April 22
TEXAS:
Trial begins in fatal Jefferson County courthouse shooting
Even Bartholomew Granger's attorneys acknowledge there's no question he is
responsible for opening fire last year outside a Southeast Texas courthouse,
fatally shooting a bystander in a failed attempt to kill his daughter who had
accused him of sexual assault.
When opening statements begin Monday in Granger's capital murder trial, his
defense team's goal appears to be keeping the 42-year-old Houston man from
being sent to death row.
"It's hard to imagine a person not going to be found guilty of this offense,"
Sonny Cribbs, lead attorney for Granger, said last week. "I just hope if he's
found guilty, which in all probability he will, I hope they ... do not execute
him. I do not believe in execution."
Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Granger for the March 14, 2012,
shooting spree outside the Jefferson County Courthouse in downtown Beaumont
that left 3 others wounded, including Granger's daughter, her mother and
another person. The 20-year-old daughter was to resume testimony in a trial
where she accused Granger of sexually assaulting her 9 years earlier. Her
testimony began the previous day in the case where Granger rejected a plea deal
because he was convinced of his innocence.
"This is not a whodunit," said Ed Shettle, a Jefferson County assistant
district attorney and lead prosecutor.
"He was trying to kill his daughter and her mother."
Granger was outside the courthouse in his truck shortly before noon when he
opened fire with a .40-caliber semiautomatic carbine. Minnie Ray Sebolt, 79, a
bystander from nearby Deweyville, was caught in the crossfire and killed as she
tried to run to the courthouse while others under attack dropped to the ground.
Law enforcement officers returned fire.
Granger fired more shots from his truck, hitting his daughter 3 times then
running her over as he fled. He abandoned the bullet-riddled truck about 3
blocks away, walked inside a construction business and took several people
hostage.
Granger, who at some point was wounded, eventually surrendered. A 10-bullet
magazine in his weapon had been emptied in the shooting binge, Shettle said.
Granger's daughter was seriously hurt. The other surviving victims had less
serious injuries.
Granger is charged with several felony counts, including attempted capital
murder. Retaliation against a witness is the accompanying felony that elevated
Granger???s murder charge to capital murder, making him death-penalty eligible,
Shettle said. If convicted, he faces death or life without parole.
Both sides agreed to move the trial to Galveston, 75 miles southwest of
Beaumont, primarily so jurors wouldn't have to walk by the crime scene each
day. A judge declared a mistrial in his sexual misconduct case one month after
the shootings due to heightened attention following the attacks.
Shettle expected it will take about 2 weeks to present his case to the 14
jurors, including 2 alternates, who were selected over the past 2 weeks.
If Granger is convicted of capital murder, his defense team will try to save
him from the death penalty by showing jurors their client is not a continuing
danger or that other circumstances - such as the sexual misconduct trial -
drove Granger to open fire.
"You???re talking about mitigation," Cribbs said. "Everything is on videotape.
They've got shooting on videotape. They've got the death of the lady in the
door. You see her fall down after being shot. That's all on videotape.
"And it's not going to be good for our side."
(source: Associated Press)
CONNECTICUT:
Conn. Supreme Court taking up death penalty repeal
The Connecticut Supreme Court is set to hear arguments on whether the state???s
repeal of the death penalty for future crimes violates the constitutional
rights of the 11 men on the state's death row.
Justices are scheduled to hear the case Tuesday.
The arguments come in the case of former Torrington resident Eduardo Santiago,
who was sentenced to death for the 2000 killing of a West Hartford man in
exchange for a broken snowmobile.
The state Supreme Court overturned the death sentence and ordered a new penalty
phase last year. But the ruling came two months after the state repealed the
death penalty for murders committed after April 24, 2012.
Justice will decide whether the repeal law bars the state from executing the
death row inmates.
(source: Associated Press)
USA:
Death penalty weighed as case is built against suspect
The White House has a range of legal options in the Boston Marathon bombings,
and they could include seeking the death penalty against the 19-year-old
suspect.
The administration has indicated it intends to move quickly to build a criminal
case against Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.
Several Republican lawmakers on Saturday criticized the administration's
approach because they said it would afford Tsarnaev more rights than he
deserves.
Prosecution of Tsarnaev in federal court would seem a natural course for an
administration that previously won a life sentence against Umar Farouk
Abdulmutallab of Nigeria for trying to blow up a packed jetliner using a bomb
sewn into his underwear on Christmas Day 2009.
The administration also will put Osama bin Laden's son-in-law on trial in
January on charges that he conspired to kill Americans in his role as
al-Qaida's chief spokesman.
