[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, PENN., MD., VA., N.C.

[Rick Halperin]

Nov. 21



TEXAS----impending execution

Panetti Attorneys File Stay Request With CCA


Attorneys for schizophrenic death row inmate Scott Louis Panetti on Thursday 
asked the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals to halt his impending Dec. 3 
execution, claiming their client is too incompetent to be legally put to death.

"This is not a last-minute filing designed to delay the execution," wrote 
Kathryn Kase of Houston, Panetti's volunteer attorney. "Nor is his claim 
frivolous. He has made a colorable showing that he is not competent to be 
executed."

In their filing, Kase of the Texas Defender Service and co-counsel Gregory 
Wiercioch of the University of Wisconsin Law School, detail a Nov. 6 visit with 
their client and interviews with Texas Department of Criminal Justice staff. 
Both, they say, reveal how Panetti's mental state is deteriorating. Panetti was 
last assessed for competency to stand execution nearly 7 years ago.

The 56-year-old's paranoid delusions in recent years, they write, have included 
believing that someone is putting "Satanic graffiti" on his cell walls, and 
that TDCJ is watching him through pumpkin decorations at the Polunsky Unit 
where he is detained.

This stay request is the latest, rushed chapter in what has been a 22-year 
legal odyssey for Panetti, who has had seen execution dates come and go before.

In 2004, he was granted a stay the day before his scheduled execution. In 2007, 
1 of his appeals made it to the U.S. Supreme Court which ruled that mentally 
ill inmates can be executed only if they understand what is about to happen and 
why. Because Panetti's competency has not been assessed since 2007, his 
attorneys claim, there's no way to know if he meets that test.

This plea to the state's highest criminal court came after state District Judge 
Keith Williams of the 216th District Court in Gillespie County denied a request 
to change Panetti's execution date so he could undergo a new competency 
assessment. Kase said she and her co-counsel were not even notified of the Dec. 
3 execution date, and learned of it 2 weeks after it was set, on Oct. 30.

Panetti, a Wisconsin native was sentenced to death in 1995 after representing 
himself at trial and dressing up in a cowboy suit in court. Court documents 
show he has had been hospitalized a dozen times for mental illness and, at the 
time of the murders of Joe Gaitan Alvarado Jr. and Amanda Carrion Alvarado, was 
collecting federal disability checks.

A separate clemency request filed a week ago to the Texas Board of Pardons and 
Paroles and Gov. Rick Perry bears the support of Texas lawmakers, mental health 
officials, Christian leaders, former federal prosecutors, judges, former Texas. 
Gov. Mark White and former U.S. Congressman and presidential candidate, Ron 
Paul.

"The circumstances of this case present a situation where execution does not 
serve the state of Texas. Respectfully I request that you grant clemency in 
this case," wrote Paul.

(source: Texas Tribune)






PENNSYLVANIA:

Montco baby killer gets death penalty


A Montgomery County judge imposed death sentences Thursday to the man convicted 
of killing 61-year-old Satyavathi Venna and her 10-month-old granddaughter, 
Saanvi Venna, in October 2012.

"The jury said you did it," Common Pleas Court Judge Steven O'Neill said to 
Raghunandan Yandamuri before imposing the jury's sentence. "You were convicted. 
It is you they sentenced to death. Make no mistake about it."

Yandamuri, 28, of King of Prussia, was also found guilty of one count of 
robbery, burglary, kidnapping and abuse of a corpse.

Judge O'Neill described the crimes as "borne of a man who appears to have no 
conscious" and that Yandamuri used his cunning to get into he Marquis 
Apartments in Upper Merion and that he betrayed the trust of a family who came 
to the United States for a better life. For the other charges, Judge O'Neill 
said Yandamuri deserved nothing less than "total confinement" and handed down 
the longest sentences for each crime allowed by law.

For counts of robbery, kidnapping, burglary and abuse of a corpse, Yandamuri 
was sentenced to 31 to 62 years in prison.

Before he was sentenced, Yandamuri said he felt sorry for the family.

"I apologize to the victims. I feel sorry for them," he said.

The Venna family was not in court on Thursday.

Yandamuri further stated that during the course of the past 2 years he has met 
"many nice people" and appreciated the fact that the district attorney's office 
did everything they could to give him a fair trial.

He also stated he did not blame the detectives in the case which contradicts 
the arguments he made in trial. In trial he constantly stated the lead 
detective, Montgomery County Detective Paul Bradbury, lied about how Yandamuri 
was treated while being questioned at the Upper Merion police department in 
October of 2012. Throughout the trial he also blamed investigators for not 
following up on his theory that 2 other men were involved in the murders.

