June 20
TEXAS----new execution date
Randall Mays has received an execution date for October 16; it should be
considered serious.
(source: MC/RH)
*************************************
Executions under Greg Abbott, Jan. 21, 2015-present----43
Executions in Texas: Dec. 7, 1982----present-----561
Abbott#--------scheduled execution date-----name------------Tx. #
44---------July 31----------------Ruben Gutierrez---------562
45---------Aug. 15----------------Dexter Johnson----------563
46---------Aug. 21----------------Larry Swearingen--------564
47---------Sept. 4----------------Billy Crutsinger--------565
48---------Sept. 10---------------Mark Anthony Soliz------566
49---------Oct. 2-----------------Stephen Barbee----------567
50---------Oct. 16----------------Randall Mays------------568
(sources: TDCJ & Rick Halperin)
**********************
Houston judge questions capability of federal prosecutor in San Jacinto County
death penalty case
A federal judge publicly rebuked a Justice Department prosecutor in a Houston
death penalty case over allegations the Washington, D.C., lawyer hid
exculpatory evidence in another capital case in Indiana federal court.
U.S. District Judge Lynn N. Hughes, who is known to air his feelings candidly
about government employees and policies, made his opinion of Assistant U.S.
Attorney James D. Peterson clear Wednesday during a discovery hearing. “I think
that America could find a better representative of its values and ideals than
Mr. Peterson,” Hughes told another prosecutor on the case. It was the second
time in the past year the judge has clashed in court with Peterson.
The judge’s admonition came during a hearing for James Wayne Ham, of San
Jacinto County, who faces a capital trial on charges that in 2013 he fatally
shot Eddie “Marie” Youngblood, a 52-year-old Coldspring postal worker and then
burned her remains.
Ham’s defense lawyers say that amid a dysfunctional culture in their unit,
Peterson and two other Justice Department lawyersdemonstrated a pattern of
misconduct in other death penalty cases around the country that warrants
further scrutiny of their work regarding Ham. If the judge orders the release
of additional documents, the defense team will assess whether they believe
evidence that weighs in favor of Ham’s innocence was withheld.
The lead defense lawyer in the Houston case, Kimberly C. Stevens, also noted
that Peterson’s Texas Bar license has been suspended since 1996 for failure to
pay his dues. She told the judge that becoming ineligible due to an
administrative suspension constitutes a violation of the federal and local
rules. Peterson has an active law license in Virginia and could appear in
federal court without a Texas license, according to the state bar association.
Evidence presented in a civil suit in Connecticut that Peterson and Steve
Mellin, another prosecutor previously tied to the Ham case, had destroyed or
failed to produce evidence favorable to the defense in other federal death
penalty cases. And a declaration by Amanda Haines, a former co-worker, in an
Indiana death penalty case stated that she had resigned due to ethical breaches
she had reported that were never addressed by management.
Haines, the aggrieved ex-prosecutor, said in a sworn statement that Peterson
“committed a fundamental error in judgment” and a violated protocol in the
Indiana case when he interviewed dozens of witnesses who had evidence favorable
to the defendant without law enforcement present.
Peterson then compounded the error, in her view, by destroying his notes and
then denying he had disposed of them. Haines said that attorney Mellin, who
worked on the Ham case in Houston from 2013 to 2014, had missed deadlines and
failed to review documents or identify exculpatory Brady material boxes of
evidence in the Indiana case.
Justice lawyers said under oath that Peterson’s department was riddled with
personnel problems, including allegations of a sexualized environment at the
office that was both hostile to and discriminatory against women. Male lawyers
accused of failing to cover the basics won awards and got plum assignments,
like the Boston Marathon bombing case, while female prosecutors got short
shrift, the women said.
Stevens, the defense lawyer in Houston also asked the judge to review the
conduct of Kevin Carwile, who previously headed Mellin and Peterson’s unit at
the Justice Department and Carwile’s deputy, Gwynn “Charlie” X. Kinsey Jr. Both
men appeared at Ham’s death penalty determination hearing in Washington
opposite 2 female defense lawyers. These top capital prosecution officials
subsequently faced scrutiny and were ousted from their roles in the wake of
allegations of misconduct and disparate treatment.
