October 20
TEXAS----stays of 2 impending executions
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals halts execution of Kwame Rockwell----It was the
2nd time the appellate court has stopped an execution this month.
For the 2nd time this month, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has halted an
execution days before it was set to proceed.
Kwame Rockwell, 42, was set for execution Wednesday, Oct. 24. In a late appeal,
his lawyers asked the high court to stop his execution, claiming he was
incompetent for the punishment due to his schizophrenia. To be executed, an
inmate must be able to understand his death is imminent and link it to the
murder in which he was convicted.
Rockwell was convicted in the 2010 deaths of a gas station clerk and delivery
man in Fort Worth, according to court records. Rockwell and 2 other men robbed
the store and shot the 2 men, killing Daniel Rojas instantly and causing the
death of Jerry Burnett 10 days later.
Though it wasn't brought up at his trial, Rockwell was later diagnosed with
schizophrenia in prison. His attorneys raised the issue in Tarrant County early
this month, but the court ruled that Rockwell hadn't shown a substantial doubt
regarding his competency.
On Friday, a majority of the judges on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
disagreed, sending the case back to the trial court and ordering the judge to
appoint at least 2 mental health experts and re-examine Rockwell's competency
for execution. Three judges, Sharon Keller, Michael Keasler and Barbary Hervey,
voted to proceed with the execution.
On an early March morning in 2010, Rockwell and 2 other men, dressed in black
and ski masks, entered the Valero gas station next to Rockwell's used car
business, according to a court opinion. Rockwell had decided to rob the gas
station because he was in danger of losing his lease.
A co-defendant, Chance Smith - who is currently serving a 20-year sentence for
the crime - testified at trial that Rockwell was the brains behind the
operation and the one who was carrying the gun. He shot Burnett, the delivery
man, in an aisle, and then, after taking money from the register and office,
killed Rojas, the clerk, according to the opinion.
Rockwell was arrested in San Antonio 4 days later, when police barged into a
convenience store bathroom he had barricaded himself in and found him
threatening to kill himself with a broken piece of glass.
After he was convicted and sentenced to death in January 2012, the prison
system diagnosed Rockwell with schizophrenia, and his appellate attorneys
sought relief based on this new development. They claimed that Rockwell had
told his trial attorneys that he'd suffered from paranoia and hallucinations at
one point, but they thought it was a ruse and told him to "cease and desist the
crazy talk," according to a court filing.
The prosecuting office pointed out that Rockwell had earlier told his lawyers
that he had no mental health problems, and the courts rejected his appeal.
But competency for execution is a question that is raised when execution is
imminent since it relies on an inmate's current mental state, and Rockwell's
lawyers objected when the trial court ruled against stopping his scheduled
execution earlier this month. They pointed to a psychologist's sworn statement
that said within the last 3 months, Rockwell said he believed he was God and
that demons built the walls of his incarceration.
(source: Texas Tribune)
*******************************
Execution date called off for Fort Worth man convicted of murdering bus rider
A Tarrant County judge called off the upcoming execution of Emanuel Kemp, a
Fort Worth killer once deemed too insane to be put to death.
But his scheduled punishment was canceled not over concerns about his sanity,
but in light of a need for further DNA testing, according to court filings.
Kemp was scheduled to die on Nov. 7 for a decades-old crime. The high-school
dropout had been out of prison for just 5 days when he hijacked a public
transit bus at knifepoint in 1987, forcing the driver to drive around town
while he raped and murdered the only passenger, Johnnie Mae Gray.
The 34-year-old died from nine stab wounds to the chest and throat according to
Texas prison records. The driver was stabbed in the neck but lived.
Kemp was arrested three days later and sent to death row the following year
after a whirlwind 6-day trial.
In the years after his conviction, Kemp was diagnosed with paranoid
schizophrenia, according to his attorney, Greg Westfall.
"He has been very psychotic to entirely utterly out there since about 1990,"
Westfall said.
By the mid-90s, 1 court deemed Kemp incompetent for execution, though a higher
court later reversed that decision after years of medication.
Since then, his attorneys raised claims of bad lawyering, violations of due
process, questions about jury selection and denial of funds to get mental
health experts.
After he lost in federal court in the early 2000s, according to Westfall, the
Tarrant County District Attorney's Office under another administration agreed
not to seek another death date - so the decision to schedule a November
execution came as a surprise to defense counsel.
"It was agreed that he was too insane to execute," Westfall said earlier this
year. "Since then, the leadership there has changed and now they have sought an
execution date. It was really out of the blue."
But on Friday, the trial court greenlit an order withdrawing the execution date
"so that matters related to his Motion for Forensic DNA Testing Can be fully
litigated," according to court filings.