Yandamuri's case will automatically go to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court for 
review. Judge O'Neill appointed Stephen Heckman, who acted as stand-by counsel 
during the trial, and sentencing phase attorney Henry Hilles as Yandamuri's 
appellate counsel.

Yandamuri was found guilty of 2 counts of 1st-degree murder on Oct. 9 after 2 
days of jury deliberation following a month and a half long trial.

The investigation began on Oct. 22, 2012, when police were called to the 
Marquis Apartments in Upper Merion for a report of a killing and a missing 
child. Police soon learned from the victim's son that his daughter was missing 
and he had found a ransom note at the scene of the crime demanding $50,000 for 
his daughter's life.

The ransom note used nicknames for the baby's parents that only a few people 
were familiar with. After going down a list, investigators found Yandamuri and, 
after several hours of questioning on Oct. 25-Oct. 26, 2012, Yandamuri admitted 
to the killings. He then told police he put the body of Saanvi Venna in the 
sauna of the Marquis Apartments after she died.

During trial however, he tried to present evidence to the jury that 2 white 
men, whom he ever identified only as Josh and Matt, forced him to help them 
into the apartment where the killed Satyavathi Venna and kidnapped Saanvi 
Venna.

(source: delcotimes.com)






MARYLAND:

O'Malley asks to meet with families of death row inmates' victims


With 2 months left in office, Gov. Martin O'Malley has asked to meet with at 
least 2 families whose loved ones were killed by men on Maryland's death row - 
a move that might signal the governor is poised to take action on death penalty 
cases..

Since the state acted last year to abolish the death penalty for future cases, 
advocates on both sides of the issue have been watching to see whether O'Malley 
would grant clemency to 4 men already on death row.

Mary Francis Moore of Boonsboro is scheduled to talk with O'Malley on Monday 
about one of them, Heath William Burch, who in 1995 killed Moore's father and 
his wife with scissors during a drug-fueled break-in of their home.

"We're very upset with this. We don't know what's happening," said Moore, 71, 
who said she and her family fear O'Malley might decide to grant Burch clemency. 
"The way they keep changing things, is this guy going to eventually get out?"

Dorothy Atkinson of Salisbury, whose son was murdered by death row inmate Jody 
Lee Miles in 1997, said an aide to O'Malley called her Tuesday and said the 
governor wanted to speak with her. A date for their meeting has not been set.

Though Atkinson believes Miles deserves to be executed, she submitted a letter 
to O'Malley 2 weeks ago, asking him to commute Miles' sentence to put an end to 
court proceedings, which she says are painful for the family.

Atkinson said she is angry the case has dragged on so long but glad O'Malley 
will meet with her.

"He's not been through this. He doesn't know what it's like," she said.

Meanwhile, Baltimore County State's Attorney Scott Shellenberger - a staunch 
death penalty supporter - said the governor's office contacted him in an 
attempt to locate relatives of the victims of death row inmates Vernon Evans 
and Anthony Grandison.

"Unfortunately, we really do not have any family members in those cases, 
because so many people have passed away over the passage of time," 
Shellenberger said. Evans and Grandison were convicted of the contract murder 
of 2 people in a Pikesville hotel in 1983.

O'Malley has largely refused to discuss the fate of the men who were already 
sentenced to death when Maryland repealed the death penalty, saying only that 
he would consider each case as requests for clemency reached his desk. A lawyer 
for Burch said recently that he submitted such a petition earlier this year.

A spokesman for the governor declined to comment for this article.

This month, Maryland Attorney General Douglas F. Gansler said his office has 
concluded that the state no longer has the authority to execute anyone, even 
though the repeal legislation was not intended to be retroactive. Gansler is 
joining lawyers for Miles in arguing that the state can't issue new regulations 
for how to carry out executions now that capital punishment has been abolished. 
The old rules were thrown out by a court in 2006.

Though Miles' appeal faces an uncertain outcome in the courts, Gansler noted 
that O'Malley has the ability with the stroke of a pen to commute death 
sentences to life without parole. Governors in Illinois and New Jersey commuted 
the existing death sentences in their states after the repeal of capital 
punishment.

Shellenberger opposes commutation. "We believe that the convictions in Evans 
and Grandison have been upheld on appeal, on numerous occasions. The law passed 
that repealed the death penalty did nothing to change the validity of those 
convictions," Shellenberger said.

Jane Henderson, executive director of Maryland Citizens Against State 
Executions, said O'Malley should commute the sentences of all 4 death row 
inmates and was pleased to hear he had reached out to victims' relatives.

