[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----OHIO, MISS., LA., IND., TENN., MO.

[Rick Halperin]

Sept. 16



OHIO:

Quadruple murder suspect pleads not guilty


The man suspected of killing 4 men over 2 days on or near Labor Day pleaded not 
guilty to all charges Monday.

With his hands shackled, wearing orange jail attire and displaying no emotion, 
Donald W. Hoffman, 41, sat between lead counsel Robert Whitney and co-counsel 
Rolf Whitney in Crawford County Common Pleas Court as Robert Whitney read his 
plea.

A grand jury last week charged Hoffman with 8 counts of aggravated murder in 
the deaths of Billjack Chatman, Jerald Smith, Freelin Hensley and Darrell E. 
Lewis, 2 counts of aggravated murder per victim.

Victims' family members and others filled most of the right side of the seating 
in the courtroom. A pretrial hearing date will be set in the future. Bond was 
continued.

Hoffman remains incarcerated at the Crawford County Justice Center on $10 
million bond, $2.5 million for each of the 4 cases. Prosecutor Matt Crall said 
he would seek the death penalty if Hoffman is convicted.

Police previously confirmed all 4 victims were beaten.

The murders shocked the normally peaceful community, Crall said.

"The reason people want to live in Crawford County is the peace and quiet," 
Crall said.

He said family members are understandably upset and angry. "I can't imagine 
what they're going through," Crall said.

According to police records, on Aug. 30 Chatman reportedly called an ambulance 
for Hoffman, who said he was the victim of an assault. The emergency call to 
police indicated Hoffman said he was beaten by up to 8 people.

Police responded initially to 2 calls of bodies discovered on Labor Day. The 
next morning, Hoffman went to the police station as a person of interest in the 
case. 2 more bodies were found that day.

Hoffman has a history of criminal activity in both Crawford and Marion 
counties, including felony theft and burglary convictions in 2009 and 2010 in 
Marion.

(source: USA Today)

*******************

Opening statements given in Akron death penalty trial delayed by accusations of 
judge's bias


Text messages and a fingerprint will be presented during the capital murder 
trial of 1 of 2 men accused in quadruple homicide.

Deshanon Haywood, 22, faces the death penalty if convicted of the aggravated 
murder of 4 people on April 18, 2013, at a townhome on Kimlyn Circle.

Opening statements in the case began on Monday.

The case against Haywood was postponed in June when prosecutors accused Summit 
County Common Pleas Judge Mary Margaret Rowlands of being biased against the 
death penalty in this case.

Rowlands ultimately recused herself, and the case is being presided over by 
Judge Paul Gallagher.

In opening statements Monday, Assistant Summit County Prosecutor Joe Dangelo 
said witnesses will testify that they drove to the townhome with Haywood, 22, 
and Derrick Brantley, 22, who is serving 4 consecutive life sentences for 
aggravated murder in the case.

He is accused of trying to rip off heroin dealer Ronald Roberts, 24. Haywood 
and Brantley then fatally shot Roberts, as well as Kem Delaney, 23, Maria Nash, 
19, and Kiana Welch, 19 - at least once in the back of the head, prosecutors 
said.

Dangelo said investigators found Haywood's thumb print on a shoe box found on 
the kitchen counter that contained heroin and a drug scale. He said text 
messages show Brantley told Haywood he planned to shoot 1 of the men found 
dead.

Defense attorney Brian Pierce said another man, Isaac Love, who alerted police 
to the dead bodies, bought a shipment of 100 grams of heroin for himself and 
Roberts the night before the killings.

He also said that several of the prosecutor's witnesses lied to police during 
interviews and that Haywood's DNA was never found inside the basement. Pierce 
also pointed out were sent from Brantley, not Haywood, and that Haywood's phone 
at the time was off and couldn't receive the messages.

********************

Brothers charged in Jim Brennan's death are indicted in gas station robbery


2 brothers charged for their roles in the death of Cleveland Heights restaurant 
owner Jim Brennan were indicted Monday and accused of robbing a gas station 
hours after Brennan was slain.

A Cuyahoga County grand jury accused Devonne and Paul Turner of Cleveland with 
aggravated robbery in the heist at Gas Express at 3726 Clark Ave. on 
Cleveland's West Side on June 30. Officials said the men were captured on 
videotape.