Hughes, the judge in the Houston case, ordered the prosecutors to produce a
list of all events and documents involving Peterson and the other Justice
lawyers. The judge said he would hold off on ruling on the defense’s request
for new evidence until he reviews these lawyers involvement in the
investigative process and trial preparation.
Peterson, seated with fellow counsel, looked flushed and shook his head. He
never addressed the judge nor did he look up from the table during the
scolding. Peterson’s supervisor, the acting chief of the Capital Case Section
in Washington, sat in front of the courtroom gallery witnessing the discussion
about his staffer.
Ham sat at the end of the defense table in olive green uniform of the federal
detention center downtown. A family member and friend were the only members of
the public watching the hearing.
Hughes, who is 77, has drawn the spotlight on a number of occasions since his
1985 appointment to the bench by President Ronald Reagan. While some lawyers
familiar with the judge’s temperament are quick to defend him, Hughes has a
reputation for tossing out off-the cuff comments that recipients perceive as
denigrating to women and people of color. He also publicly castigates lawyers
for improper attire and poor decorum. He famously issued an “order of
ineptitude” to a D.C. lawyer who showed up in his courtroom in a track suit
after an international flight.
The judge last clashed with Petersonin October when the team of Houston and
Washington prosecutors declined to accept a guilty plea from Ham. The
42-year-old defendant had offered to forgo a murder trial in exchange for a
sentence of life prison without parole.
The judge asked Peterson at that hearing the benefit of spending $600,000 to
$800,000 of taxpayers’ money to have a defendant potentially wait for years on
end to be executed. Peterson and another lawyer told Hughes the decision to
pursue the death penalty was made by former Attorney General Eric Holder.
Hughes complained about Peterson’s “very long bureaucratic answer” to his
question.
Prosecutors said Wednesday that the rationale for seeking the death penalty is
due in part to Ham’s lack of remorse.
On Wednesday, the judge considered the sworn statements from other
jurisdictions indicating Peterson and Mellin had withheld evidence. After
defense lawyers in Terre Haute submitted allegations of so-called Brady
violations involving their client earlier this year, the federal prosecutors
agreed to accept a guilty plea and closed the case.
(source: Houston Chronicle)
NORTH CAROLINA:
Lethal State: North Carolina's Delicate Dance With Death
In 'Lethal State: North Carolina's Delicate Dance With Death,' Professor Seth
Kotch explores the racial politics, decline, and revival of the death penalty
in North Carolina.
There are 142 inmates on North Carolina’s death row, but the last time the
state executed someone was 2006. North Carolina’s history with the death
penalty is complicated.
Host Frank Stasio talks with professor and author Seth Kotch about the role
that race, the media, and white supremacy play in the death penalty.
Mandatory sentencing may call for death, but juries were oftentimes willing to
acquit rather than ending a life. Governors were equally reticent, frequently
commuting death penalty sentences. The issue of race is frequently at the core
of discussions about the death penalty.
NAACP statistics show that while African Americans only make up 13% of the
population, they constituted 42% of death row inmates in 2016.
Seth Kotch is an assistant professor of American studies at the University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill and author or “Lethal State: A History of the
Death Penalty in North Carolina” (UNC Press/2019). He chronicles how the state
went from mob lynchings of black men to legal lynchings; the transition from
public hangings to private executions in Raleigh; and the decline and revival
of the death penalty in this state.
Kotch joins host Frank Stasio to share his research and the role that race, the
media and white supremacy play in the death penalty.
(source: WUNC news)
SOUTH CAROLINA:
'Firing squad' death penalty bill stalled in SC House committee----The bill,
which passed the Senate, would allow inmates to choose electrocution, lethal
injection, or a firing squad
After Lexington County father Timothy Jones Jr was sentenced to death last week
for the murders of his 5 kids, there’s renewed focus on a proposed death
penalty Senate bill in the South Carolina Statehouse.
Senate Bill 176 would make death by electrocution the default death penalty
option in the state instead of lethal injection.
The change comes as South Carolina is having issues getting the drugs needed
for lethal injections.
