[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, N.C., FLA., ALA., TENN., OHIO

[Rick Halperin]

July 3



TEXAS:

Gabriel Hall Trial, Other Death Penalty Cases Delayed Due To DNA Testing Law


The capital murder trial of Gabriel Hall starts next month, nearly 4 years 
after police say he attacked an elderly couple in their home.

News 3 takes a look at why death penalty cases in Texas are taking longer to go 
to trial.

Gabriel Hall didn't say a word during a nearly hour long pre-trial hearing 
Tuesday.

He was only 18 when he was arrested in October 2011 for the murder of Edwin 
Shaar and attack on his wife Linda at their College Station home.

The trial was set to start more than a year ago but there are delays due in 
part because of a 2013 law requiring more DNA testing for death penalty cases.

"We're looking at in some cases hundreds of items that wouldn't have normally 
been tested previously," said Brazos County Assistant District Attorney Kara 
Comte.

Comte says the law helps prevent wrongful convictions.

"That's all done to ensure that we don't have cases that are coming back on 
appeal to ensure that people get a fair trial and we get it right the 1st 
time," she said.

While Gabriel Hall's defense team has spent $822,000, Marc Hamlin the Brazos 
County District Clerk tells us the county is out more than $2 million so far, 
and that's on the conservative side.

The State Crime Lab in Austin tells us they have tested all the DNA in his case 
and DPS admits the backlog has gotten worse because of the law.

Dennis Wayne Brown also faced the death penalty until he was found dead in the 
Brazos County Jail in May. He was accused of killing Noel and Mac Devin. His 
case had 88 items needing DNA testing.

"We had been advised by the DPS Lab that it was going to take up to a year to 
test those items," said Comte.

Despite the large price tag, Hamlin says the county is able to afford it.

"We are very fortunate in Brazos County in one way that we have the tax base 
that we do to be able to encumber this amount of cost," Hamlin said.

The new law is only required for crimes that carry the ultimate punishment.

Hall's capital murder trial is expected to start in August.

In a separate case convicted capital murderer Christian Olsen will face a new 
punishment trial to see if he will be re-sentenced to the death penalty.

His trial starts in October.

DPS officials tell us the average turnaround time for testing DNA evidence is 
six months. Senate Bill 1292 was co-authored by State Senator Charles 
Schwertner, (R) District 5 who represents parts of the Brazos Valley. We were 
unable to reach him for comment Thursday.

(source: KBTX news)

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

So far this year in Texas, number of death sentences = zero


Texas continues to execute people in the highest number in the nation. But new 
death sentences is a different matter. So far this year, not 1 death sentence 
has been handed down among Texas' 254 counties.

That's an astounding statistic considering Texas' history with the death 
penalty. In 1994, death sentences in Texas reached a high of 49.

It has now been more than 6 months since jurors in Texas imposed a new death 
sentence. The last person sentenced to death was Eric Williams, on December 17, 
2014. This is the 1st time in at least 20 years that the state has gone more 
than 6 months without a new death sentence. And, according to Kathryn Kase at 
Texas Defender Service, it's also the longest we've gone in a calendar year 
without a new death sentence. Overall, new death sentences in Texas have 
declined nearly 80% since 1999.

What's going on here? Lots.

The Defender Service's executive director, Kathryn Kase, shared some of them 
with the DMN's Steve Blow in May.

Among the reasons:

The public knows that the justice system has made awful mistakes in the recent 
past, and prosecutors know that jurors know this. That means officials aren't 
going to be gung-ho, like they might have been previously, about taking 
marginal cases to trial.

Plus, it's expensive to try a death-penalty case and litigate the appeals. 
That's 1 reason less than 1/2 of Texas counties have sent someone to death row 
since reinstatement in 1976.

Also, this is the age of CSI. Jurors may get the idea that prosecutors should 
be able to present air-tight proof fresh from the lab. Without strong 
forensics, a DA might be prone to settle for something less.

Finally - and this is potentially a big one - 2 Texas prosecutors in the recent 
past have been disbarred for their conniving in seeking and defending flawed 
murder convictions. Prosecutorial misconduct has always been a reality, but 
only recently have prosecutors been forced to pay a price. That will have them 
think long and hard about cutting ethical and legal corners to get a 
conviction.