The grand jury also charged them with felonious assault, kidnapping, theft of 
more than $1,000 and gun charges.

Defense attorney David Grant, who represents Devonne Turner, said he could not 
comment because he has not seen any reports on the case. Paul Turner's 
attorney, Richard Drucker, said his client denies any wrongdoing.

For the Turners, the charges are the latest allegations brought by Cuyahoga 
County prosecutors.

Devonne Turner, Brandon Jones and Darien Jones are charged with aggravated 
murder, kidnapping, aggravated robbery, aggravated burglary and felonious 
assault in the slaying of Brennan at his restaurant, Brennan's Colony.

Each is being held in the county jail on $1 million bond. The Joneses are 
brothers who live in Garfield Heights.

Turner's brother, Paul, has been charged with obstructing justice, tampering 
with evidence and illegally possessing a weapon while a convicted felon. He is 
being held on $500,000 bond.

The 4 have pleaded not guilty to charges involving Brennan. On June 30, 
Brennan's restaurant was closed, but he was there preparing for the week. 
Lawyers in the case have told The Plain Dealer that Darien Jones shot Brennan.

Prosecutors will consider this week whether he, Brandon Jones and Devonne 
Turner will face the death penalty in that case.

At the time of Brennan's slaying, the Turners were wanted on a warrant for 
failing to appear for a June 4 hearing in another robbery case. In that 
indictment, records show, the brothers were accused of robbing and attacking 2 
people in April.

Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge Maureen Clancy is handling Brennan slaying, 
as well as the case of the April robbery. She also is expected to handle the 
new indictment against the Turners.

The Turners are expected to appear for an initial hearing on the new charges 
Thursday.

(source for both: cleveland.com)






MISSISSIPPI:

Mississippi Death Row Case Faults Bite-Mark Forensics


In one of the country's 1st nationally televised criminal trials, of the 
smirking serial murderer Ted Bundy in Florida in 1979, jurors and viewers alike 
were transfixed as dental experts showed how Mr. Bundy's crooked teeth 
resembled a bite on a 20-year-old victim.

Mr. Bundy was found guilty and the obscure field of "forensic dentistry" won a 
place in the public imagination.

Since then, expert testimony matching body wounds with the dentition of the 
accused has played a role in hundreds of murder and rape cases, sometimes 
helping to put defendants on death row.

But over this same period, mounting evidence has shown that matching body 
wounds to a suspect's dentition is prone to bias and unreliable.

A disputed bite-mark identification is at the center of an appeal that was 
filed Monday with the Mississippi Supreme Court. Eddie Lee Howard Jr., 61, has 
been on death row for 2 decades for the murder and rape of an 84-year-old 
woman, convicted largely because of what many experts call a far-fetched match 
of his teeth to purported bite wounds, discerned only after the woman's body 
had been buried and exhumed.

The identification was made by Dr. Michael West, a Mississippi dentist who was 
sought out by prosecutors across the country in the 1980s and 1990s but whose 
freewheeling methods "put a huge black eye on bite-mark evidence," in the words 
of Dr. Richard Souviron, a Florida-based dental expert who helped identify Mr. 
Bundy in 1979, in an interview last week.

Since 2000, at least 17 people convicted of murder or rape based on "expert" 
bite matches have been exonerated and freed, usually because DNA tests showed 
they had been wrongfully accused, according to research by the Innocence 
Project in New York. Dr. West was the expert witness in two of those cases.

In 6 additional cases, one involving Dr. West and one involving Dr. Souviron, 
indictments and arrests linked to bite-mark identifications were dropped after 
new evidence showed that the matches were wrong.

Still, without glaring new proof of innocence, courts have been reluctant to 
reopen cases based on even the most dubious of dental claims, leaving scores 
more defendants with questionable convictions to languish in prison or on death 
row, said Chris Fabricant, the Innocence Project's director of strategic 
litigation.

One of them is Mr. Howard. His appeal cites the scientific consensus that 
bite-mark identifications are unreliable, and questions the methods used by Dr. 
West. The appeal to reverse his conviction, prepared by the Mississippi 
Innocence Project at the University of Mississippi, also cites newly completed 
DNA testing that found no traces of Mr. Howard on the murder weapon, the body 
or elsewhere at the crime scene.