“The companies are subject to retaliation in various forms, even violence, if
they're known that they're the ones disseminating or providing those drugs. So,
that means that it's very difficult for states to get them, which eliminates
one of the options,” said Republican Governor Henry McMaster on Wednesday.
Inmates sentenced to death have a choice in South Carolina. At the moment, that
choice is between lethal injection or electrocution.
The bill would give them 3 options, electrocution, lethal injection, or by
firing squad.
The bill continues if lethal injection is not available or ruled
unconstitutional, then the death sentence must be carried out with
electrocution no matter what the person decided.
Governor McMaster says he would sign the bill.
“So, we need to see that law enforcement moves forward and part of law
enforcement is the execution of sentences. And whatever it takes to accomplish
those means, those ends, I'll support,” McMaster said, adding he would sign it.
The Senate passed the bill in January of 2019, but it is currently waiting in
the House Judiciary Committee for a vote to send to the full House.
The group Justice 360 advocates for fair, reliable, and transparent use of the
death penalty and provides resources for attorneys handling capital cases.
Its Executive Director Lindsey Vann said whatever the state decides to do, the
public needs to be involved.
“If the state is going to be taking the life of one of its citizens that is
really the ultimate power. And when we're doing things, anything in the
government, we should be doing things transparently, so the public can review
it, can have an idea, and an understanding of how and why things are being
carried out the way that they are. That's extremely important here with the
death penalty that is such an awesome power the state is exercising,” Vann
said.
She added that Justice 360 is not against the death penalty nor does it have a
position on the legislation. Vann said they only advocate for fair and open
proceedings.
36 inmates received lethal injections and 7 were electrocuted in the state
since 1977, according to Justice 360.
In February, the bill's main sponsors and Senators Greg Hembree and Shane
Martin sent a letter to the House Judiciary Committee urging them to act on the
bill.
(source: WLTX news)
****************************
What life is like on death row for SC man who killed his 5 kids
Last week’s death sentence for Timothy Jones Jr. means the man who murdered his
5 children in 2014 will spend the bulk of his days alone in a 6-foot-by-14-foot
cell surrounded by 36 other inmates on South Carolina’s death row.
How long the 37-year-old will remain on death row at Columbia’s Kirkland
Correctional Institution is unknown.
The only thing certain about Jones’ pending execution is that it won’t happen
on Nov. 30, the date set by Judge Eugene Griffith, as dictated by state law.
State law also requires an automatic appeal to the state Supreme Court for
death sentences, which triggers a barrage of appeal possibilities in multiple
state and federal courts with no timeframe for conclusion.
The execution date is “largely a symbolic statement that is somewhat like the
novel, ‘The Scarlet Letter.’ It’s a public expression of condemnation that
serves no actual practical purpose,” said Robert Dunham, executive director of
the Washington-based Death Penalty Information Center, which takes no stance on
the death penalty itself.
After jurors decided death for the man who killed all 5 of his children — ages
1, 2, 6, 7, and 8 — in rural Lexington County, Jones’ attorneys gave a long
list of objections, including allowing jurors to see autopsy photos of the
bodies he dumped along a logging road in Alabama in separate garbage bags 9
days after their death and not allowing Jones’ grandmother to testify about the
horrors of her childhood during the trial’s penalty phase.
Griffith promptly denied the request for a new trial. But those objections will
be the basis of upcoming appeals.
Life on death row
Now housed in the state’s highest-security prison unit, Jones can sit in the
same room only with his attorneys.
He can have 8 visits monthly from anyone on an approved list, which will likely
consist of the family members who pleaded with jurors for a life sentence, but
they will be behind a glass barrier.
There’s no limit to the number of phone calls he can make, as long as each is
less than 15 minutes, according to the state prisons agency.
Jones can socialize with his fellow condemned prisoners one hour a day, 5 days
a week, in the death row’s central area, in groups of no larger than six, if he
wishes. His cell is on 1 of 8 hallways extending from that center. And he’s
allowed outside 1 hour a day, 5 days a week, weather permitting.
Otherwise, he eats alone in his cell, can worship once a week 1-on-1 with a
chaplain, can shower daily and can visit the unit’s law library, which includes
a computer. And each cell has a TV with local broadcast stations. Death row
inmates can’t work a prison job or do anything else to earn money, according to
the agency.
