Dec. 11
USA:
States put brakes on capital punishment
For just the second time since 1984, Virginia and Maryland will end the year
without executing a single death row inmate - reflecting a national trend of
states using capital punishment less often over the past decade.
Maryland has long been reluctant to use its death penalty. Virginia, which
ranks only behind Texas in the number of executions over the past 35 years, has
put fewer people to death in recent years as many cases are tied up in appeals
and as juries become less likely to recommend the punishment in capital murder
cases.
Analysts say executions have plummeted nationwide and are banned in some states
because of rising concerns over heavy court costs, biased sentencing and,
perhaps most prominently, the fear that a state could - or already has - killed
an innocent person.
"The advent of science in the world of criminology has showed that the justice
system makes mistakes," said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death
Penalty Information Center. "That, I think, is a real shocker for the public
and jurors, and they're now less likely to give a death sentence."
Yearly executions in the U.S. have decreased by more than 50 % since 1999, when
98 people were put to death - the most since the Supreme Court placed an
effective moratorium on capital punishment in 1972, and reaffirmed its legality
in 1976.
This year, 42 convicts have been executed in a total of nine states, even
though 33 states allow the death penalty and more than 3,000 inmates are on
death row nationwide.
The year's final execution is scheduled for Tuesday in Florida, where former
South Florida police officer Manuel Pardo, 56, is scheduled to be executed for
killing 9 people in 1986. The execution would bring the nationwide total to 43,
matching last year's total but falling short of the 46 inmates who were
executed in 2010.
Mr. Dieter said execution rates rose steadily in the 1980s and 1990s as
reducing crime rates became a major political issue but have since declined
largely because of prosecutors' and juries' reliance on life without parole as
a common alternative.
Slow appeals process
David Muhlhausen, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, said he thinks
the drop in executions largely has been a result of a national decline in
murder rates and longer appeals processes for death row inmates.
According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, inmates executed in 2010 - the
most recent year for which statistics were available - had been under sentence
of death an average of 14 years and 10 months, which was 9 months longer than
those executed in 2009.
Mr. Muhlhausen, who supports the death penalty, said he does not expect
executions to increase anytime soon unless the legal process is expedited.
Although he is reluctant to call for such reforms because they could increase
the likelihood of wrongful executions, he said, the death penalty should be
kept in place to punish the nation???s most violent offenders and serve as a
deterrent.
"Each additional execution, in fact, saves lives," he said. "And that's
something opponents don't consider."
While a declining crime rate has led to fewer executions, Mr. Dieter said,
another major factor has been a number of high-profile exonerations of death
row inmates.
Sentence overturned
Since 1973, 141 people have been sentenced to death but subsequently had their
convictions overturned for reasons including withheld evidence by prosecutors,
coerced confessions and false or unreliable witness testimony, according to the
Death Penalty Information Center.
About half of those exonerations have occurred in the past 15 years, and 18
took place after the discovery of DNA evidence that contradicted court
testimony or pointed to other assailants.
None of the 1,319 people executed since 1976 has been legally exonerated after
execution, although activists and legal groups have argued for their innocence
in numerous cases.
"You can release an innocent person from prison, but you can't release them
from the grave," former Illinois death row inmate Randy Steidl told Northern
Kentucky University's the Northerner newspaper last month. He spent 17 years in
prison for double murder before he was acquitted in a 2004 retrial because of a
lack of evidence and a recanted witness statement.
Another factor in declining executions over the past 2 years has been a
national shortage of sodium thiopental, a barbiturate once commonly used in
3-drug lethal injection cocktails.
The drug was pulled off the market in 2011 after its only U.S. producer moved
operations to Italy. The Italian government prevented the product from being
exported for use in executions. States including Ohio and Virginia have
countered by using pentobarbital, a powerful barbiturate that can be used for
single-drug executions, instead of sodium thiopental.
Public sentiment
While polls show that sentiments against the death penalty in the U.S. are at
their highest level in 40 years, a majority of Americans still favor capital
punishment.