"One of the biggest reasons [to commute the sentences] is just to end this and 
not put the families through more legal procedures, when everyone knows there's 
no way to carry out a death sentence in Maryland," Henderson said.

Burch, 45, was sentenced to die in 1996 for killing Robert Davis, 70, and Cleo 
Davis, 77, in their Capitol Heights home. Moore said it has been years since 
she heard anything about the case. She said O'Malley's aides did not 
specifically say why he was seeking the meeting but mentioned Burch.

O'Malley's "been in there how many years and never touched this. Now all of a 
sudden he's paying attention?" said Moore, who lives in Washington County. 
"It's like he's trying to get this resolved before he leaves."

Moore said her conversation with O'Malley on Monday will be over the phone. She 
declined a face-to-face meeting, not because she does not want to meet with the 
governor, but because she generally prefers to stay at home with her family on 
their farm. She said her mind has been racing about what the governor wants to 
speak to her about.

"I've got to get myself prepared," she said. "I've got to write things down. I 
want to be able to kind of go step to step with him."

Moore believes the move might be politically motivated, with O'Malley, a 
Democrat, preparing to leave office and with the election of a new governor, 
Republican Larry Hogan, who opposed the repeal of capital punishment. Hogan has 
been noncommittal about the remaining inmates.

Burch's attorney, Michael E. Lawlor, could not be reached for comment Thursday. 
Earlier this month, he said the "basic element of consistency and fairness 
would seem to dictate that these 4 individuals be removed from death row and 
given sentences of life."

Burch lived down the street from the Davises, and admitted in court that he was 
high on crack and intended to rob them to get money to buy more drugs.

Robert Davis, a World War II veteran and retired Washington, D.C., firefighter, 
confronted Burch with a gun but didn't fire after he recognized his neighbor.

Burch beat and stabbed the couple dozens of times with a pair of scissors, 
stole four guns and a small amount of cash, and fled in their pickup truck.

He was sentenced to 2 death sentences, one of which the state's highest court 
overturned. The appeal divided the 7-member Court of Appeals, with Chief Judge 
Robert M. Bell writing that errors in sentencing meant the court should 
overturn both death sentences.

A Prince George's County judge signed his death warrant in 2004, and execution 
dates have been set, only to be canceled.

Moore's uncle and Robert Davis' brother, Jack, said Burch should have been put 
to death years ago.

"He should get what he's sentenced to," Jack Davis, who now lives in Florida, 
said Thursday.

Davis said he initially had mixed emotions when the sentence was handed down - 
"I'm not a killer," he said - but he believes Burch's sentence should be 
upheld.

"The judge ordered to give him the death penalty. What the hell does the 
governor have to change that?" he said.

(source: Baltimore Sun)






VIRGINIA:

5 Virginia death row inmates challenge solitary confinement


5 of Virginia's death row inmates alleged in a lawsuit Thursday that their 
nearly constant solitary confinement is unconstitutional and they should be 
give more freedom to exercise in the gym and see their immediate family members 
without a glass partition.

The lawsuit filed in federal district court in the Eastern District of Virginia 
asks that the five inmates be given the same privileges as inmate Alfredo 
Prieto, whose challenge to his own solitary confinement led a federal judge 
last year to rule that corrections officials could not impose such extreme 
isolation unilaterally and automatically. Prison officials have appealed that 
decision.

At stake in the lawsuit - as it seemed to be in Prieto's case - is just how 
solitary life should be for Virginia's death row inmates, and exactly what 
prison officials have to do in each case to justify imposing isolation. 
According to the Death Penalty Information Center, the state has 8 inmates on 
death row, including Prieto and those involved in the more recent lawsuit.

The suit - filed on behalf of Thomas Porter, Anthony Juniper, Ivan Teleguz, 
Mark Lawlor and Ricky Gray - alleges that forcing death row inmates to spend 
nearly every hour of every day in small cells with "almost no contact with 
other human beings" is a form of cruel and unusual punishment.

All of those in the suit have been convicted of heinous crimes, including 
murders of a police officer and children.

The lawsuit says the inmates asked for the same privileges as those given to 
Prieto - who was allowed to exercise in the gym and see his immediate family 
without a glass partition after his legal challenge - but were denied. Prieto 
was convicted of murder in California and of killing a man and woman near 
Reston in 1988.

"It's outrageous for the state to provide legally mandated relief for one of a 
bunch of similarly situated persons, particularly when what's at issue is 
having to live in such horrific conditions," said Victor M. Glasberg, 1 of the 
lawyers who filed the suit.