In following prison rules, Jones was put on a 72-hour suicide watch when he
entered death row last Thursday evening. He was seen by a psychiatrist on
Friday.
Jones, who had pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, has been taking
antipsychotic drugs since his September 2014 arrest. In his closing argument in
the penalty phase, defense attorney Boyd Young stacked up bags and bags of
pills, representing what Jones has taken while in maximum security pending
trial.
The defense team put many experts on the stand who concluded Jones had
schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder. But a court-appointed forensic
psychiatrist, who wasn’t paid by either side, concluded Jones was indeed
psychotic when he killed his kids, but because of increasing drug use, not
schizophrenia, which he believed Jones was faking.
Medical personnel will take Jones’ pre-trial evaluations in account when they
make their diagnosis and decide his prescription medications going forward,
agency spokeswoman Chrysti Shain said.
SC’s death penalty
South Carolina is among 29 states with a death penalty, though governors have
halted executions in four of those, including California, home to the nation’s
largest death row of more than 740 prisoners. One of those has also been
sentenced to death in South Carolina.
Of the 43 inmates executed in South Carolina since 1985 — when executions in
the state resumed after a 1962 federal moratorium — the average time between
their sentence and execution was about 12 years, according to state Department
of Corrections data.
That average includes nine inmates who voluntarily gave up and asked to die
before exhausting their appeals. The prisoner on death row the longest has been
there since 1983.
It’s been 8 years since the state executed anyone.
Jeffrey Motts, the last person executed in South Carolina, died by lethal
injection in May 2011 for killing his cellmate in 2005. Already serving a life
sentence for fatally shooting 2 elderly people in Spartanburg County in 1995
while robbing them to buy crack, Motts confessed to strangling his cellmate and
was sentenced to death in 2007.
Despite telling his attorneys he wanted to die and abandoning his appeals, his
execution didn’t occur for more than 3 years.
Now South Carolina can’t carry out an execution unless an inmate chooses to die
by electrocution, as three have since 1995, when lethal injection became state
law.
But South Carolina has not had the drugs for executions since the state’s
supply of pentobarbital — 1 part of the lethal 3-drug cocktail — expired. The
supply of the other 2 drugs has expired since.
All efforts to restock have failed because pharmaceutical companies will no
longer supply prisons with the drugs needed to kill people, S.C. Corrections
director Bryan Stirling has told legislators repeatedly.
Legislation requiring executions by either electrocution or firing squad, if
lethal injection is unavailable, passed the state Senate earlier this year. The
bill has yet to get a hearing in the House, but debate can pick up in that
chamber when legislators return in January.
The lack of drugs hasn’t prevented any executions.
Appeals for several inmates are pending in federal courts, which means some are
closer to completion than others.
But when appeals for any of them may wrap up is unknown, the state attorney
general’s office says.
(source: The Post and Courier)
GEORGIA----impending execution
Georgia preparing to execute man for 1996 killing
Georgia is preparing to execute a man convicted in the killing of an off-duty
prison guard more than 2 decades ago.
Marion Wilson Jr. is scheduled to receive a lethal injection Thursday. Wilson
and Robert Earl Butts Jr. were convicted of murder and sentenced to death in
the March 1996 slaying of Donovan Corey Parks. Butts was executed in May 2018.
Authorities have said Butts and Wilson asked Parks for a ride outside a Walmart
store in Milledgeville and then fatally shot him a short distance away. The
pair then stole Parks' car.
The State Board of Pardons and Paroles held a clemency hearing Wednesday and
said it would release its decision Thursday. The board is the only authority in
Georgia that can commute a death sentence.
(source: Associated Pres)
*********************
Georgia Panel Delays Clemency Ruling for Condemned Man
The state parole board has delayed making a decision in a clemency hearing for
a Georgia inmate set to be executed for the slaying of an off-duty prison
guard.
Marion Wilson Jr. is scheduled to receive a lethal injection Thursday. Wilson
and Robert Earl Butts Jr. were convicted of murder and sentenced to death in
the 1996 slaying of Donovan Corey Parks.