(source: Rodger Jones, Dallas Morning News blog)

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

Texas Death Row Continues to Shrink As No Death Sentences Imposed in 1st Half 
of 2015


Death row in Texas has shrunk from 460 men and women at its peak in 1999 to 260 
today. The main reason for that drop, according to an article in The Texas 
Tribune, is the dramatic decline in death sentences imposed in the state. In 
1999 alone, Texas sentenced 48 people to death. But in the first 6 months of 
2015, no death sentences have been imposed in Texas. This development is 
unprecedented, according to the Texas Defender Service (TDS). "This is the 
longest we've gone in a calendar year in Texas without a new death sentence," 
said Kathryn Kase, director of TDS. Kase said that a major factor contributing 
to the decline in death sentences is Texas' adoption of life without parole in 
2005. "Life without parole allows us to go back and reverse our mistakes," Kase 
said. "We can be really safe in these cases." In the decade since life without 
parole became a sentencing option, Texas has averaged about 10 death sentences 
per year. In the prior decade, an average of 34 people were sent to death row 
each year. The Tribune reports that "Between 2007 and 2014, the number of 
life-without-parole sentences jumped from 37 to 96." 3 death penalty cases have 
been tried in Texas so far this year, and all three resulted in sentences of 
life without parole.

(source: Death Penalty Information Center)






NORTH CAROLINA:

Revenge or justice? Time for death penalty debate.


Even as a narrowly divided U.S. Supreme Court approved the use of a 
sometimes-unreliable drug for executions, 2 of the high court's justices 
wondered if the death penalty itself is constitutional.

It's a question that needs a thoughtful answer. It should have been asked long 
ago.

Even though a majority of states have either deliberately walked away from 
death sentences or created a de facto moratorium on them, the law in most 
places still permits executions.

Given the uncertainty that too often accompanies convictions for capital 
crimes, we've got to wonder why that is. Does our innate drive for revenge for 
heinous crimes overwhelm our ability to render a judgment that cannot possibly 
be mistaken? Or is that level of certainty a human impossibility?

Cumberland County resident Henry McCollum probably understands the question 
better than most of us. He spent 31 years on death row after he was convicted 
of the murder and rape of an 11-year-old girl in Robeson County. His brother, 
Leon Brown, spent part of that time on death row too, until a new trial set 
aside his murder conviction.

Were it not for legal appeals - and the state's Innocence Inquiry Commission, 
which found evidence that exonerated them - they could have been executed. In a 
state with a quicker execution trigger, like Texas, they might not have lived 
to see real justice prevail.

In recent years, there have been more than 100 cases like McCollum's. That is, 
in part, what led Justice Stephen Breyer to write in a dissent that, "I believe 
it highly likely that the death penalty violates the Eighth Amendment." Justice 
Ruth Bader Ginsburg joined Breyer in that dissent.

We doubt there is a majority on the Supreme Court that would label the death 
penalty "cruel and unusual" punishment. But Breyer and Ginsburg may have sown 
the seeds that will someday grow into a ruling.

Meanwhile, this state and the others that still at least theoretically support 
executions need to confront some problems, especially the lack of absolute 
certainty about guilt that gives us cases like Henry McCollum's. There is, too, 
the expense of imposing the death penalty - millions of dollars in legal fees, 
as opposed to a few hundred thousand to imprison a murderer for life.

We also need to settle the question about whether an execution is justice or 
revenge. We're increasingly inclined to believe it's the latter.

(source: Editorial, Fayetteville Observer)






FLORIDA:

As death penalty debate reignites, Florida carves its own path


For nearly 6 months, the death chamber at Florida State Prison has remained 
empty.

No prisoners have been executed, not since Jan. 15, when Johnny Kormondy - 
convicted of fatally shooting a Pensacola banker in 1993 and raping his wife - 
was given a series of 3 injections and breathed his last breaths.

A Supreme Court ruling last week means that unusual respite for convicted 
killers should end, with Florida resuming what has been an accelerated pace of 
executions ordered by Gov. Rick Scott.

Just don't expect the rest of the country to follow its lead.

With the exception of a few states like Florida, use of the death penalty has 
waned amid legal challenges in state and federal courts and shifting public 
opinion. Last week, two Supreme Court justices suggested the death penalty 
itself is not constitutional, writing that it's time for a robust debate and 
for the high court to act.

Other questions have fanned the debate over the death penalty itself. The 
Nebraska Legislature overrode their governor's veto to ban capital punishment 
in May, and the U.S. Supreme Court decided to take up a case about the 
procedures that put Floridians on death row.

Amid those legislative and legal attempts to curtail capital punishment, both 
the number of people on death row and the total number of executions have been 
trending downward nationwide since 2000.

And then there's Florida.