As a U.S. citizen, Tsarnaev could not be tried by a military commission under
current law. The only option for prosecuting an American is in civilian courts.
A federal official with knowledge of the case said Tsarnaev was naturalized as
a U.S. citizen in September 2012.
Tsarnaev was under armed guard at a Boston hospital Saturday and was reported
in serious condition and unable to be interrogated.
He has yet to be charged, but prosecutors appear to have no shortage of federal
laws at their disposal.
The most serious charge would be the use of a weapon of mass destruction to
kill people, which carries a possible death sentence.
Massachusetts does not have the death penalty, and it remains to be seen
whether the administration would try to persuade a jury to sentence Tsarnaev to
death. The state could try to bring charges against him, including for the
death of a police officer who was killed by Tsarnaev and his brother, Tamerlan.
Tamerlan died shortly afterward in a shootout with police.
(source: Associated Press)
**************************
Feinstein: Boston bombing 'should likely be a death penalty case'
Sen. Dianne Feinstein says she agrees with the Obama administration's decision
to use a public safety exception to interrogate Dzhokhar Tsarnaev before
reading him his Miranda rights and trying him as a criminal.
Feinstein, a California Democrat who chairs the Senate Intelligence Committee,
said on "Fox News Sunday" she disagrees with Republicans who want to treat him
as an enemy combatant and put him on military trial.
"It would be unconstitutional to do that," she said.
Feinstein said law enforcement authorities are building a strong case to
convict him in civilian court, including using fingerprints, eyewitnesses and
the fact that Tsarnaev and his brother told someone they were responsible for
the Boston bombings Monday. So she said there's no need to treat him as an
enemy combatant.
"It should likely be a death penalty case under federal law," she said, adding
that federal prosecutors have secured convictions in similar cases, such as
with underwear bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab. "They've gotten convictions."
(source: Politico.com)
****************
Federal terrorism laws' record mixed in bombing prosecutions
As prosecutors weigh charges in the Boston Marathon bombings, the same laws
used successfully in deadly terrorist acts such as the Oklahoma City bombing
and the first World Trade Center attack in 1993 may be at the top of their
list.
Terrorism cases brought in the past 20 years show there are several federal
statutes that could be applied. They include counts of conspiracy to use, or
the actual use, of a weapon of mass destruction, both of which are punishable
by death.
Yet, even in cases matching the brutality of the Boston bombings, there is a
mixed record of those prosecuted under federal terror statutes.
Timothy McVeigh, was found guilty of 11 crimes in the 1995 Oklahoma City
bombing, including conspiracy and use of a weapon of mass destruction. His bomb
at a federal building killed 168 people and injured more than 800. He was
executed.
Ramzi Yousef, who assembled a team and the supplies to build a 1,200-pound bomb
used in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, was convicted of conspiracy and
other charges. He is serving a life sentence.
Faisal Shahzad, accused of a foiled plot to blow up his Nissan Pathfinder in
Times Square on May 1, 2010, was charged with conspiracy to detonate an
improvised explosive and incendiary device and other charges. He pleaded guilty
and was sentenced to life in prison.
Adis Medunjanin, charged in a conspiracy to detonate bombs in New York City
subways, was indicted on a weapon of mass destruction count and other terrorism
charges. He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
Federal death penalty prosecutions, unlike many state cases, require rigorous
vetting at the Justice Department's highest levels. All death penalty cases
require a second trial, a so-called penalty phase, where jurors decide whether
the convicted person deserves life in prison or death. They weigh mitigating
and aggravating factors.
On Friday, Boston U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz declined to say after Dzhokhar
Tsarnaev's capture whether she would seek the death penalty.
(source: Newsday)
***********************
Executing Human Dignity: U.S. Death Penalty System Dominates IACHR Repor
According to a recent Inter-American Commission on Human Rights report on the
death penalty in the Americas, the United States stands out as an outlier in a
region that has come close to abolishing the death penalty. This report will be
officially launched at a public event next Monday at the American Bar
Association, moderated by the ACLU.
What is most striking about the report is not its human rights analysis or the
revelation that the U.S. death penalty system has been a failed legal
experiment, but rather the human rights body's persistence in addressing not
only systemic failures to uphold due process and fundamental fair trial
protections, but also individual cases of death row inmates, most of whom have
been executed. The commission mentions at least 36 cases in which precautionary
measures - equivalent to a court injunction - were issued and yet, in the vast
majority of cases, the U.S. went ahead and executed the individuals. The
commission report also details over a dozen merit decisions issued against the
United States in the past 15 years.