Prosecutors say Wilson and Butts killed Parks and stole his car after asking
him for a ride at a Walmart.
Butts was executed last year.
The State Board of Pardons and Paroles says a decision regarding clemency would
be issued before Thursday's scheduled execution.
The parole board is Georgia's only authority that can commute a death sentence.
Wilson would be the 2nd prisoner executed by Georgia this year.
(source: Associated Press)
****************************
Georgia group says 'merciful and restorative alternatives' can replace death
penalty
Marion Wilson, Jr. and Robert Earl Butts, Jr. were both sentenced to death in
the killing of an off-duty prison guard outside of a Milledgeville Walmart in
1996. Over 20 years later, some say Wilson shouldn't be facing the death
penalty.
Butts was executed last year, and Wilson is scheduled to be executed Thursday,
but a new petition by his lawyers is aiming to drop his death sentence.
The 28-page petition says there's no credible evidence that Wilson killed
Donovan Corey Parks himself, that the prosecution exaggerated his juvenile
record to warrant the death penalty, and that his chaotic youth warrants a life
sentence instead.
The Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles said a decision on Wilson's
clemency hearing wouldn't be made Wednesday but on Thursday before his
scheduled execution.
The Board could turn his sentence to life with or without parole, deny
clemency, or issue a stay of up to 90 days.
Georgians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty have been working to end the
death penalty for over 20 years. They sent WGXA this statement regarding
Wilson's scheduled execution:
We are working towards a world in which we don’t discard people based on their
conviction, but where there are merciful and restorative alternatives to give
people the resources they need when harm is caused. We plan over 10 vigils
around the state, including a vigil at Macon City Hall at 6:30 p.m. the night
of scheduled executions to preserve and uplift the humanity of those the state
seeks to kill.
"This case fits the profile that clemency might be granted. In fact there was
no evidence at trial that Marion Wilson actually shot anybody. The evidence
suggested the co-defendant, Mr. Butts, that was executed a year ago was the
killer," Robert Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information
Center, said.
21 states have abolished the death penalty, and Dunham said more than 12 others
have introduced legislation in 2019 to end capital punishment in their states.
"We have seen gradually, one by one, states moving away from the death
penalty," said Dunham.
The last person to be sentenced to death in Georgia was Tiffany Moss.
"Tiffany Moss, who was a brain-damaged defendant, who was committed by the
court to represent herself, and she presented no defense," said Dunham.
The death penalty is meant to reduce murders and protect police officers, but
the statistics prove otherwise, he adds.
"Over the course of this 31-year period, murder rates were higher in states
that have the death penalty, compared to states that don't, and police officers
were murdered at higher rate," said Dunham.
He adds that death penalty cases also cost taxpayers more than cases that don't
sentence offenders to the death penalty.
"A death penalty on average cost $1 million more than a normal case," said
Dunham.
(source: WGXA TV news)
***********************
Tiffany Moss’s original death sentence dates come and go----The Gwinnett County
woman was given the death penalty in April for starving her 10-year-old
stepdaughter, Emani Moss, to death. She represented herself throughout the
trial.
Under Georgia law, Judge George Hutchinson was required to set a date for the
death penalty to be imposed. He was required to set it within 20-60 days of
imposing the sentence and he chose the week of June 7-14.
However, there was no way Moss would have been put to death that soon because
death penalty sentences have an automatic appeal process.
“There is no chance she will be executed in 2019,” explained Gwinnett County
District Attorney Danny Porter, who prosecuted Moss.
The appeals process is lengthy. Moss can either file the appeal herself or ask
the court for attorneys to help her file the appeal. She can also choose to
file no appeal at all. If that happens the Supreme Court of Georgia will look
at the court transcripts and case files to make certain the trial was fair.
“I would certainly consider you appoint counsel with whatever appeal,” Judge
Georgia Hutchinson advised Moss after she was sentenced to death.
Georgia Capital Defender’s group has filed a request for a new trial on 6
points. They claim Moss was not competent to act as her own attorney.