Under Scott, Florida has been executing death row prisoners at a faster rate 
than under any governor since the death penalty came back into use in 1977.

Since Scott entered office in 2011, Florida has executed 21 people. Last year, 
the state's eight executions put it third nationwide, behind just Texas and 
Missouri, which executed 10 apiece. Apart from those three states, there were 
only seven other executions in the country last year.

Florida is one of just a few states directly affected by last Monday's Supreme 
Court decision.

In the ruling, the high court said that midazolam, one of the three drugs used 
for lethal injections in Florida, is constitutional. Critics had tried to ban 
it, arguing it constituted "cruel and unusual punishment."

Within hours, Attorney General Pam Bondi asked for permission to continue 
executions which were halted by the Florida Supreme Court in February while the 
use of midazolam was under review.

Bondi isn't the only Florida leader pushing to continue executions here.

"If you don't have the death penalty, it's a free murder," says Rep. Matt 
Gaetz, R-Fort Walton Beach, a staunch supporter of the capital punishment. "I'm 
for no free murders, and that's why I think Florida is right for bucking the 
national trend of watering down the death penalty."

Gaetz has been at the forefront of pushing for capital punishment reforms aimed 
at shortening the amount of time between sentencing and execution.

He sponsored a 2013 law that forces the governor to move quickly after death 
row prisoners have exhausted all of their appeals in the courts. That law, the 
Timely Justice Act, is one of the reasons executions have ticked up the last 
two years, he said.

The goal, said Gaetz, is to bring the average death row wait down to eight 
years from the current wait time exceeding 20 years. Despite Scott's fervor in 
signing death warrants, no one convicted after 2000 has been executed.

But laws like the Timely Justice Act worry opponents of the death penalty, who 
point to those exonerated from death row.

For every four people sentenced to death in Florida since the 1970s, one person 
has been released, according to Mark Elliott, executive director of Floridians 
for Alternatives to the Death Penalty.

"We call for a halt on Florida executions," Elliott said in a statement. "No 
one knows how many more innocent people remain on Death Row or, God forbid, 
have already been executed."

Still, the appetite for reform remains focused on moving prisoners through the 
appeals process and into the Starke death chamber as swiftly as possible.

The last couple years, members of the Legislature have proposed stricter 
requirements for judges to issue death sentences.

Florida is unusual in that it requires only a seven-to-five vote from a jury to 
recommend a death sentence. The judge makes a final determination based on the 
jury's suggestion, but majority required is unusually narrow.

A bill this year to require unanimous consent of juries failed to gain traction 
after its first hearing in the Senate. And Gaetz says he was researching a 
similar proposal in 2013 when he chaired the House Criminal Justice 
Subcommittee.

"Before the sun set on the day I sent some questions to the attorney general's 
office, Pam Bondi was in my office wagging her finger in my face," Gaetz said. 
"It's the only time in my 6 sessions that Pam Bondi has ever visited my 
office."

Her concern was that changing the sentencing rules will open new opportunities 
for the 395 people on death row to appeal their cases, overloading the courts. 
Yet, these same sentencing rules could be thrown out even without the support 
of the Legislature.

Most states require a unanimous vote or at least a 10-to-2 majority.

The next major death penalty case to be taken up in the U.S. Supreme Court will 
seek to answer this very question: Is a 7-to-5 majority on a Florida jury 
sufficient to recommend the state put someone to death?

This series of smaller questions - 1st lethal injection drugs and next 
sentencing processes - could blossom into a broader challenge to any use of the 
death penalty.

Supreme Court Justices Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, in fact, called 
for the Court to take up a case on the constitutionality of the death penalty 
itself in writing a striking dissent to the lethal injection case.

As most states have banned the death penalty altogether or their governors have 
abandoned its use, Elliott says he's seeing the tide turn politically against 
the death penalty.

"We are seeing more and more conservatives, libertarians and progressives in 
agreement to end capital punishment programs," he said.

That doesn't sway Gaetz, who says the death penalty remains essential, 
especially in Florida.

"I think that Florida attracts more than its fair share of depraved killers," 
he said. "We have had a large quantity of high-profile murders in our state 
with very heinous motives ... The memories of these events are seared in the 
minds of many Floridians."

(source: Tampa Bay Times)

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

State Supreme Court upholds death sentence in triple murder


The Florida Supreme Court has upheld the conviction and death sentence of a 
Jacksonville man who killed his ex-girlfriend, her new boyfriend and her 
daughter.

