March 29 TEXAS----execution Texas inmate executed for 2 1994 slayings Hours after setting a fire in his cell to protest his punishment, a Houston air conditioning contractor was executed tonight for the deaths of 2 Florida men gunned down in a dispute over missing drug money. Roy Lee Pippin, 51, had vowed to fight his execution and be uncooperative with corrections officers, but he walked to the death chamber and caused no additional disturbances. "I charge the people of the jury, the trial judge, the prosecutor that cheated to get this conviction, I charge each and every one of you with the murder of an innocent man," Pippen said defiantly from the gurney. In a blanket statement meant for all the courts that heard his case, he added, "You will answer to your maker when God has found out that you have executed an innocent man. May God have mercy on your souls." Pippen expressed love to family members and then asked for forgiveness from "all the people of the United States for all the poison I brought into the country I love. Please forgive me for my sins. If my murder makes it easier for everyone else, let the forgiveness be part of the healing." He ended his final statement by telling the warden, "Go ahead warden, murder me. Take me home Jesus." He was pronounced dead at 6:42 p.m., 8 minutes after the lethal drugs began to flow. Pippin set a fire inside his cell at the Walls Unit this morning, hours before he was executed for 2 1994 slayings. Pippin piled trash near his cell door, connected a copper coil to an electric outlet and ignited the fire at 10:45 a.m. Minutes later, officers put out the fire, which created lots of smoke, but didn't cause any damage or injury, a prison spokeswoman said. Pippen had been on a 6-week hunger strike until Monday and the fire was apparently another form of protest, Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokeswoman Michelle Lyons said. When he arrived at the Huntsville Unit, about 45 miles away, he repeated his intention to not cooperate with officers. "I promise you, my oath, I won't try to hurt any guards," he said. Prison officials credited talks he had throughout the afternoon with a prison chaplain with calming him before the execution. Pippin acknowledged involvement in a Colombian drug operation that used his business to transport drugs and launder cash but insisted he wasn't the triggerman who killed cousins Elmer and Fabio Buitrago almost 13 years ago. The 2 Miami men were taken to a warehouse rented by Pippin and fatally shot because $2 million in drug proceeds was missing. Pippin was the 11th convicted killer executed this year in Texas, the nation's busiest capital punishment state, and the 2nd in as many nights. A San Antonio man, Vincent Gutierrez, received lethal injection Wednesday night for shooting an Air Force captain 10 years ago during a carjacking. Pippin becomes the 391st condemned inmate to be put to death since Texas resumed capital punishment on December 7, 1982. He becomes the 151st condemned inmate to be put to death since Rick Perry became Governor of Texas in 2001; a record 152 condemned inmates were put to death during the tenure of then-Governor George W. Bush. The next 2 executions in Texas are set for April 11 (James Clark) and April 18 (Cathy Henderson). Pippin becomes the 12th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1069th overall since the nation resumed executions on January 17, 1977. (sources: Associated Press & Rick Halperin) WASHINGTON: Review of state death penalty warranted Working its way through the state legislative hopper is a bill that would create a task force to review the state's death penalty statutes. The task force would examine: 1) The uniformity of decisions made by prosecuting attorneys across the state when they decide to charge a person with committing a capital (i.e., punishable by death) offense. 2) The impact that race, gender, ethnicity or economic status might have on decisions to seek the death penalty. 3) Whether the death penalty in this state is applied randomly or capriciously. 4) The financial costs of trials and appeals when the death penalty is involved. Each issue warrants extensive probing. Race and costs are usually matters that attract the greatest amount of interest and receive the most scrutiny. None of the four, however, may be of greater importance -- and less likely to get the attention it deserves -- than the first: how do the decisions of prosecutors across the state stack up when it comes to determining who will be charged with committing a capital offense? It is common knowledge that not everyone who commits murder faces the prospect, if convicted, of the death penalty. As two high-profile serial murder cases in our state dramatized a few years ago, a number of factors affect the decision. A matter of pivotal importance is the choice made by the prosecuting attorney