trial in Massachusetts.
What is the case about?
Sampson, 57, a drifter from Abington, said he carjacked and killed 19-year-old
Jonathan Rizzo and Philip McCloskey, 69, in separate incidents during a violent
spree in July 2001. During the same week, he also killed Robert "Eli" Whitney,
58, in New Hampshire. Although he admitted to the crimes, a jury must decide
whether he should be sentenced to death or life in prison without parole.
Why does he face the death penalty?
Massachusetts does not have a death penalty, but the United States court system
does for certain crimes, such as carjacking resulting in death. Federal
prosecutors chose in 2001 to seek capital punishment based on the severity of
the crimes.
Why is the case happening now?
Sampson pleaded guilty in 2003 and a federal jury condemned him to death that
same year. After a lengthy appeals process, a federal judge vacated that jury's
decision, however, after finding that 1 of the jurors lied during a screening
process. An appeals court upheld the decision. Federal prosecutors agreed to
seek the death penalty in a new trial.
(source: The Boston Globe)
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