Although the lawsuit claims prison officials have relaxed the conditions under 
which Prieto was confined, Virginia officials have fought his case all the way 
to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit, arguing that restrictive, 
solitary confinement conditions for death row inmates are necessary to keep the 
prison safe from people with little to lose.

U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema had rejected those arguments and ordered 
prison officials to either determine death row inmates' confinement conditions 
on a case-by-case basis or to change all of their confinement conditions, "if 
only slightly," so that they are not so restrictive.

The appeals court has not yet ruled on the case, and the ruling certainly could 
undercut the more recent lawsuit.

The 5 inmates - who have been on death row from 3 to 9 years - do not suggest 
specific ways in which they should be given more liberties, except to say that 
they want to be treated like Prieto. They complain, though, that their cells 
are not adjacent to any others, and that they are only allowed to see family 
members for non-contact visits in a room with a glass partition. They also 
complain that the recreation room they are allowed to use for 1 hour a day, 5 
days a week is a small outdoor cell without exercise equipment.

Michael Kelly, a spokesman for the Virginia attorney general's office, said he 
could not comment because state lawyers had not yet reviewed the lawsuit.

(source: Washington Post)






NORTH CAROLINA:

Racial Justice Act decision pending in Supreme Court


Racial Justice Act Timeline

August 1994: Marcus Reymond Robinson is sentenced to death for the 1991 robbery 
and murder of a teenager.

May 1998: Tilmon Golphin and his younger brother, Kevin, are sentenced to death 
for the murder of a deputy and a state trooper. Kevin is later removed from 
death row because of his age at the time of the killings.

July 2000: Christina S. "Queen" Walters is sentenced to die for leading a gang 
that kidnaps 3 women, killing 2 and shooting the 3rd.

October 2002: Quintel Augustine gets the death penalty for murdering a 
Fayetteville police officer.

January 2007: Robinson is scheduled to be executed, but a a judge halts his and 
all other executions in North Carolina because of legal questions about the 
state's execution methods and practices.

August 2009: The Democratic-controlled General Assembly and Democratic governor 
pass the Racial Justice Act. Most death row inmates file claims in the next 
year.

April 2012: Superior Court Judge Greg Weeks orders Robinson removed from death 
row under the terms of the law.

July 2012: The legislature, now controlled by Republicans, modifies the Racial 
Justice Act to make it harder to use.

December 2012: Judge Weeks orders Walters, Golphin and Augustine removed from 
death row under both the 2009 version and the 2012 version of the Racial 
Justice Act.

June 2013: The Republican-controlled legislature repeals the Racial Justice 
Act. It also passes a law on execution protocols intended to resume executions, 
which have been in hiatus since 2007 because of a legal fight over the 
protocols.

April 2014: The N.C. Supreme Court hears arguments on whether the Racial 
Justice Act was correctly appplied in removing Robinson, Walters, Augustine and 
Golphin from death row.

November 2014: A ruling from the Supreme Court is pending. Executions have not 
resumed because the 2007 litigation over protocols is unresolved.

--

It's been 7 months since the state Supreme Court heard arguments on whether 4 
convicted murderers were correctly or wrongly removed from death row based on 
evidence of racism in North Carolina's criminal justice system.

And it's been 8 years since North Carolina has last carried out an execution.

The state's method of carrying out the death penalty has been paralyzed in 
state and federal courts since January 2007.

People for and against the death penalty and the Racial Justice Act are 
watching for resolution to both issues.

On Nov. 10, a judge gave prisoners' lawyers until Dec. 10 to file new paperwork 
challenging the execution protocols.

A Supreme Court ruling on the Racial Justice Act, the controversial law that 
allowed the four inmates to come off death row in 2012, could come as soon as 
Dec. 12, when it's next expected to publish decisions.

But there is no certainty to that date.

It's to be expected that the Supreme Court has yet to rule on the Racial 
Justice Act cases, said lawyer Ken Rose of the Center for Death Penalty 
Litigation in Durham.

"It's a very difficult, huge issue for the court that affects a lot of people," 
Rose said. "And it doesn't surprise me that they're being very deliberative 
about it."

Regardless of the Racial Justice Act ruling, executions are unlikely to resume 
anytime soon, Rose said. The fight in state and federal court over the state's 
method of execution will remain unresolved. Rose predicted there will be no 
executions in in North Carolina in 2015.

Local inmates

The Racial Justice Act of 2009 has been the most-visible death penalty law in 
North Carolina in the past five years, and often was incorrectly blamed for 
North Carolina's unofficial moratorium on executions.