The state, according the paperwork notes, has agreed to the motion.
Neither Westfall nor the Tarrant County District Attorney's Office could be
reached Monday for comment.
The canceled execution is now the 2nd death date called off from Tarrant County
in the past week.
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals stayed an October death date scheduled for
Juan Segundo, who was sent to death row in 2005 for the cold case murder of
11-year-old Vanessa Villa. The order opens the door to investigate claims that
he's too intellectually disabled to be put to death.
(source: Houston Chronicle)
***************************
Executions under Greg Abbott, Jan. 21, 2015-present----37
Executions in Texas: Dec. 7, 1982----present-----555
Abbott#--------scheduled execution date-----name------------Tx. #
38---------Nov. 14----------------Robert Ramos------------556
39---------Dec. 4-----------------Joseph Garcia-----------557
40---------Dec. 11----------------Alvin Braziel, Jr.------558
41---------Jan. 15----------------Blaine Milam------------559
42---------Jan. 30----------------Robert Jennings---------560
43---------Feb. 28----------------Billy Wayne Coble-------561
(sources: TDCJ & Rick Halperin)
*************************
TX Supreme Court reverses course, will hear case over execution drug supplier
secret
"Texas Supreme Court reverses course, will hear case over whether state can
keep execution drug supplier secret" was first published by The Texas Tribune,
a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans - and engages
with them - about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
In June, it looked like Texas would have to name a pharmacy that had supplied
the state with execution drugs. But with a Texas Supreme Court reversal on
Friday, that decision is now up in the air.
This summer, the high court declined to review a Austin-based 3rd Court of
Appeals decision that found the Texas Department of Criminal Justice must
provide identifying information for an execution drug supplier. But the state
requested a rehearing, and on Friday, the justices granted it.
The case is now on hold until after oral arguments on Jan. 23.
The lawsuit represents an ongoing battle over the secrecy that surrounds Texas'
execution drugs as other states struggle to keep lethal doses in stock.
Brought forward in 2014 by three Texas death penalty lawyers, the suit sought
the name of a pharmacy that provided compounded pentobarbital, the sole drug
currently used in Texas executions. The suit was filed after Republican Gov.
Greg Abbott, then the attorney general, said the state could withhold
identifying information of drug suppliers because the pharmacies faced “real
harm.” Previously, he had said in three rulings that the information was
public.
The death row lawyers have said they requested the information to ensure
potency and purity of the drugs used to put their clients to death, citing drug
scarcity and botched executions. In the same year as the lawsuit was filed,
several states gained national attention for grizzly executions using new,
experimental drug combinations.
"This is the gravest task that the state carries out, and the Supreme Court is
giving it due consideration given the seriousness of the issue," said Maurie
Levin, one of the lawyers named in the lawsuit, of the Friday decision. "I
trust that the court will uphold the principals of transparency and open
government that are the foundation of this litigation."
Before the decision on Friday, Texas had lost the lawsuit at every point in the
court process. Though the 2015 Texas Legislature passed a law that made secret
any identifying information of those involved in executions, including drug
suppliers, the law was not retroactive. It's unclear whether the 2014 supplier
is the same pharmacy that provided drugs most recently to the state in June.
The department claimed in its last-ditch request for a rehearing that revealing
the identity of its supplier could endanger the pharmacy as well as the
existence of the death penalty nationwide. In a plea for the Texas Supreme
Court to reconsider its June decision, the state said the high court's denial
had caused a pharmacy that had provided drugs to the state to say in an
anonymous affidavit that it would no longer conduct business with Texas
Department of Criminal Justice if its identity was revealed. It's unknown if
the anonymous pharmacy is the state's current supplier.
"This scenario confirms the U.S. Supreme Court's recent warning on this issue,"
wrote Texas Solicitor General Scott Keller, referring to a 2015 decision by
Justice Samuel Alito on lethal injection drugs. "Death-penalty opponents have
created 'practical obstacle[s]' to carrying out the death penalty by
'pressur[ing] pharmaceutical companies to refuse to supply the drugs used to
carry out death sentences.'"
But according to the lower appellate court's ruling in 2017, the state needs to
show that the disclosure of such information would create a substantial threat
of physical harm - not economic harm or unwanted attention - if it wants to
withhold the information. The court emphasized it is not the role of the court
to focus on threats of harm to "privacy or economic interests."
The death penalty lawyers snapped back at the state in their response filed
last month, claiming Texas' claims of threats to the death penalty were
overblown. They said there has never been any violence toward execution drug
suppliers, and emphasized that any decision by this court would only be limited
to naming the 2014 supplier, since the 2015 shield law would keep secret any
suppliers after that.