Pinkney "Chip" Carter, now 60, was convicted of 3 counts of murder in 2005. The 
jury found he drove to his ex-girlfriend's Arlington home and shot and killed 
the victims. Liz Reed, his ex-girlfriend, was 35; her boyfriend, Glenn Pafford, 
was 49; and her daughter, Courtney Smith, was 16.

The murders occurred in 2002. All were shot with a .22-caliber rifle Carter 
said he took to the home to get answers from Reed about their break-up. Reed 
and Pafford died instantly, and Smith died later in a hospital.

The jury voted 9-3 for death for killing Pafford and 8-4 for death for killing 
Reed. Circuit Judge Lance Day sentenced Carter to 2 death sentences for those 
murders and gave him a life sentence for killing Smith.

Attorney Frank Tassone argued that Carter's trial attorneys didn't do a good 
enough job defending him, saying attorneys should've brought in mental-health 
experts to testify that Carter was experiencing a mental or emotional 
disturbance.

Carter was defended at trial by Bill White, who was then the elected public 
defender in Jacksonville, and former Assistant Public Defender Alan 
Chipperfield.

But the Supreme Court unanimously upheld the death sentence, finding that 
Carter's trial counsel did investigate his mental health, retain experts and 
had full psychological evaluations done.

The defense team had previously said it did not call these mental-health 
experts during Carter's penalty phase because the conclusion reached by them 
would not have helped.

Attorneys instead attempted to argue that Carter was a good guy who deserved 
life in prison over death.

Introducing the experts also would have allowed prosecutors to produce more 
evidence of Carter's violent past. For example, Carter once held a knife to an 
ex-wife's throat and was declared a sexual deviant.

After the murders, Carter fled Jacksonville, traveling through several states 
before ditching the murder weapon in the Rio Grande and swimming to Mexico, 
where he was arrested for entering the country illegally. He was released by 
Mexican authorities after paying a fine and then disappeared.

Carter was finally arrested Jan. 6, 2004, near Paducah, Ky., where he was 
working as a roofer under the alias of Rodney Vonthun. He had been picked up 
earlier for being drunk in public and was released the next day. But an alert 
Kentucky state trooper later recognized his photo on an FBI wanted poster in 
another police station.

This was Carter's 2nd appeal, the Florida Supreme Court rejected a previous 
appeal in 2008.

Lawyers for Carter will likely begin appealing the decision in federal court.

(source: St. Augustine Record)






ALABAMA:

As support for death penalty decreases nationally, where does Alabama stand?


When Nebraska abolished the death penalty in May, was that change inspired by 
the state's unique circumstances, or is it a harbinger of the tide turning in 
other conservative states?

The decision prompted a flurry of speculation that other states will follow 
suit and death penalty opponents will continue to gain ground.

In a Time magazine cover story heralding the end of the era of capital 
punishment, author David Von Drehle wrote that "... prosecutors, judges and 
jurors are concluding that the modern death penalty is a failed experiment."

The Washington Post described Nebraska's vote as 1 victory in a much larger war 
- "part of a little-covered and slow-moving strategy to abolish the death 
penalty nationwide."

In 2014, the number of executions hit a 20-year low, and only 72 new death 
sentences were imposed across the country, according to the DPIC.

Nebraska's move is a significant step in a nationwide shift away from capital 
punishment, as polls show waning public support, said Robert Dunham, the 
executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center.

"What happened in Nebraska is, in many respects, a microcosm of what's going on 
in the United States," Dunham said. "There has been, for a long time, a solid 
core of people who have been opposed to the death penalty on moral grounds and 
a variety of other grounds, like innocence and race discrimination."

'I don't see it leaving the South soon'

Nebraska's political climate is fundamentally different from that of Alabama, 
which incarcerates the most death row inmates per capita and, with 198 inmates, 
the fourth-most in the nation by sheer numbers.

In Nebraska, 11 inmates were on death row in May. The state had executed just 3 
people since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976, and 
the last was carried out nearly 2 decades ago.

Alabama, meanwhile, has executed 51 people since 1983 and carried out its most 
recent execution in July 2013. Executions were on hold for months in several 
states as officials awaited a decision from the U.S. Supreme Court in a case 
out of Oklahoma.

On Monday, the court ruled that the lethal injection drug combination used to 
kill the condemned is not cruel and unusual punishment. Alabama Attorney 
General Luther Strange appeared ready to resume executions after months of 
delays.