Moss barely uttered a word during her trial. She questioned no witnesses,
offered no opening or closing statements, and refused to ask for leniency
during her sentencing phase. Moss stared straight ahead for most of the trial
showing emotion at only two points during testimony:
Husband testified against her – Moss stared at Eman Moss as he was on the stand
and followed him with her eyes as he left the court
Trash can presented as evidence – Moss looked away and seemed upset as the
trash can in which Emani’s body was found. Tiffany and Eman Moss tried to burn
Emani’s body in the can to get rid of the evidence.
Emani’s father is serving a life sentence for his role in the murder. Moss is
the only woman on Georgia’s death row.
(source: 11alive.com)
FLORIDA:
Ocala jury will decide if admitted hitman gets the death penalty
The penalty phase of Jose Manuel Martinez’s trial began Wednesday, with
Assistant State Attorney Amy Berndt telling jurors that the 57-year-old
defendant has been killing people since he was 18.
Berndt said it was the beginning of what she called Martinez’s killing spree
for money or personal reasons.
On a television screen, Berndt showed jurors the names, dates and places of a
dozen people who she said were killed by Martinez, either alone or with
assistance, in Alabama, California and Florida. Two of those murders occurred
in Marion County. Martinez was convicted of those murders last Thursday, which
was his birthday.
The jury of 12, 7 women and 5 men, decided Martinez’s guilt in less than 30
minutes. 2 alternate jurors were told to wait in a separate room until after
the verdict was returned. All 14 have returned for the penalty phase of this
death penalty case.
The jury will decide whether Martinez should be put to death or face life in
prison. The vote for death must be unanimous.
If the jury recommends death, then the judge will hold what is known as a
Spencer hearing, in which he will listen to additional evidence and make a
final decision on the sentence. Circuit Judge Anthony Tatti is presiding.
Martinez was found guilty of fatally shooting Javier Huerta, 20, and Gustavo
Olivares, 28. The bodies of the two men, residents of Pierson, were found in an
abandoned Nissan pickup along State Road 19 in the Ocala National Forest.
Martinez, a self-proclaimed hitman, had contacted Huerta and Olivares to
collect a debt that Huerta, a drug dealer, owed for 10 kilograms of cocaine,
and the meeting led to their deaths, authorities say. Martinez was first
connected to the murders after a cigarette butt from the pickup tested positive
for his DNA.
Martinez was captured crossing the border from Mexico into Arizona. After his
arrest in 2013, he told police he had killed more than 30 men throughout his
life.
Since then, he has been convicted of 10 killings and 1 attempted murder. He
pleaded guilty to 1 count of murder in 2014 in Alabama and was sentenced to 50
years in prison. The next year, he pleaded guilty to 9 counts of murder and one
count of attempted murder in California and was sentenced to 10 consecutive
life sentences.
Berndt said that in Martinez’s 1st murder, in 1980, he was paid $700. In that
case, Martinez was told the victim was messing around with a man’s wife. The
prosecutor said Martinez did not verify the information, and instead watched
the man, then shot and killed him while the man, his wife and a man were
driving to work.
For the remaining murders, Berndt gave details on how the killings occurred.
In a 1995 murder, Berndt said, the victim parked in Martinez’s driveway.
Martinez did not want the man to park in the driveway because one of his
children was run over by a vehicle. Martinez told the victim twice not to park
in the driveway.
The victim ignored Martinez’s request. And so Martinez, according to Berndt,
drove with the man to an area where Martinez shot and killed him.
Eventually, Martinez’s price increased and by 2009, he was paid $8,000 to kill
a man accused of raping a girl in Mexico.
In 2013, Martinez killed a man for talking bad of his daughter. The man, who
was dating Martinez’s daughter, called her a bad mother and cursed her. Little
did the man know that he was talking to his girlfriend’s father.
Berndt said during the killings, Martinez quickly learned not to shoot victims
in the stomach and instead shoot them in the head. That’s because one of his
victim’s survived a stomach wound.
Jessica Roberts, one of Martinez’s lawyers, asked jurors to spare her client’s
life because he was dealt a bad hand before birth.
Roberts, who is from the Public Defender’s Office, said Martinez’s mother tried
to end her pregnancy when she was expecting Martinez. She said Martinez’s
mother was raped by her uncle and fathered at least one other child with her
uncle.