A Gallup poll last year found that 61 % of Americans support a death penalty in
cases of murder, and last month voters in California - which, with 724 death
row inmates, houses 1/4 of the nation???s condemned prisoners - voted down a
referendum that would have repealed capital punishment.
In Virginia, an effort is under way by some lawmakers to broaden the death
penalty by eliminating the state's so-called "triggerman rule," which in most
cases prohibits the state from executing a person convicted of 1st-degree
murder if that person was not the only one who physically committed the act.
The rule has exceptions for murder-for-hire schemes, which allowed the state to
execute Teresa Lewis in 2010, and for acts of terrorism, which it used to
execute Beltway sniper mastermind John Allen Muhammad in 2009.
Delegate Robert B. Bell, Albemarle Republican, said he thinks the death penalty
is an effective deterrent that has prevented criminals from killing witnesses
to lesser crimes or escalating non-capital offenses such as kidnap and rape.
Virginia has executed 109 people since 1976, 2nd to Texas' 491.
"The majority of Virginians think that for the most heinous of offenses the
death penalty is an appropriate sanction for the jury to consider," he said.
"We have the appeals process in place to make sure that we get it right."
Abolishing the death penalty
Nonetheless, lawmakers in Virginia and other states have made recent calls to
repeal the death penalty. The practice has been abolished in 17 states and the
District, with 5 of those states - New Jersey, New York, New Mexico,
Connecticut and Illinois - banning it in the past 5 years.
Maryland lawmakers are expected to consider a ban next year, although the state
has executed just five people since 1976 and none since 2005.
The state's highest court placed a moratorium on executions in 2006 after
deciding that the state's regulations on lethal injections were outdated, and a
2009 law now requires biological evidence, videotaped confessions or conclusive
video evidence for the death penalty to be applicable.
Death penalty supporters have called the law an effective ban, but opponents
say it is time for an official repeal.
"We should get it off the books," said Delegate Samuel I. Rosenberg, Baltimore
Democrat who has proposed past bills to repeal the death penalty. "The
possibility of executing an innocent person, the extraordinary time, effort and
resources that go into death penalty cases can be used elsewhere."
(source: Washington Times)
******************************************************************
--New federal death sentence (CONN.)--
Federal judge to impose death sentence on Bridgeport triple murderer
A Bridgeport man will become the 1st person in at least 200 years to be
sentenced to death in a Connecticut federal courtroom when a judge formally
imposes the penalty on Dec. 17.
U.S. District Judge Janet Bond Arterton cleared the final hurdle to the
sentence when she denied a request for a new trial by Azibo Aquart. In 2011,
Aquart was convicted of federal charges in connection with drug dealing and the
brutal baseball bat deaths of Tina Johnson -- whom he considered a rival drug
dealer -- her boyfriend James Reid, and a family friend, Basil Williams.
The victims were beaten to death in an apartment on Charles Street in
Bridgeport on Aug. 24, 2005. All three were bound with duct tape that also
covered their faces.
The judge had considered defense requests to set aside the verdict and conduct
a new trial. The defense claimed that Lashika Johnson, Aquart's former
girlfriend and the sister of one of his henchmen, Efrain Johnson, committed
perjury while testifying in the separate trials of her ex-boyfriend and
brother.
That testimony involved questions about Johnson being threatened by
investigators. During Aquart's trial, she denied being threatened.
But during Efrain Johnson's trial 6 months later, she said that a federal
prosecutor screamed at her, threatened to put her in shackles and then jail,
and would make sure she lost custody of her children.
Aquart's defense team submitted a transcript of that testimony, citing the
inconsistencies.
Johnson was asked in that case by her brother's lawyer: "Did you feel that if
you didn't start saying different things that you could be going to jail...and
you could lose your kids?"
She responded "Yeah."
But Arterton was not convinced that would have changed the verdict for Aquart.
"The jury's decision to convict Mr. Aquart could hardly have been materially
affected by how accurately she characterized the government's confrontation
with her during her Oct. 14, 2008, interview," Arterton said in a 10-page
decision.