Georgia Kemp, a reclusive 84-year-old in Columbus, Miss., had been stabbed to 
death and was partially dressed when police found her body among smoldering 
fires in her rundown house in 1992. The medical examiner found bruises 
"consistent with" rape but no hair or semen to prove it.

In the absence of fingerprints or witnesses, it was understandable when the 
police turned to Mr. Howard as a person of interest: Only 4 months earlier, he 
had gone to Columbus after spending most of the 2 previous decades in prison 
for attempted rapes.

But soon enough, an arguably shoddy process of justice began.

Mr. Howard had a history of mental illness and he made a series of seemingly 
incriminating, if contradictory and irrational, statements that made him the 
prime suspect. Though no confession was recorded or written down, he reportedly 
told 1 police officer that "the case is solved" and that "I had a temper and 
that's why this happened," even as he said that 6 others were involved and he 
failed to recognize Ms. Kemp's house.

3 days after Ms. Kemp was buried, the medical examiner had her exhumed so that 
Dr. West could look for bite marks using a fluorescent light method he had 
developed. He said he found 3 bites and - without showing any photographs or 
other evidence - testified at trial that Mr. Howard was the biter "to a 
reasonable medical certainty."

Adding to the circumstantial evidence, Mr. Howard's girlfriend said he had 
bitten her during sex and that he smelled like smoke the day after the murder.

Mr. Howard, who steadfastly maintained his innocence after those initial 
ramblings, defended himself, disastrously, at his trial in 1992, resulting in a 
speedy guilty verdict and sentence of death.

He was retried in 2000 after the Mississippi Supreme Court said he had been 
incompetent to represent himself. But his new court-ordered lawyers hardly did 
better, failing to call any witnesses at his new trial, not even a forensic 
expert to counter the prosecutor???s assertion that Dr. West was "a pioneer, a 
visionary" who had made a positive identification "just like a fingerprint."

The death sentence was reimposed and the Supreme Court has refused so far to 
reopen his conviction. In a 2006 ruling, the court said: "Just because Dr. West 
has been wrong a lot, does not mean, without something more, that he was wrong 
here." The court did agree in 2010 to order DNA testing of the knife and other 
crime scene objects, with new results described as exculpatory in Mr. 
Howard???s newest appeal.

Dr. West retired as an expert witness several years ago to a dental practice in 
Hattiesburg, after, according to his r???sum???, investigating more than 5,200 
deaths and more than 300 bite marks over 29 years.

In a deposition in 2012, Dr. West indicated a striking shift in thinking, 
saying he no longer believed that bite marks were as unique as fingerprints, 
that bite-mark analysis was open to error and that with the availability of DNA 
testing it should not be used in court.

In a telephone interview, Dr. West sought to play down his role in convicting 
Mr. Howard, saying, "I didn't put him on death row, the State of Mississippi 
did."

But of his testimony in the case, Dr. West said, "The evidence I collected, the 
analysis I performed, I still stand on that opinion unless new evidence is 
given to me."

Dr. West added that humans made mistakes and that he opposed the death penalty. 
"If you've got them locked up it's not possible for them to kill a 3-year-old 
or an 84-year-old," he said. "If you kill them, you can't undo a mistake."

The lack of a scientific basis for bite-mark identification was stressed by the 
National Academy of Sciences in a 2009 report on forensics. The academy said 
that such analysis could not reliably identify one individual, among all 
others, as the source of a bite.

Bite marks on the skin change over time and are easily distorted, the academy 
said, while there is a huge potential for bias when an expert is asked to match 
a bite wound with the teeth of a known suspect.

Dr. Peter W. Loomis, a consultant in dental forensics in Albuquerque and 
president of the discipline's professional body, the American Board of Forensic 
Odontology, did not dispute the academy's conclusions but said that bite-mark 
analysis still had a useful role in court.

The board has begun scientific studies, he said, to establish whether and when 
it can produce reliable identifications. A narrowing of the pool of likely 
suspects might be possible, for example, when the bite marks are clear and 
obvious, when the number of potential biters is known and limited, and if 
suspects have contrasting dental patterns.