Roberts said eventually, Martinez’s mother met another man, a drug trafficker
who worked for a cartel. Martinez’s drug dealing was sanctioned by his mother,
Roberts said. After awhile, Martinez’s mother told her son he had to protect
the family when her man was taken away by U.S. officials.
Roberts said 1 of Martinez’s sister was murdered. The public defender said with
Martinez’s lack of brain development, poor family life and hard upbringing,
Martinez was forced into a bad life. She calls him a good family man.
The 1st victim’s wife, Cecilia Camacho, told the court about how her husband
was shot. She said days before the shooting, she saw a strange car lurking
around the home.
3 California law enforcement officials — Christal Derington, Ark Knight and
Chris Dellenback — took the stand and were questioned by Berndt and Rich
Buxman, another assistant state attorney prosecuting the case.
Similarly, aside from Roberts, Joshua Woodard questioned the same witnesses.
Helping Roberts and Woodard in the defense are John Spivey, executive chief
assistant at the Public Defender’s Office, and Morris Carranza.
(source: ocala.com)
**************************
Convicted hitman confesses to murder of 30 people
Fla. The sentencing trial for the convicted hitman, Jose Manuel Martinez, began
Thursday, and he could be facing the death penalty.
Martinez said he worked extensively with the Mexican drug cartel, killing more
than 30 people throughout his life, including 2 men in North Central Florida.
The state of Florida is taking action against Martinez, after he confessed the
several murders he committed, 2 of those taking place in the November 2006
death of 2 Volusia County men, he left for dead in the Ocala National Forest.
Thursday morning the state and defense addressed the jury and continued to
bring witnesses to the stand.
The state walked the jury through some of the killings done by Martinez, while
the defense put faith in the jury, saying his fate is in their hands.
The state brought forth many witnesses Thursday to speak about their experience
with Martinez and the aftermath of his jobs.
Art Knight, who at the time was working with the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's
Office, testified about his time working on 1 of Martinez's murder.
“Gunshot wound to the right side of his head and the right side of his body,”
he said describing Martinez's victim.
The jury will have to decide between the death penalty or life in prison. A
sentence of the death penalty will have to be unanimous.
Martinez is already serving 10 consecutive life sentences.
Both the state and the defense have several other witnesses to testify before
the jury can make a final decision.
(source: WJCB news)
ALABAMA:
1-time death row Alabama inmate being freed after plea
A man who spent about 15 years on Alabama’s death row is being set free.
News outlets report 43-year-old Emanuel Aaron Gissendanner is being released
after pleading guilty on Monday to the killing of 77-year-old Margaret
Snellgrove in 2001.
Gissendanner was originally convicted of capital murder and sent to death row
in 2004. A court ordered a new trial because of defense mistakes.
The state let Gissendanner plead guilty to a reduced charge of murder rather
than go through another trial. A judge then said he can be freed based on the
time he’s served for killing the woman during a robbery.
Defense lawyer Becca Wahlquist says a new trial could have vindicated
Gissendanner, but there wasn’t any point in him spending more time in prison.
(source: Associated Press)
***********************
Russell County has 12 death penalty cases, compared to 1 in Muscogee----There
is 1 capital case in Columbus
With Ricky Morris’ arrest this week, there are now 12 people facing the
possibility of the death penalty in Russell County.
By comparison, there is 1 active capital murder case – Brandon Conner — in the
6-county Chattahoochee Judicial Circuit that includes Musocgee County.
Why the high number in Russell County?
In Alabama there are 18 different ways you can find yourself a defendant in a
capital case. Drive-by shootings, armed robbery, killing 2 or more people,
arson, killing a law enforcement officer, killing someone under 14 to name a
few.
Longtime District Attorney Kenneth Davis said these kinds of charges run in
spurts. There have been 5 people facing capital charges on offense that were
committed this year.
“We take the cases as they come,” Davis said. “But if a case fits into one of
those categories that allow or call for capital punishment, generally that’s
what we charge.”
4 defendants – Morris, Ashley King, Daryus Sullivan and Joshua Pickard — are
accused of arson-related murders in 3 different cases.
(source: WRBL news)
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