The commission report additionally highlights major developments in the region,
including in the United States, where momentum is building towards abolishing
the death penalty. As we stated in our recent submission to the U.N. High
Commissioner for Human Rights:
In the last decade the U.S. Supreme Court has outlawed the execution of
juveniles, the intellectually disabled, and those who did not commit homicides.
The number of new death sentences has dropped dramatically - from a peak of 315
in 1996 to 78 in 2012. New York, New Jersey, New Mexico, Illinois, and
Connecticut have recently repealed the death penalty. In November 2012
California also came close to repealing, with 47% of voters supporting the
ballot measure that would have replaced the death penalty with a life sentence.
On March 15, 2013 the Maryland legislature approved a bill that would make
Maryland the 6th state in 6 years to repeal capital punishment. On March 26,
2013 Delaware's Senate passed a bill to repeal the death penalty. The Delaware
House of Representatives is expected to consider the bill in April 2013.
North Carolina passed the Racial Justice Act in August 2009, requiring courts
to enter a life sentence for any death row defendant who proves that race was a
factor in the imposition of his sentence. In a landmark April 2012 ruling based
on that Act, a judge found intentional and systemic racial discrimination in
the case of Marcus Robinson, and commuted his death sentence to life without
parole. 3 more death sentences were set aside under the Racial Justice Act in
December 2012.
Increasingly, judges, prosecutors, law enforcement officials, and other former
supporters of the death penalty acknowledge that its problems are too legion
and the consequences of error too severe.
But people are still being executed. According to the Death Penalty Information
Center, as of December 2012, 1,320 people have been executed since the death
penalty was restored in 1976. Yet international scrutiny is mounting and the
U.S. is left in the sorry company of countries like China, Iran, Iraq, Saudi
Arabia, and Yemen as top imposers of the death penalty.
While the death penalty is practiced primarily at the state level, the federal
government continues to retain the penalty and fails to do its share to rid the
country of this reviled punishment. For example, the federal government could
issue a moratorium on all federal executions. It could also take interim
actions to minimize the widespread problems in the imposition of the penalty,
especially with regard to access to effective counsel and racial disparities in
the system. The latter is something the U.S. has committed to do as part of the
2010 Universal Periodic Review of the United States' human rights record by the
U.N. Human Rights Council. Other concrete steps the U.S. could take to abolish
the federal death penalty have been identified by the ACLU and other groups.
Unfortunately, not only does the Obama administration seem unwilling to issue a
moratorium on federal executions, it has sought to impose the federal death
penalty even in jurisdictions that have long outlawed the penalty, like the
Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.
On the bright side, the U.S. federal government has in the past utilized the
IACHR in efforts to limit the imposition of the death penalty. For instance,
the commission report highlights the attempt to halt the execution of Leal
Garcia in 2011, in which the U.S. government submitted an amicus brief to the
Supreme Court and sent communications from the IACHR to state authorities in
charge of the execution. Although the application for a stay of execution was
ultimately denied, this is a positive example of ways the federal government
can play a role in at least limiting the use of the death penalty.
The commission's concerns about the U.S. death penalty system are shared by
close U.S. allies, particularly in Europe, who are taking a more aggressive
stand against the use of the death penalty in the United States. European
nations regularly condemn individual states for continuing to execute people
(see here and here). France has initiated an international campaign to abolish
the death penalty, and the European Union regular condemns the practice as
contrary to human dignity. Earlier this month, the U.N. Human Rights Committee
sent the U.S. detailed questions regarding the government's compliance with the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).
Despite the pressure from our allies, the U.S. continues to defend the death
penalty, claiming it has not been outlawed under international law and meets
the human rights requirements and safeguards outlined in the ICCPR and other
human rights instruments. (Article 6 of the ICCPR provides that the death
penalty may not be imposed arbitrarily and may be utilized only for the most
serious crimes.)
However, as the IACHR report concludes, the U.S. position is untenable. The
U.S. death penalty system does not meet the rigid requirements of international
human rights law: as we note in our statement, the penalty is applied in an
arbitrary and discriminatory manner without affording vital due process rights
such as access to effective counsel and the right to remedy to halt executions
- not to mention that methods of execution and death row conditions have been
condemned as cruel, inhuman, or degrading.
The U.S. cannot continue to bury its head in the sand and ignore the evolving
international consensus against the death penalty, or discount sound
jurisprudence from around the world, which clearly shakes the legal and moral
foundation of the penalty.