whether to seek the penalty of death in a given case. If asked why decisions differ from one county to the next, prosecutors would be the first to maintain that each case is different, every homicide is unique, and no hard or fast rule can be laid down that would assure uniform results. Nevertheless, it's no secret that prosecutors also vary widely in the eagerness or caution with which they consider charging a person with the commission of a capital crime. One need not, for openers, try to make comparisons here in Washington; if one wants a case-in-point, no more stunning example -- on the eagerness side of the ledger -- can be found than in Maricopa County, Arizona. Maricopa County has long been a national poster child for the bizarre in the criminal justice arena. Its four-term top county cop revels in the carefully cultivated reputation of being "America's toughest sheriff" -- a legend created by his instituting the practice of placing incarcerated offenders on chain gangs while they carry out various public works functions around the county, housing them in a canvas compound labeled Tent City where the meals cost 15 cents per person, and forcing inmates to wear pink socks and undershorts, ostensibly because of the "calming impact" the color has on inmate behavior. Now -- and apropos to the Washington death penalty review -- comes word that the new prosecuting attorney in Maricopa County has nearly doubled the number of cases in which he has sought the death penalty, even though the number of first-degree murder cases in the county has not changed materially in the past decade. In the year before the new prosecutor took office, the county sought the death penalty in 28 of 108 cases. Last year, the new prosecutor sought the death penalty in 44 of 89 murder cases. Currently, Maricopa County has 138 capital cases pending or awaiting trial -- a number that surpasses the total number of convicted offenders nationwide sentenced to death in 2006. An overwhelming desire to be non-judgmental precludes opining as to whether randomness or capriciousness is involved in the Maricopa prosecutor's decisions. No judgment at all is required to conclude there's nothing whatsoever uniform about Maricopa's death penalty record with anyplace else in the nation. Attorney General Robert Jackson, who became a distinguished justice of the U.S. Supreme Court and who served as a special prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials, declared "the prosecutor has more control over life, liberty and reputation than any other person in America." That alone is sufficient warrant for a task force to take a close, dispassionate look at how prosecutorial decisions in capital cases are made in our state and whether there is any consistency in those decisions across the state. A number of state legislatures are reviewing the application of the death penalty in their jurisdictions and have called a moratorium on executions until the reviews are completed. Washington's review could not be more timely or appropriate. (source: Seattle Post-Intelligencer; Hubert G. Locke, Seattle, is a retired professor and former dean of the Daniel J. Evans Graduate School of Public Affairs at the University of Washington) ILLINOIS: State Considers Death Penalty in Freeport Murder A Freeport woman is in court after her boyfriend is stabbed to death. Sharlene Calvin, 41 is charged with First Degree Murder. Police say she killed 46 year old Kevin Baker. At a court hearing Thursday, the court found probable cause to move forward with the case and ordered a jury trial. Baker was found Monday night on Winneshiek Street. He died before paramedics could get him to the hospital. Calvin's trial is scheduled to start June 4th. Court documents show the state has until April 11th to file a motion if it plans to seek the death penalty. (source: WREX News) ALABAMA: IDAHO: Federal judge dismisses Rhoades' death penalty appeals U.S. District Court Judge Edward Lodge has denied several appeals from death row inmate Paul Ezra Rhoades. Lodge's ruling came down Wednesday. Rhoades was given 2 death sentences for the murder, kidnapping and rape of Idaho Falls teacher Susan Michelbacher in 1987. He was also sentenced to death for the murder of Stacy Dawn Baldwin and to life in prison for the murder of Nolan Haddon, but Lodge's ruling Wednesday dealt only with Michelbacher's murder. Rhoades appealed his sentence on several fronts, claiming in part that prosecutors withheld some evidence from the defense, and that the victim impact statement in his case was inadmissible, in addition to several other claims. Lodge dismissed all of them, saying that in many cases no error was made and in others any error was so slight that it wouldn't have changed the outcome of the case. (source: Associated Press) ALABAMA: Sentencing in Death Penalty Case Bobby Baker was arrested for a 