"Guess what? Contrary to the tack taken in the motion for rehearing, the sky is
not falling," the filing said.
(source: The Texas Tribune)
LOUISIANA:
Murder appeal denied; Reeves remains on death row
The state Supreme Court has denied an appeal for a man found guilty and
sentenced to death for the murder of 4-year-old Mary Jean Thigpen in 2001.
Jason Manuel Reeves, 43, was convicted in 2004 of abducting Thigpen from Moss
Bluff on Nov. 1, 2001, and then raping her before stabbing her 16 times and
slicing her neck.
His 1st trial began Oct. 27, 2003, but was declared a mistrial after the jury
was unable to meet a unanimous verdict on the 1st-degree murder charge.
Reeves' 2nd murder trial ended with jurors finding him guilty on Nov. 4, 2004.
He was sentenced to death by legal injection on Dec. 10, 2004.
Judge Mike Canaday signed a death warrant in 2012, but the defense appealed,
saying Reeves suffered from an intellectual disability. Canaday ruled in May
2015 against that assertion. In April 2016, the state's Supreme Court upheld
that ruling and Reeves' death sentence.
Last year, Canaday heard motions in state district court that centered on
Reeves' statement that he had received ineffective counsel.
The proceedings were contentious at times as prosecutors clashed with the
defense over various issues.
"Your client confessed to this murder, did he not?" asked then-prosecutor Carla
Sigler to defense attorney Kerry Cuccia of the Capital Defense Project.
Cuccia fired back, "Yes, after 3 days of intense interrogations."
Sigler continued, asking Cuccia, "Your theory was degraded DNA, correct?"
"No, ma'am," said Cuccia. "It isn't a theory. It's fact; it's science."
Sigler, who has since left the Calcasieu Parish District Attorney's Office to
go into private practice, shook her head before asking, "Are you suggesting
this DNA evidence was planted or faked?"
"That could be one reasonable conclusion," Cuccia said. "All I'm saying is that
there is reasonable doubt in this case. Especially when it concerns where this
DNA sample even came from."
Sigler also questioned state district Judge Ron Ware, who had worked as an
attorney on Reeves' case for his 2nd trial, asking him how he and his
co-counsel prepared for the case.
"We had 12 boxes of materials from the 1st trial, transcripts, and many things
to go through," Ware said. "I read through all of those, spoke and visited with
Jason Reeves from time to time, and tried to process everything. But I had
other big cases going on at the same time. I didn't have adequate time to fully
prepare for the case. My time was compressed."
But Ware did tell Sigler he felt prosecutors had a strong case against Reeves.
In denying this latest appeal by the defendant, the state Supreme Court said,
in part, "Once again, Reeves improperly attempts to re-litigate an issue upon
which he has already sought review." Reeves had previously raised the issue of
what he called ineffective counsel. He has continued to push for a new trial
and to appeal his conviction and death sentence.
The court also said, "Reeves contends penalty-phase counsel failed to discover
and present evidence and additional expert witnesses to help explain the
effects of his difficult childhood, and the history of sexual abuse he
suffered."
The court found that Reeves "did not disclose to his penalty phase counsel any
of the additional sexual abuse revealed in these newly-discovered documents,
meaning that the best potential source of this information proved most
unhelpful to his own defense. As a result, it is not clear that counsel failed
to engage in a reasonable mitigation investigation."
Reeves has been on death row at Angola since 2004.
(source: americanpress.com)
*********************
A Louisiana cry for life and call for death
14 years ago this week, Derrick Todd Lee received the death penalty in
Louisiana. He was the state's most notorious and prolific serial killer. I was
there in the courtroom when the verdict was handed down.
It was a cool Tuesday evening, and I was leaving a reception for former
congressman Billy Tauzin at the Old State capital in downtown Baton Rouge.
Billy and I had fought many battles together when we both served in the
Louisiana legislature back in the 1970s. He had fought and won a separate
confrontation with cancer, and a number of Billy's friends all turned out to
celebrate a full life he had led.
I headed to my parked car about a block away across the street from the East
Baton Rouge Courthouse. It was 8 o'clock in the evening, and as I approach my
car, I could see numerous television lights and a large crowd on the front
steps of the courthouse.
"What's going on?" I ask one of the reporters I knew. "The jury's still
deliberating whether Derrick Todd Lee lives or dies," he told me. "Will they
come up with the verdict tonight?" I asked. "It's getting late." He nodded and
said: "That's what we hear. They're supposed to push on till they make a
decision. They'll want to go home," he answered.