Alabama's death penalty statute covers a broader range of homicides than other 
states' laws, and prosecutors seek it more aggressively. Alabama also is one of 
just a few states that allow a judge to override a jury's sentencing 
recommendation. That power usually serves to override a life sentence and 
impose death.

Kathryn Morgan, an associate professor at UAB, is researching the application 
of the death penalty in Alabama and across the country. Alabama's criminal 
justice relies enough on the death penalty that Morgan doesn't see the state's 
stance changing.

"It's a Southern subculture of violence that will not allow us to end the 
practice anytime soon," she said.

"If you look at the history of the South, it has been fraught with violence. I 
don't see it leaving Alabama soon, and I don't see it leaving the South soon."

In Alabama, Morgan says, the application of the death penalty raises the issue 
of discrimination based on race and class. Black offenders have been executed 
disproportionately since it was reinstated in 1976, and many of the inmates 
currently on death row couldn't afford qualified counsel.

"When the Supreme Court abolished it in the '70s, it was an opportunity for 
states to establish guidelines so it would not be applied in a discriminatory 
manner, but nothing has changed," Morgan said. "We still have the same kind of 
discriminatory application of the death penalty. It's about race. It's about 
money. As long as those things matter, we're going to have a problem with 
implementing the death penalty."

Shifting public opinion nationwide

In the most recent Pew Research studies, about 60 % of Americans said they 
supported the death penalty, down from 80 % in the 1990s.

Exonerations, like that of Anthony Ray Hinton in Alabama this year, have played 
a huge role in influencing public opinion, Dunham said.

Since the start of 2014, 11 death row inmates in eight states, including Texas, 
Florida and Mississippi, have been exonerated, according to the DPIC's records. 
Those exonerations have changed the nature of the death penalty discussion, as 
they raise issues of prosecutorial misconduct, errors in testimony and the use 
of investigative techniques and analysis later deemed junk science.

"Both innocence and [prosecutorial] misconduct are significant because the 
ultimate concern for many people is that they don't want to execute somebody 
who's innocent," Dunham said. "There are a lot of things that have happened 
recently that suggest that that is an inevitability when you have the death 
penalty."

"For many years, the death penalty was being looked at dogmatically rather than 
pragmatically." - Robert Dunham

Conservatives have begun discussing the "unacceptable probability" of executing 
innocent people, which goes against their traditional values, Dunham said.

Another practical issue to take into account is the economics of capital 
punishment.

Before the recession, states were effectively handed a blank check to pursue 
the death penalty. As money grew tighter and budgets were crunched, politicians 
have reevaluated policies through an economic lens. The death penalty, which 
can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars per case to pursue and implement, is 
no exception.

"For conservatives, the nature of the discussion has changed," he said. "For 
many years, the death penalty was being looked at dogmatically rather than 
pragmatically."

Alabama lawmakers are still strongly in support of the death penalty, a stance 
most say is a reflection of the voters who elected them.

State Sen. Hank Sanders and state Rep. Merika Coleman-Evans have each 
introduced bills implementing a moratorium, but their proposed legislation has 
garnered little support.

In June, Miriam Shehane, who founded Victims of Crime and Leniency after three 
men raped and murdered her daughter in 1976, told AL.com that the death penalty 
offers the only final closure for relatives of murder victims.

Morgan, the UAB researcher, said she doesn't think diminishing support for the 
death penalty demonstrated in national polls has spread to Alabama yet.

"I think we're moving slowly in that direction, and some states are slower than 
others," she said. "Religious fundamentalism, conservatism, prejudice is still 
alive and well. Many criminologists argue that, because of the continued 
presence of those things, the death penalty will continue to be supported 
overall."

Which state is next?

The signs that a state might abolish the death penalty arise years before it 
happens. Prosecutors seek the death penalty less frequently. It is imposed 
less, and fewer executions are carried out.

In the states that have ended capital punishment, "the death penalty had begun 
to die through disuse before it was abolished by law," Dunham said.

Nebraska, the 19th state to abolish the death penalty, was the first 
predominantly Republican state to do so since North Dakota in 1973. Other 
states, like New Hampshire and Montana, have come close.

"Nebraska was the breakthrough, the state in which there was vocal and visible 
bipartisan support for abolition," Dunham said.

Politically, it's hardly a surprise that Alabama isn't among the states experts 
expect to abolish the death penalty anytime soon.

Based on recent trends, the most likely candidates are Kentucky, where three 
people have been executed since 1976, and Kansas, which hasn't had an execution 
since 1965.