1994 shooting spree that wounded 2 people and left his wife dead. He was found guilty of capital murder and sentenced to die. However, the state Supreme Court reversed the decision and ordered a new trial and Baker was found guilty again. That same jury recommended death. And in Thursday morning's sentencing as the convicted killer sat in the courtroom expressionless he waived his opportunity to present evidence in the case. That could possibly sway Judge Lawson Little's decision. Minutes later, Judge Little handed down the death sentence. But family members of Baker say, regardless, they'll continue to support him and say they are sad he's going to death row but right now there's nothing they can do about it. Meanwhile, district attorney Doug Valeska says what could happen to Baker is justly deserved. Baker attorney's automatically appealed the decision. That ruling will come down within 2 weeks. During the appeals process Baker will wait on death row at Holman Prison in Atmore. (source: WTVY News) INDIANA: Death row inmates challenge states execution method A man sentenced to die by lethal injection on May 4 and another death row inmate have asked a federal judge to allow them to join a third condemned prisoner in challenging the state's execution method, alleging it constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. David Leon Woods, who fatally stabbed a DeKalb County neighbor in April 1984, and Michael Lambert, who killed a Muncie police officer in 1990, have asked U.S. District Judge Richard L. Young in Indianapolis to allow them to join Norman Timberlake in challenging Indiana's lethal injection protocol. Timberlake was scheduled to die Jan. 19, 2006, for the 1993 slaying of Master Trooper Michael E. Greene along Interstate 65 on Indianapolis' northwest side during a routine traffic step. The state Supreme Court stayed the execution, however, because the U.S. Supreme Court is considering whether it is legal to execute those who are mentally ill. But Timberlake also has a federal injunction pending challenging how Indiana executes its death row inmates. That is the case Woods and Lambert are seeking to join. The state is challenging the motions by Woods, filed March 5, and by Lambert, filed March 1, saying they have known for years how the state executes inmates and have waited until now to challenge it. Adding more defendants and attorneys to the Timberlake case would only complicate it, the state claims. Timberlake, in his argument against the state's execution method, states he "will be fully conscious and in agonizing pain for the duration of the execution process." He states that Indiana inmates who have been executed have repeatedly failed to receive adequate anesthesia and have remained conscious during the administration of lethal drugs. The state denies its method of executing inmates constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. Timberlake's attorneys have no objection to Woods and Lambert joining the case. Young has not yet ruled. Woods, whose execution date was set earlier this week, also likely will challenge a state Supreme Court ruling denying him a new post-conviction claim that would exempt him from the death penalty because he is mentally retarded. The justices ruled Woods has not shown a reasonable possibility that he is mentally retarded. But Woods' attorney, William Van Der Pol Jr., contends the Supreme Court erred and he likely will file a challenge on Monday. Van Der Pol said he will meet Friday with Woods to talk about whether to seek clemency, but he expects to file for it. An execution for Lambert has not yet been set. He still has an appeal pending in state court, his attorney, Alan Freedman, said Thursday. Timberlake's case is expected to go to trial by May 2008. (source: Journal and Courier) TENNESSEE: No DNA testing for death row inmate A judge today denied a request for DNA testing by a Millington-area man convicted and sentenced to death for the brutal 1987 stabbing deaths of a mother and her 2-year-old daughter. Criminal Court Judge John Colton Jr. said the strength of other evidence pointing to Pervis Payne's guilt, including his crime-scene fingerprints and his own testimony, shows there is little likelihood that he would not have been convicted even if blood tests did not link him to the crime. He was sentenced to death for the murders of Charisse Christopher and her daughter, Lacie Jo. Her 3-year-old son was critically injured in the attack, but survived. The 40-year-old Payne's execution set for April 11 has been stayed by Gov. Phil Bredesens moratorium to rework the states lethal injection procedures. The moratorium is in place until May 2. (source: The Commercial Appeal)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----TEXAS, WASH., ILL., IDAHO, ALA., IND. TENN.
Rick Halperin Thu, 29 Mar 2007 21:33:04 -0500 (Central Daylight Time)