The judge wrote that the jury "had ample opportunity to assess Ms. Johnson's
credibility as a witness, knowing of law-enforcement pressure on her to change
her initial versions and denials, which the jury could consider along with the
testimony of 62 other witnesses in (Aquart's) trial, including the testimony of
the defendant's drug-trafficking co-conspirators, phone records, DNA evidence,
prison tapes and the testimony of John Taylor...who actually participated in
the murders of the three victims."
Efrain Johnson was convicted and faces a life sentence.
Azikiwe Aquart, Aquart's brother, was sentenced to life in prison; and John
Taylor was given 9 years in prison.
(source: News Times)
US MILITARY:
Hypnosis OKd for sergeant charged in Army clinic killings; Army Sgt. John
Russell is accused of killing five fellow soldiers at Camp Liberty in Iraq
A military judge has ruled that defense examiners can utilize hypnosis to help
Army Sgt. John Russell penetrate the haze of amnesia he says prevents him from
remembering the day he allegedly killed 5 fellow service members at a mental
health clinic in Iraq.
Monday's ruling is a boost for the defense, which hopes to show that Russell
should not face the death penalty because he was suffering from a mental
breakdown brought on by longstanding depression, mental illness and Army
psychiatrists who allegedly taunted him instead of treating him.
Judge David L. Conn also authorized the defense to hire an expert to conduct
tests for signs of physical brain damage, but ruled that defense lawyers hadn't
shown they need additional experts to analyze whether there were deficiencies
in the psychiatric care that Russell received at the hands of Army doctors. The
evidence already laid out so far, he said, suggests the defense is well able to
present such a case even without its bid to have an expert witness testify
about the Army's standards of care for combat stress.
The judge quoted from the defense's chief mental health consultant, Robert L.
Sadoff of the University of Pennsylvania, who has said he believes Russell was
"provoked to violence by the ineptitude and lack of compassion" of 2 of his
Army psychiatrists while he was in an acute state of depression.
Russell, a 48-year-old communications specialist from Sherman, Texas, was under
watch by colleagues who were worried he was falling apart and who had entreated
doctors at the Camp Liberty combat stress clinic to help him. On the day of the
shootings in May 2009, Russell stormed out of the Baghdad clinic after failing
to get much help, grabbed a weapon from a colleague, returned and opened fire,
killing 5 service members.
Army prosecutors, who are seeking the death penalty, have said the killings
grew out of conflicts Russell was having with members of his unit and assert
that Russell carried out the killings with full knowledge of what he was doing.
They argued in court against employing hypnosis to help him recover his memory
of that day, saying it can produce "spontaneous errors" in memory.
"There is no demonstrated value of hypnosis, as it is completely unreliable and
subject to easy manipulation," Army prosecutors argued in court papers.
Substantial questions remain about whether any evidence gleaned through
hypnosis will be admissible during Russell's court-martial. But his civilian
attorney, James Culp, said the court???s rulings could help prove to a military
jury that Russell cannot be considered mentally responsible for the shootings.
Culp noted that the same investigating officer who recommended that the 2009
attack at Ft. Hood in Texas be tried as a capital case, Col. James Pohl,
advised in 2011 against seeking the death penalty for Russell. Pohl concluded
that Russell suffered from an "undisputed mental disease or defect' that makes
capital punishment inappropriate.
Army commanders overturned that recommendation and this fall reaffirmed their
decision to seek the death penalty.
"Unexplainably, the prosecution continues to seek to kill Sgt. Russell," Culp
said in a statement.
The defense is "disappointed" not to have access to an expert on what standards
are set for Army combat stress psychiatrists, Culp said. "Nevertheless, we are
encouraged by the judge's rationale that the evidence of Sgt. Russell's
maltreatment and the significant role it played in the overall tragedy of this
case is so obvious and inexcusable, it requires no expert explanation."
Military prosecutors have said they are prohibited from commenting on the case.