Passed when Democrats controlled state government, the law said death row 
inmates could ask judges to review their cases to see if racism was a factor in 
their prosecutions, convictions and death sentences. If a judge found racism to 
be a significant factor in an inmate's case, he would commute the sentence from 
death to life in prison without parole.

In the year after the law passed in August 2009, all but 8 of the approximately 
155 people on death row at that time sought relief. These included whites as 
well as black and American Indian defendants.

One way the inmates attacked their death sentences was to criticize the jury 
selection of their trials. If they could prove that prosecutors were racist in 
deciding which jurors were allowed to be seated, the inmates could win commuted 
sentences.

It's illegal for a prosecutor to consider the race of a potential juror when 
deciding whether to strike him from the panel.

The initial batch of Racial Justice Act claimants alleged that the prosecutors 
operated on a theory that black jurors were less likely to convict or sentence 
a person to death than white jurors.

The 1st claimant, Marcus Reymond Robinson, had statistical data that said 
prosecutors struck black potential jurors more often than whites.

Robinson was on death row for robbing and killing a 17-year-old who had given 
him a ride in Fayetteville.

The next 3 claimants used this data, plus notes made by the prosecutors to make 
their claims.

Those 3 are Christina Walters, who led a gang that kidnapped and shot 3 women, 
killing 2; Tilmon Golphin, who with his brother killed a deputy and a state 
trooper; and Quintel Augustine, who was convicted of killing a Fayetteville 
police officer.

In spring and fall 2012, Cumberland County Superior Court Judge Greg Weeks 
commuted the sentences of the 4 inmates.

Robinson's case led the legislature in summer 2012, and now controlled by 
Republicans, to make it harder to use statistical data to prove a Racial 
Justice Act claim.

Weeks' decision on the other 3 claims later that year spurred lawmakers to 
repeal the entire law in 2013 in an attempt to stop any other inmates from 
using it.

It remains in dispute whether the death row inmates who had claims pending when 
the law was repealed can still use it.

The Supreme Court heard arguments in the 4 original cases in April and received 
hundreds of pages in legal briefs.

The state Attorney General Office argues that Weeks made numerous mistakes.

Among them:

--That Weeks misinterpreted the law.

--That he was wrong to conclude that the statistics proved there was racism.

--That he was wrong to conclude that racism was proven in Robinson's case.

--And that he prevented prosecution witnesses who could have rebutted some of 
the evidence from testifying. The inmates' lawyers contend that the Attorney 
General's Office is wrong and Weeks was correct in his interpretation and 
application of the law and the evidence presented.

When rulings come down, there are several possible outcomes, said Rose, who 
represents Golphin.

"Affirm the life sentence, vacate and impose the death sentence, or remand for 
further consideration and further hearing," Rose said.

If the cases are remanded, they would return to Cumberland County Superior 
Court.

Weeks has retired, so it's not certain which judge would take up the case.

Deadline nears

Separately, the court system is evaluating North Carolina's execution methods.

The dispute arose in January 2007, when Robinson was scheduled to be executed.

He and several other inmates facing imminent execution persuaded a Wake County 
Superior Court judge to halt all executions to consider whether North Carolina 
officials had obeyed state law when they set up the procedures.

There have been other related challenges over the years that further blocked 
executions.

In the meantime, it has become more difficult for states to obtain all three of 
the drugs that were used to kill the inmates - some drug makers don't want to 
be associated with capital punishment.

Frustrated by the delay and impediments, state lawmakers in summer 2013 changed 
the law on execution protocols in an effort to clear a path to resume 
executions.

For example, the law said that a single drug, chosen by the Secretary of the 
Department of Public Safety, could be used to kill the condemned.

These changes were in the same bill that repealed the Racial Justice Act.

"This new legislation will start the dead men walking once again," said state 
Sen. Thom Goolsby of Wilmington, the bill sponsor, in March 2013.

State Rep. Paul Stam told the Associated Press that summer that he expected it 
would be a matter of many months instead of years before executions resumed.

But instead of spurring executions, the law change instead has given death row 
inmates more ammunition to delay their dates with the executioner's needle.

"The General Assembly created a new set of issues, is what I would say," Rose 
said. "Every time they change it, there's another, a new set of questions that 
they raise."

Inmates are challenging the new law and its implementation.

"That is holding up executions, I would say, for the foreseeable future, 
certainly through 2015," Rose said.

On Nov. 10, Wake County Superior Court Judge Donald W. Stephens gave lawyers 
for the death row defendants until Dec. 10 to file their latest arguments.

(source: Fayetteville Observer)