To combat bias, he said, current guidelines call for "double blind" procedures 
in which the same expert does not both study the wound and take dental 
impressions from the suspect, and the suspect's dental model is mixed among 
several others before any comparison is made.

Even so, he said, "actually naming an individual biter to a reasonable degree 
of certainty should be very limited."

(source: New York Times)






LOUISIANA:

Kenneth Willis' capital murder case delayed, state will assign new counsel


Less than a month before his jury selection scheduled to start, Judge Brady 
O'Callaghan pushed back accused child killer Kenneth Willis's trial.

"The case was ripe for trial now so I was disappointed," Assistant District 
Attorney Dale Cox said.

ADA Cox says he almost always objects to a trial's delay, but he says this is 
just the latest in an increasingly common trend of pushing back death penalty 
cases while state regulators decide whether or not to fund local defense teams.

The Capital Assistance Project of Louisiana, or CAPOLA, defends capital murder 
suspects who cannot afford to hire private attorneys. Cox believes the 
Louisiana Public Defender Board, or LPDB, is effectively eliminating the death 
penalty by getting rid of the only attorneys qualified to try the cases.

"It's been coming to a head for a long time in this state, not just in this 
parish," Cox said.

CAPOLA director Richard Goorley recently testified that the organization - 
funded by state tax dollars - was running on reserve funds and would close 
before the end of the year.

Previous article: Agency handling area death penalty defense services could 
close by the end of the year

Several of the organization's employees jumped ship when budget issues came to 
light. Last week, veteran defense attorney Elton Richey said he too would 
leave, citing health reasons.

Judge Brady O'Callaghan says the state board has 30 days to find Kenneth Willis 
new representation but adds, "This is a very troubling area of law. This is a 
very trouble situation."

Willis is charged with the 2007 death of his 1-month-old son, Zamian Willis.

(source: KTBS news)

************************

Sanders could face death----Penalty phase of trial begins today


Death penalty sentences are rare in Central Louisiana, but one could be handed 
down in the coming weeks to Thomas Sanders.

Sanders was convicted last week of kidnapping resulting in death and using a 
firearm in a violent crime that resulted in death in the killing of Lexis 
Roberts, whose remains were discovered in the Catahoula Parish woods in October 
2010.

He returns to U.S. District Court in Alexandria at 9:30 a.m. Tuesday for the 
penalty phase. He could be sentenced to death on both counts.

Attorneys for Sanders admitted in opening statements that he killed 12-year-old 
Lexis Roberts and her mother, Suellen, over Labor Day weekend in 2010.

Sanders confessed the killings to multiple law enforcement officers. In a taped 
interview with an FBI agent, he says, "I made (Lexis) get in the car" after 
shooting her mother. His description of Lexis' killing was matched exactly by 
the wounds on her body.

When Sanders was arrested in Gulfport, Miss., in November 2010, he was driving 
Suellen's car. Inside were a rifle that matched the type used to shoot Lexis 
and a knife with Lexis' DNA on the blade.

The defense argued that Sanders should be tried in state court, rather than 
federal, but Judge Dee Drell denied a motion to dismiss on those grounds and 
the jury was not swayed. They took just over an hour to convict him.

Attorneys for Sanders did provide some indication of how they may attempt to 
save his life in the penalty phase.

Defense attorneys argued that Sanders reacted irrationally and without any sort 
of plan when he took Lexis. The defense laid groundwork to argue that Sanders 
showed remorse for killing Lexis, both through displays of emotion and by 
assisting law enforcement in the case against him.

Law enforcement personnel agreed that Sanders cooperated completely, 
implicating himself voluntarily through confessions and providing details that 
ensured his conviction. It was details provided by Sanders that led law 
enforcement to Suellen's body in Arizona.

"I want Suellen found," Sanders said in a taped interview.

Sanders did not take the stand during the trial phase.

The last death sentence handed down in Rapides Parish was in 2001, when Darrell 
James Robinson was sentenced in 9th Judicial District Court for the 1996 murder 
of 4 people in Poland.