(source: Los Angeles Times)
CALIFORNIA----female faces death penalty
Former Disney Princess Charged in Double Murder Case Gets Lowered Bail; Judge
halves $100,000 bail for Rachel Mae Buffett, 25, accused of lying to hide her
ex-fiance's alleged involvement in a grisly double murder.
A former Disneyland Princess accused of lying to help her ex-fiance cover-up a
double-murder and dismemberment saw her bail amount cut in half in a Santa Ana
courtroom Monday.
A judge lowered the bond for Rachel Mae Buffett, 25, from $100,000 to $50,000.
Authorities charge Buffett with misleading Costa Mesa Police officers during
the investigation of her former fiance, actor Daniel Patrick Wozniak.
Wozniak faces the death penalty if convicted of murdering and dismembering his
neighbor Samuel Herr in a Los Alamitos Theater in order to gain access to his
bank account and then killing the man's girlfriend, Juri "Julie" Kibuishi, in
an elaborate ploy to cover up his crime.
He is also accused of taking part of Herr's body and hiding them around Long
Beach's El Dorado Park, where they were found after his arrest.
Buffett's attorney Anja Sharma-Wilson said she had attempted to have Buffett
released on her own recognizance.
"She doesn't even own a passport," Sharma-Wilson said. "This girl is not a
flight risk."
Buffett is currently in custody, and Sharma-Wilson said she didn't know if the
family would be able to make the lower bail.
"I hope so, but I don't know," Sharma-Wilson said.
Buffett is due back in court Thursday morning for a preliminary hearing, and
Sharma-Wilson said she's looking forward to talking to prosecutors because she
doesn't see anything that would lead them to file felony charges against
Buffett.
The senior deputy district attorney handling the case could not be reached for
comment.
According to a statement from the Orange County District Attorney's office,
Buffett fabricated a story about Herr, 27, having family problems to throw
suspicion off Wozniak and help him "avoid and escape from arrest, trial,
conviction and punishment for the felony."
However, her family and her attorney have repeatedly said Buffett had no
knowledge of the murders before police contacted her.
Arrested Nov. 20, Buffett pleaded not guilty in court on Dec. 3.
Buffett faces 3 felony counts of accessory after the fact. If convicted, she
would face a maximum sentence of 3 years and 8 months in state prison.
Buffett, an actress who grew up in Seal Beach, worked as a princess at Medieval
Times and played several characters at Disneyland, including Princess Ariel and
Alice from Alice in Wonderland.
(source: Los Alamitos--Seal Beach Patch)
UTAH:
Brothers of murdered victim speak out
Greg Schultz is the brother of Todd Schultz, who was brutally murdered on Oct.
4, 1982 at the young age of 19, alongside his girlfriend Annette Cooper, 18.
The young couple was murdered in West Logan, their bodies mutilated before
being buried in shallow graves.
After believing for several years that Cooper's stepfather, Dale Johnston, had
committed the crimes, Greg Schultz, who is now 51, said that he no longer holds
any animosity towards Johnston now that he's been deemed an innocent man.
"We have no axe to grind with Dale Johnston, but my personal thing is that this
shows our justice system works with the appeals process, and it's obvious now
that the original investigation was botched up pretty bad," Schultz explained.
"It shows our court system does work, and the court system saw he was innocent.
I'm just glad he wasn't executed for a crime he didn't commit."
30 years later, the case appears to be solved and one man - Chester McKnight -
is in jail serving 20 years to life for their murders.
Johnston, who sat on death row after being found guilty in the 2 teens' death,
was eventually released and won his wrongful imprisonment lawsuit against Ohio
Attorney General Mike DeWine's office last month. However, DeWine's office
appealed the decision earlier this week.
Schultz recalled in an interview with The Logan Daily News earlier this week
that the night his brother didn't come home, his family knew something was
wrong.
"It wasn't like him to go away. It just wasn't in his nature to go off and not
tell anyone where he was going to be," Schultz explained.