The ACLU is committed to remaining vigilant in the fight against this penalty
at home and will continue to inform the international human rights community
about the flaws in the system and progress made toward abolition. International
advocacy by the NAACP in the1940s garnered global support against racial
segregation and Jim Crow policies, which hurt U.S. standing and interests
abroad during the beginning of the cold war era. Similarly, the death penalty
and other domestic human rights abuses should be a great concern to
international civil society and governments with proven commitments to
universal human rights.
(source: ACLU Blog)
PENNSYLVANIA:
Death penalty trial opens in Harrisburg Monday
A death penalty trial is slated to open Monday in Dauphin County.
Harrisburg police said Miguel Figueroa-Novoa shot and killed his 19-year-old
girlfriend, Yarelis Berrios, just a few days before Christmas in 2010. Police
said he then shot Berrios' mother multiple times before attempting to take his
own life.
Police said it all happened inside the home Figueroa-Novoa and Berrios shared
at the Ivey Lane apartments. Police said the 2 lived with their toddler son,
who was not hurt. Investigators said Berrios' 9-year-old niece witnessed the
shootings. She escaped and ran for help.
If convicted of 1st-degree murder, prosecutors said they will seek the death
penalty against Figueroa-Novoa.
(source: WHTM News)
NORTH CAROLINA:
Opening statements Monday in Shaniya Davis murder case
Opening statements are expected Monday afternoon in the capital murder trial of
a man accused of raping and killing a 5-year-old Fayetteville girl in 2009.
Mario Andretti McNeill, 32, is charged with murder, rape and kidnapping in the
death of Shaniya Davis. If convicted, he could face the death penalty.
Opening statements were delayed Friday after a last-minute defense motion that
Superior Court Judge Jim Ammons is expected to address Monday morning.
It deals with suppressing a statement that McNeill made regarding the location
of Shaniya's body. Ammons is also expected to address a legal issue about
attorney-client privilege.
McNeill's attorneys say the 1st defense attorney on the case had reached a deal
with prosecutors not to seek the death penalty if McNeill helped locate
Shaniya's body. Prosecutors have denied any such agreement.
As jury selection began earlier this month, McNeill rejected a deal offered by
prosecutors to guarantee a life prison sentence if he pleaded guilty. His
attorneys said he maintains his innocence.
Shaniya's body was found in a kudzu patch off N.C. Highway 87 near the
Lee-Harnett county line on Nov. 16, 2009, six days after her mother, Antoinette
Nicole Davis, reported her missing from their mobile home on Sleepy Hollow
Drive in Fayetteville.
Davis is charged with 1st-degree murder, indecent liberties with a child,
felony child abuse, felony sexual servitude, rape of a child, sexual offense of
a child by an adult offender, human trafficking and making a false police
report.
Investigators say she sold the girl to McNeill to pay off a drug debt.
She will be tried after McNeill's case is over, and prosecutors aren't seeking
the death penalty against her.
(source: WRAL News)
*****************************
Death penalty opponent to speak at UNCA on April 26
Sister Helen Prejean, the author, activist and nun who sparked national
dialogue on the death penalty and whose book inspired the film "Dead Man
Walking," will speak at UNC Asheville, and the university will host a
concert-style performance of the opera of the same name. Prejean's talk, "The
Journey Continues," will take place at 2:30 p.m. on Friday, April 26, and is
free and open to the public. The concert starts at 8 p.m. Both events take
place in Lipinsky Auditorium.
Prejean began ministering to inmates on death row in 1981 and served as chair
of the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty from 1993-95. Her book
"Dead Man Walking: An Eyewitness Account of the Death Penalty in the United
States" (Random House, 1993) was adapted for the screen in 1995, and the film
"Dead Man Walking," starring Susan Sarandon and Sean Penn, was seen by millions
and nominated for 4 Academy Awards.
Prejean also is the author of "The Death of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of
Wrongful Executions" (Random House, 2004) and is the honorary chairperson of
Moratorium Campaign, a group gathering signatures for a world-wide moratorium
on the death penalty.
"Dead Man Walking," which speaks of faith, redemption and the struggles of
families of murder victims as well as death row inmates, became the basis of an
opera composed by Jake Heggie, with libretto by Terrence McNally. The opera,
which premiered by the San Francisco Opera in 2000, will be presented concert
style at UNC Asheville by the Modern American Music Project.
The performance will feature Jane Bunnell, Elise Quagliata, Christiaan
Smith-Kotlarek, Simone Vigilante, and children's and adult choirs. Tickets for
the public range from $25-$40 and are available online at
tmamp.org/productions.html or by phone at 800/595-4849.
(source: UNC Asheville News Service)
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