(source: The Town Talk)

************************

2 jailed, 1 dead in shooting of NOPD officer during robbery attempt, 
authorities say


The day after a New Orleans police officer was shot and wounded during an 
attempted armed robbery at a Marigny po-boy shop early Sunday, authorities say, 
all three suspects were either in jail or dead.

Officer Jonathan Smith, 44, who was working an off-duty, uniformed security 
detail at Gene's Poboys, remained hospitalized in stable condition. A bullet 
fractured his right femur and another lodged near his spine, police said.

Authorities say Cornelius Barthelemy, 34, and Ceasar Adams, 36, approached the 
shop on the corner of Elysian Fields and St. Claude avenues around 1:40 a.m. 
Sunday, intending to rob the place. Barthelemy pointed a "large, chrome 
revolver" at the officer outside and fired several shots, police wrote in an 
arrest warrant.

Smith returned fire with about 8 bullets, wounding Barthelemy and killing 
Adams, according to authorities. Surveillance video released by police shows 
both men limping to a waiting SUV that had reversed to meet them.

About seven hours later, Gretna police responded to a 911 call placed by 
Barthelemy's cousin at an apartment complex in the 900 block of Gretna 
Boulevard, where Barthelemy was bleeding from a gunshot wound to the lower 
abdomen, the arrest warrant says. Officers found the lifeless body of Adams, 
who had been shot once in the torso, in the back of a white Ford Expedition 
nearby.

Both Barthelemy and the dead man were still in the same clothing they were seen 
wearing on a surveillance video, the warrant says, noting also that 
Barthelemy's hands tested positive for gunshot residue.

During questioning by NOPD, Barthelemy admitted he was one of the perpetrators 
on the video, but claimed he did not remember being at that intersection, and 
insisted he "would never shoot" a police officer, the warrant says.

When shown the video at the hospital by NOPD detectives and FBI agents, the 
warrant says, Barthelemy admitted he was one of the perpetrators -- the one 
seen pointing the gun, firing the first shots and wearing a red T-shirt with a 
white design, jean shorts and a Los Angeles Clippers cap.

Barthelemy and the suspected getaway driver, James Wilson, 26, were booked into 
Orleans Parish Prison on counts of attempted 1st-degree murder of a police 
officer and 1st-degree murder.

Wilson surrendered to the Plaquemines Parish Sheriff's Office around 9 a.m. 
Monday, identifying himself as "Renegade," the third suspect police were 
publicizing as wanted. NOPD detectives and FBI agents brought Wilson back to 
New Orleans for questioning.

'Armed robbery gone bad'

Though they are not accused of shooting their supposed accomplice, Adams, both 
Wilson and Barthelemy are facing first-degree murder charges in his death. 
That's because authorities say they tried to commit an armed robbery together, 
one of the crimes that, under state law, if someone dies during the commission 
of, the perpetrator may be found guilty of murder, regardless of intent.

The charges could potentially carry the death penalty. Price Quenin, an 
attorney with the Capital Defense Project of Southeast Louisiana, appeared on 
Barthelemy's behalf at his first-appearance hearing Monday morning.

Clad in an orange jumpsuit, Barthelemy stood with his hands behind his back and 
stared solemnly ahead as the judge considered his case. Barthelemy, of Marrero, 
told authorities he works at Terry's Oysters and cannot afford a private 
attorney.

Quenin asked the judge to set Barthelemy's bond at $50,000 to $100,000 for the 
attempted murder charge, far less than the $750,000 prosecutors had requested.

"By the state's account, he didn't fire the shots ... that killed the 
decedent," Quenin told the judge.

But Assistant District Attorney Philip Costa responded that state law allows 
for armed robbers to be convicted of murder if someone dies during the 
commission of the robbery. "This is the result of an armed robbery gone bad," 
Costa said. "He can be found guilty of first-degree murder."

Magistrate Judge Harry Cantrell sided with the prosecution, and held Barthelemy 
on no bond for the first-degree murder charge and set bond at $500,000 for the 
attempted murder count.

Bond for Wilson had not been set as of Monday night.

Criminal pasts

2 of the 3 suspects have criminal records.