Greg Schultz was just 2 weeks shy of his 21st birthday when his brother
disappeared. Being the closest in age to Todd out of all 4 siblings, the 2 grew
up and did everything together.
"I got up on Tuesday morning and saw Todd hadn't come home that night," Schultz
explained. "I was staying downstairs, and I checked in his room and his bed was
still made."
After telling his mom, Sandy, that Todd hadn't come home, Schultz said that he
went to work on Tuesday and Wednesday, but by the time Thursday arrived and his
brother still hadn't contacted anyone, they definitely knew something had
happened to him.
"We knew something had happened, but it didn't cross our mind he was dead,"
Schultz said. "That wasn't a common thing for Logan, especially back then."
11 days later, Schultz recalled, his brother and Cooper's body were positively
identified, and local attorney and family friend Will Kernen broke the news to
them at the Logan Fire Department, where Todd volunteered and his dad, Don,
worked.
"It was just devastating, just a shock, and we were in disbelief. It took a
little bit to wrap our head around it," Schultz said, adding that his dad was
on duty when the news arrived, but he had to wait for someone to come to the
department and relieve him.
Although Schultz says that the investigation was botched from the beginning and
that he holds no animosity towards Johnston and feels justice has been served,
he also believes that Johnston played a role in hindering the investigation.
"He acted creepy, like someone who was trying to cover up a crime, something
between him and Annette [Cooper]," Greg Schultz said. "People want to make him
out to be the victim, but he put himself in that position.
"I see a lot of people who are arrested for crimes they didn't commit, and a
lot of them have a history of behavior that puts a light on them," he added.
"You have to be responsible for your actions."
Speaking about the investigation which was conducted, Schultz said that he
understands why Johnston was zeroed in on as the primary suspect.
"It was a small town, and for some of these [investigators], this is their
moment... it???s get-serious time, and this is the 1st time some of them have
been involved with this big of a crime," Schultz said. "They get this guy who
seems kind of weird, is not acting right and not cooperating with them - I can
see where they put their blinders on. Were they objective? I don't think they
were, but Johnston acted creepy."
Schultz disagrees with a few things in a book published this summer that goes
into great detail about the murders and subsequent investigation.
The book, Guilty By Popular Demand, paints a picture that Todd was killed while
attempting to defend Cooper who was receiving sexual advances from Chester
McKnight.
The book alleges that Todd and Cooper were at a home in West Logan that night
to purchase marijuana, which Greg Schultz says is a complete falsehood.
According to both Schultz and his youngest brother, Erich Schultz, who now
works as a dispatcher at the Logan Police Department, Todd was a "square" and
was never involved with alcohol or drugs.
Erich, who was eight years younger than Todd, can remember hearing stories
about how Todd would be given a beer at a party, but would take it into the
kitchen and slowly pour it down the drain.
"This stuff about Todd looking for drugs and stuff, I never knew him to smoke
pot," Greg said. "He didn't even drink beer. He didn't like the taste of it, so
I didn't see that as accurate. He was a pretty square kid when it came to that
stuff. He wasn't looking for drugs. I think Annette knew Kenny [Linscott's]
girlfriend. They might have been walking and stopped by."
A few years ago, Erich was visited at the LPD by Linscott, who in 2009 pleaded
guilty to a 1st-degree misdemeanor of abusing Todd and Cooper's corpses.
After McKnight reportedly shot Todd and Cooper that night in West Logan,
Linscott reportedly held their bodies while McKnight cut off their limbs,
mutilating them in the process.
Linscott was requesting a background check from LPD, but didn't recognize who
Erich was. When another dispatcher asked Erich if he wanted them to handle the
request, Erich said no and decided to help Linscott himself.
"It's not a big deal, I was just doing my job," Erich told The Logan Daily
News. "He's not worth losing my job over."
Erich said that he made sure to print his name underneath his signature on the
paperwork before giving it to Linscott so that he could see who he was, though.
"He'll be judged by another power," Erich said. "I just turned it over to God,
so I don't have any animosity towards Kenny. I wouldn't go have a beer with him
if I saw him, but he didn't recognize me and I signed the form and I even
printed my name really big."