I walked into the courthouse and took the elevator up to the 6th floor to the
courtroom of the presiding judge, Richard Anderson. Sheriff's deputies were
everywhere and security was tight. I went through the metal detector and walked
into a packed courtroom.
Col. Greg Phares was in charge of the numerous deputies surrounding the walls
in the courtroom. Angola prison warden Burl Cain and I talked for a while.
"Whatever happens, I've got a full night ahead of me. He will go to Angola
tonight for the rest of his life, however long that is," the warden mused.
About then, the bailiff quieted the courtroom and the jury filed in. The
process was short. A signed verdict sent to the clerk, who read out the
decision. Derrick Todd Lee should be put to death. Then tears and sobs from the
victims' families, from Lee's relatives, even the district attorney's wife
wiped away a few tears now that the ordeal was over.
So should Derrick Todd Lee die? There was an overwhelming community feeling
that, yes, he should. The guy is charged with killing 7 women. And there may be
more. If you were looking for the right poster face for the death penalty, you
can't do better than Lee.
Putting aside the arguments for opposing the taking of anyone's life, what
possible reason would there be not to execute him? One is money. It costs on
average 4 to 5 times more to invoke capital punishment than it does to put him
away for life. The costs of appeal, including attorney's fees that are almost
always paid by the state, often run several million dollars. It's much cheaper
to stick him in a cell and spend a few dollars a day to feed him.
And you can make a pretty good argument that if you want to put someone through
hell, stick them in a maximum-security prison where he will either be
brutalized by the prison population, or confined in solitary where he lives
almost like an animal in total boredom. Some would argue this punishment is
worse than the death penalty.
But we demand an eye for an eye. Oh, it may take a decade or more. But the odds
were, that one day Lee would die. John McKeithen, Edwin Edwards and Buddy Romer
each told me the toughest decision they ever faced as governor was whether to
let a condemned man die. It was the 1st decision Roemer had to make the day he
was sworn in. But they always let it happen.
2 different people that night at 2 different events. One a celebration of a
full and continuing life. The other, just a block away, a decision to take away
a life.
The challenge, of course, is to live a life of dignity. To see your own
existence as a heightened example of universal experience - a life that is
fulfilling in a way that is somehow larger-than-life. On that night 14 years
ago, it was obvious that 1 succeeded and 1 failed.
(source: Jim Brown is a Louisiana legislator, Secretary of State and Insurance
Commissioner----bayoubuzz.com)
TENNESSEE:
Zagorski reprieve ends Monday, but execution questions remain
At the stroke of midnight Sunday going into Monday, a 10-day execution reprieve
ends for Edmund Zagorski.
Governor Haslam issued the reprieve last week for the death row inmate
convicted of killing 2 Middle Tennessee men in 1983.
Zagorski was within hours of execution on Oct. 11 when Haslam used the powers
of his office to issue a 10-day reprieve.
It followed the death row inmate's request that he be executed by the electric
chair earlier in the week, but the state argued the choice, which death row
inmates are given in Tennessee, came too late.
At the same time, there was a flurry of court filings back and forth all the
way to the U-S Supreme court that included lingering questions about the drugs
used for lethal injection.
The governor told reporters Thursday the idea of Zagorski's reprieve was to
"step back and make sure everyone is prepared in the right way."
Mr. Haslam was asked if the Tennessee Department of Corrections was ready to
use the electric chair last week.
He said department Commissioner Tony Parker told him "if you want us to do this
tonight...we can do that."
The governor then decided on the reprieve, but he says it was not a case of
reconsidering Zagorski's execution.
"It was just when the method changed...you are always open, listening," added
the governor. "The purpose of the reprieve was not to reconsider the
circumstance."
Still in effect is a temporary order from a federal court in Nashville
preventing Zagorkski's execution by lethal injection.
The state is expected to ask the state supreme court for a new execution date
for Zagorski once the governor's reprieve expires next week.
(source: WKRN news)
ARKANSAS:
Mark Chumley Found Guilty of Capital Murder for Death of NWA Woman
A local man has been found guilty for his involvement in the murder of a
Northwest Arkansas woman.
Mark Chumley, 49, was convicted of capital murder for being an accomplice to a
capital murder for the 2015 death of Victoria Annabeth Davis.
The state is seeking the death penalty.
Davis was held captive for hours before she was beaten to death by Chumley and
4 others.
The victim's husband already pleaded guilty to the same charge and was
sentenced to 37 years in prison.
The 3 other defendants are being held in the Washington County Detention
Center.
Chumley first went to trial in May, but a mistrial was declared.
(source: KNWA news)
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