Barthelemy has prior convictions for possession of drugs in Texas and Jefferson 
Parish, and attempted possession of a firearm by a felon and illegal possession 
of a stolen vehicle -- both the latter cases were in New Orleans.

Adams, of New Orleans, has prior convictions for illegally carrying weapons and 
possession of crack cocaine with intent to distribute.

Wilson does not appear to have a criminal record in Orleans or Jefferson 
parishes.

'Here to protect us'

In the aftermath of the shooting, police officers rallied around Smith, a 
four-year veteran of the NOPD. Several officers visited him and wrote about him 
on social media, saying they were reminded of the dangers they face every day.

"Once you put the uniform on, it is as dangerous working the detail as it is 
patrolling the streets," NOPD Superintendent Michael Harrison told reporters 
Sunday.

He was the 1st officer to be shot in the line of duty since Harrison took 
office last month. "It's tough," Harrison said, adding he was making sure 
Smith's family was kept up-to-date.

Despite the spinal injury, Smith on Sunday appeared to have full mobility and 
sensitivities in his limbs, Harrison told reporters, adding, "he was in good 
spirits and very coherent."

Smith is a patrol officer in the 5th District, which covers the Marigny, 
Bywater, 8th Ward and 9th Ward.

Smith was not wearing a bulletproof vest, which is supposed to be required for 
officers working authorized details, Tyler Gamble, a department spokesman said. 
There was no marked NOPD car outside the store, he said.

He is well-liked at Gene's Poboys, where cashier Pam Francis said he often 
joked with the staff. "He was here to protect us and that's what he did," 
Francis told our news partners WVUE-TV / Fox 8. "So I mean it didn't have to go 
like it did. ... We cant wait 'til he come back."

Police said DNA and ballistics tests are pending. The Office of the Independent 
Police Monitor will review the internal investigation, and the Orleans Parish 
District Attorney's Office will determine what charges to pursue.

(source: nola.com)






INDIANA:

Death penalty sought for suspect in Gary cop killing


Lake County Prosecutor Bernard Carter is seeking the death penalty for a Gary 
man charged with murder in the July 6 shooting of Gary police Patrolman Jeffrey 
Westerfield.

An entry in the online docket shows Carter filed an amended information Tuesday 
for a death sentence request "for the murder of Jeffrey Westerfield."

The alleged shooter, Carl Blount, 26, will be told of the death sentence filing 
at an omnibus hearing set for Wednesday morning. Lake Superior Court Judge 
Samuel Cappas will preside at the hearing, during which it is anticipated that 
extra police and courthouse security officers will be present.

Blount has pleaded not guilty.

Court records allege that Westerfield, a 19-year police veteran, was in his 
police car at 26th Avenue and Van Buren Place in Gary and was looking for a 
person who had been involved in an earlier domestic dispute. Westerfield was 
shot at close range with a .40-caliber handgun that had been stolen about 10 
months earlier from a truck in Indianapolis, court records state.

The night before Westerfield was killed, Blount and his girlfriend, Jennifer 
Guzman, had been at the Voodoo Club in Gary. On the way home, a friend of 
Guzman's accused Blount of having an affair with another woman and told him to 
"come clean." Blount became irritated with the friend and pulled up his shirt 
to reveal a black handgun tucked in the waistband of his pants. Blount and 
Guzman began arguing, and got out of the car. Both she and Blount grabbed the 
gun and began struggling. At one point, Guzman had control of the gun and it 
"just went off," court records state. Blount was wounded in the thigh.

The girlfriend dropped the gun and Blount picked it up, along with a shell 
casing.

Westerfield's last radio communication was at 4:26 a.m. on July 6 - his 47th 
birthday - in which he communicated directly with another officer asking for a 
description of Blount. His spotlight was operating, leading investigators to 
think he had made contact with Blount, the probable cause affidavit states. A 
passer-by found Westerfield dead at 5:50 a.m.

The domestic was at 2340 McKinley Street in Gary and police think Blount was 
headed to 1 of 2 places east of there - 2659 Jackson St., where relatives live, 
or 2806 E. 21st Place, where the other girlfriend lives.

Before Blount arrived at a relative's home at 2659 Jackson St., Blount's 
half-brother, Dontae Blount, told police he was talking on the phone with 
Blount, who said he had to end the call because he'd seen a police officer in 
the area with his spotlight on. Blount said he was near the Jackson Street 
residence and would be home soon, the probable cause affidavit states.