"He never seemed that remorseful in court, so just like I said, I've given up
that anything was going to happen here with a trial, so we were happy with what
we got," he continued.
Although Linscott originally faced three charges of aggravated murder, each of
which carried death-penalty specifications for his involvement, he pleaded
guilty to a 1st-degree misdemeanor of abusing a corpse in June 2009. The charge
carried up to a 6-month jail sentence and a $1,000 fine.
Since Linscott had been in jail since September 2008 and had served more than 6
months in jail, he was subsequently released.
According to Greg, the prosecution was afraid that if they took Linscott to
trial that they might lose.
"We said if you try him, and he's found not guilty, we can live with that, and
that's what we told them, and then they came back and said they were going to
do a plea deal with him, and it was just another disappointment with the legal
system in Hocking County," he said. "Then this book comes up from Osinski, and
it's like, for crying out loud, we've been through a lot, and someone else is
painting Dale [Johnston] as the poor victim.
"We thought Dale [Johnston] was guilty, he got out, we felt we got the
runaround on that, and it was just kind of like no one cared," Greg continued.
"It wasn't until the state got involved that we found out there were other
avenues to investigate, so up until that time, we felt like we weren't getting
justice and we thought the person who we thought murdered our brother and son
was free, and had gotten away with the crime.
"We cooperated with Bill [Osinski], and he said he would write a book and
wanted to make Todd out to be a hero," Greg added. "Instead, he painted my
brother out as a deadbeat unemployed bum, but he was going to Columbus looking
for jobs and stuff. And about Todd trying to make some quick money by getting
Dale's car - that never happened. The reason she needed that car is because she
was looking to get a job in Lancaster to go to Ohio University. She wanted to
go to campus and needed the car. Todd had a car, but she needed an extra car to
drive."
(source: Perry Daily)
COLORADO:
Lawyers for accused Colorado shooter to subpoena Fox News reporter
An attorney for accused Colorado theater gunman James Holmes said in court on
Monday he will subpoena a Fox News reporter to reveal her source for a news
story about the massacre, setting up a potential First Amendment showdown.
Public defender Daniel King said he plans to subpoena New York-based
correspondent Jana Winter, who days after the July 20 rampage reported Holmes
had sent a notebook to a psychiatrist detailing his plans to commit mass
murder.
Holmes, a 24-year-old former neuroscience graduate student, is charged with
multiple counts of murder and attempted murder for the shooting spree in the
Denver suburb of Aurora, Colorado that killed 12 people and wounded 58.
King said the story, which cited an unnamed law enforcement source, violated a
gag order imposed by Arapahoe County District Judge William Sylvester.
"We have not received a subpoena on Jana Winter's behalf and will evaluate once
we do," a Fox News spokesperson told Reuters.
The psychiatrist, Lynne Fenton, is on staff at the University of Colorado,
where she saw Holmes as a patient before he started the process to withdraw
from the university before the massacre.
The move by King came after a court hearing in which more than a dozen law
enforcement officers who saw the package containing the notebook in a
university mail room denied under oath that they were the source of the leak.
On the night of the shooting, Holmes bought a ticket to the movie, but left the
theater minutes into the film to put on tactical body armor and a gas mask. He
returned to the theater and fired on the audience using several weapons, police
have said.
In court on Monday, a bearded Holmes sat impassively throughout the hearing,
shackled and dressed in maroon prison clothes.
Holmes' parents attended the legal proceeding, the 1st time they have been in
court since their son's arrest. Holmes turns 25 on December 13.
His lawyers are asking the judge to impose sanctions on prosecutors for the
leaked information about the notebook.
Craig Silverman, a former Denver prosecutor now in private practice, said
Holmes' lawyers are making an issue of the notebook in the hope that the judge
take the death penalty off the table as a sanction against the prosecutors.
"There's a real danger that the sideshow is taking over the circus," said
Silverman, who attended the hearing.
(source: Reuters)
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