Dontae Blount told police he heard several gunshots in rapid succession, 
grabbed his pistol and opened the front door to see what was happening. Dontae 
Blount told police he saw Carl Blount running toward the home. Blount had a 
handgun in his possession when he walked inside the house. Dontae Blount told 
police that Carl Blount appeared to be intoxicated "and in an emotional 
outburst, Carl Blount stated that he had shot a police officer," court records 
state.

Between 8:35 a.m. and 11 a.m. on the morning Westerfield was killed, Blount 
made 11 calls to a longtime friend. In one of those calls, Lucius Mayes said to 
Blount: "Sounds like you in some s***."

Blount responded, "Yeah, a little bit ... ," court records state.

Blount asked Mayes to help him get a hotel room and said, "They are gonna put 
me away for a long time on this one," court records state. Blount also spoke of 
dismantling and hiding a gun and flushing bullets down the toilet.

During an interview with police, Blount was shown a photograph from a video 
image of a nearby day care center around the time Westerfield was killed. "Is 
that something in my hand?" Blount asked the detectives.

Under Indiana law, one of the aggravating circumstances that could apply to the 
Westerfield homicide is that the victim is a law enforcement officer acting in 
the course of duty.

(source: Gary Post-Tribune)

******************

Man Accused Of Murdering Ex-Girlfriend, Eating Her Organs


A man is being held without bail after allegedly revealing that he killed his 
ex-girlfriend and ate parts of her body. The details of the gruesome incident 
were revealed during Joseph Oberhansley's 1st court appearance.

Oberhansley has been accused of killing his ex-girlfriend Tammy Blanton, 46, 
after breaking into her home on Locust Street last week.

According to court documents, he not only admitted to the crime, but also 
admitted to removing and eating parts of Blanton's brain, heart and lung: after 
stabbing Blanton to death, he cooked and ate the organs.

Oberhansley, now 33, spent 13 years in prison in Utah for killing his 
17-year-old girlfriend and shooting his mother. He was released from prison in 
2012. The Clark county prosecutor said that Oberhansley should not have been 
released from jail in the first place.

This also does not mark the 1st occasion in which Oberhansley has been in 
trouble with the law in Indiana: earlier this summer, he was arrested after 
police said he tried to strangle a man and another time, he allegedly led 
police on a chase.

Blanton was the one who paid the bond to get him released.

"I'm his fiancee," Blanton told the court on July 23 prior to posting the bond. 
In his court appearance on Monday, Oberhansley reportedly appeared anxious and 
told the judge that police have the wrong guy because his name is "Zeus Brown."

Police and prosecutors said that the court appearance was the 1st time 
Oberhansley brought up that name. "I don't buy it. I think there is a motive 
and a reason for what you saw in the courtroom today and I don't believe he 
really believes he's Zeus Brown," said Clark County Chief Deputy prosecutor 
Jeremy Mull.

Oberhansley currently faces charges of murder, abuse of a corpse and 
residential entry.

Blanton's family was in court, but has declined to comment. As reported by 
WLKY, prosecutors confirmed they will consider asking for the death penalty.

(source: opposingviews.com)






TENNESSEE:

Anti-death penalty protesters voice concerns on Capitol Hill


With 11 executions currently scheduled in the next year, a small group of 
anti-death penalty protesters voiced their concerns Monday on Tennessee's 
Capitol Hill by sharing an open letter to Governor Bill Haslam.

The group, who calls itself Tennessee Students and Educators for Social 
Justice, wants the governor to suspend all of the scheduled executions and 
establish a commission to review capital punishment in the state.

Among those speaking was Ndume Olatshuni, who was formerly known as Erskine 
Johnson, when he was sentenced to death row for a 1983 Memphis robbery and 
murder that the courts overturned in 2011.

"I would not be here if it had not been overturned," Olatshuni told News 2 
after the protest where the letter to the governor was read aloud. "I had never 
even been to Tennessee until I was brought here for trial."

Olatshuni is 1 of 3 Tennesseans who have had their convictions overturned since 
2012.

He said prosecutorial misconduct was cited as a reason his case was overturned.

3 others on Tennessee's death row have been exonerated.

The protestors cited a list of reasons for suspending upcoming executions and 
reviewing capital punishment including:

--Inadequate procedures to address innocence claims --Geographical disparities 
in Tennessee's capital sentencing

--Excessive caseloads of defense counsel

--Racial disparities in Tennessee's capital sentencing

1 recent study showed that 45 % of those on Tennessee's death row are from 
Shelby County.

The 1st scheduled execution is for October 7 for Billy Ray Irick who was 
sentenced for the rape and death of a 7-year-old Knoxville girl he had been 
babysitting.

The governor's office has not commented yet on the request to suspend 
executions and review the state's capital punishment.

Tennessee has not had an execution since 2009 after questions were raised about 
the state's lethal injection process for execution.

Last year, state lawmakers passed a bill making electrocution the method of 
execution if there is a legal question or chemicals unavailable for lethal 
injection.

(source: WKRN TV news)



MISSOURI:

2 recent exonerations cause new concern about the death penalty


I was relieved that Henry McCollum and Leon Brown, after waiting over 30 years, 
finally proved their innocence with the help of DNA evidence and were released 
from prison in North Carolina.

As someone who personally knows the horror of being wrongfully convicted, it's 
hard to celebrate this news. Thankfully these men are free, but they are 
burdened with the emotional pain of suffering in prison, fearing a possible 
execution, being vilified by the media, and not knowing for all those years 
whether the truth would ever come out.

These exonerations mark the 145th and 146th time that an individual has been 
wrongfully sentenced to death and later found innocent in the U.S. since 1973. 
So many wrongful convictions have come to light in recent years, in death 
penalty and non-death penalty cases, that there's a tendency to grow numb to 
these injustices.

Since my exoneration in 2008 of a murder I didn't commit, there have been over 
a dozen exonerations just in Kansas and Missouri, including that of Reginald 
Griffin, who was wrongfully sentenced to death and spent 30 years in prison 
before his release.

We can't allow ourselves to grow numb to these injustices. The appalling facts 
in McCollum's and Brown's cases cry out for action, and remind us of the urgent 
need to end the death penalty.

In 1983, McCollum and Brown became the prime suspects in the horrific rape and 
murder of an 11-year-old girl. The deck was stacked against them from the 
start. They were young, black, mentally disabled, and also outsiders, having 
recently moved to North Carolina from New Jersey. Officials focused their 
investigation on McCollum and Brown after a teenager suggested them as 
suspects. Scared after hours of interrogation by the police, the 2 men 
confessed to the crime just to make the interrogation stop.

They tried to recant at the trial, but that was a losing proposition. They had 
confessed - case closed. Both were sentenced to death and, because the crime 
was so horrible, most were certain that justice was done. The Supreme Court 
refused to review the case, and Justice Antonin Scalia - without a shred of 
doubt - singled out McCollum as the prime example of someone deserving the 
death penalty. As late as 2010, McCollum's mug shot appeared on campaign 
mailers attacking anyone who might be "soft on crime."

At all levels of government, everyone was certain that these men were monsters 
deserving to die. But they were all wrong. New DNA evidence pointed to another 
individual with a record of sexual assaults. Finally the world knows what 
McCollum and Brown knew all along - they are innocent.

If this case teaches us anything, it teaches the importance of humility in our 
criminal justice system. In the aftermath of grave crimes, like those that have 
recently rocked the Kansas City area, there is understandable anger and a 
desire for the death penalty. But executions have no place in an imperfect 
system that sometimes convicts the innocent.

In Kansas and Missouri, it is at our own peril if we fail to act in light of 
injustices like those suffered by Henry McCollum and Leon Brown. Both states 
need to end the death penalty - and soon.

(source: Darryl Burton was wrongfully convicted of murder in Missouri on the 
basis of perjured testimony and spent 24 years in prison before being 
exonerated and released. He currently is pursuing his Master of Divinity at St. 
Paul School of Theology and serves as a pastor intern at United Methodist 
Church of the Resurrection in Leawood. To learn more about him, go to 
www.dabex.org.----Kansas City Star)