Dunham says we're likely to see renewed and reinvigorated bipartisan efforts to 
end the death penalty across the country. Ultimately, the issue will probably 
be settled by the U.S. Supreme Court.

In the meantime, Nebraska's decision gives both opponents and supporters of the 
death penalty an idea of what could come next.

"It is not an indication that the tide is turning," Dunham said. "I think it's 
an indication that the tide may already have turned. You are seeing 
conservatives expressing their opposition to the death penalty more openly. 
You're seeing conservatives talking to each other about the issue, when, in 
years past, there was an unspoken assumption that political conservatives 
automatically supported the death penalty."

(source: al.com)






TENNESSEE:

Death row inmates lose a Tenn. Supreme Court case----Death row inmates in 
Tennessee lose a challenge to use of the electric chair.


The state Supreme Court rejected a request by those inmates to challenge 
electrocution as an alternative execution method.

Thursday, the court ruled unanimously that the challenge is premature since 
none of the inmates is currently a candidate for death in the electric chair, 
and won't be unless lethal injection is declared unconstitutional or drugs 
become unavailable.

The court said future execution orders will require the state to give notice of 
the method of execution, and a challenge to electrocution may occur then.

The case is part of a lawsuit filed by 34 death row inmates over Tennessee's 
death penalty protocols.

Tennessee last executed a prisoner in 2009. Since then, legal challenges and 
problems obtaining lethal injection drugs have stalled new executions.

Last year, the General Assembly passed a law establishing electrocution as an 
alternative if lethal injection cannot be used, either because the lethal 
injection protocol was found unconstitutional or if the commissioner of the 
Tennessee Department of Correction certified that an ingredient essential to 
lethal injection was not available.

This is the 2nd time this year that the Tennessee Supreme Court has ruled on an 
issue in the inmates' lawsuit challenging the state's execution protocol. In 
March, the court determined the state was not required to release the names of 
individuals involved in the execution process. The case now returns to the 
trial court. A previous Supreme Court order directed the trial to begin by July 
8.

(source: WCYB news)






OHIO:

Ohio looks overseas in search for lethal drugs



\Ohio has explored overseas options in its search for lethal injection drugs no 
longer available in the U.S. despite a court ruling that banned such purchases, 
records show.

The prison where Ohio carries out executions successfully applied for an import 
license from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration late last year in its 
search for lethal injection drugs, according to documents obtained by The 
Associated Press through an open records request. The license expires at the 
end of February next year.

"Law enforcement purpose," Richard Theodore, prisons agency policy adviser, 
said on a DEA questionnaire in November, prompted for the reason for applying.

The state declined to comment directly on the license, saying only it was still 
looking for lethal drugs.

"Ohio continues to seek the drugs necessary to carry out court ordered 
executions. This process has included pursuing multiple options," JoEllen 
Smith, a spokeswoman for the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, said 
in an email.

In May, Nebraska's governor confirmed the state had obtained sodium thiopental 
from India. But two weeks later, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said the 
state cannot legally import a drug needed to carry out lethal injection.

2 years ago, in a case brought by death row inmates in Tennessee, Arizona and 
California, a federal appeals court ruled the FDA was wrong to allow sodium 
thiopental to be imported for use in executions.

Asked about Ohio's license, the FDA says it's seen no evidence besides news 
reports that sodium thiopental has been imported into the U.S. recently by 
state prison systems.

"With very limited exceptions, which do not apply here, it is unlawful to 
import this drug and FDA would refuse its admission into the United States," 
spokesman Jeff Ventura said in an email.

While the DEA can approve an entity's request for an import license, a separate 
process starts when the entity actually tries to bring the drug in, said 
Patrick Rodenbush, a Justice Department spokesman. Smith, of the prisons 
agency, declined to comment on the FDA ban.

In Ohio, the drugs are needed to restart executions in the state, which hasn't 
put an inmate to death since January 2014. As in many states, Ohio's 
traditional supply of injection drugs dried up as companies began putting them 
off-limits for executions after decades of more or less unrestricted use in 
capital punishment.

No executions are scheduled in Ohio this year. The state ditched its previous 
2-drug combo following a troubling 2014 execution that lasted 26 minutes and 
left the inmate gasping and snorting.

Executions are scheduled to resume in early 2016, with 21 execution dates set 
over the next 4 years.

Ohio's current policy calls for single doses of either sodium thiopental or 
pentobarbital, both powerful sedatives. In its DEA application, the prisons 
agency said it wants to import both ready-to-use supplies of sodium thiopental 
as well as bulk supplies, meaning it might try to have the drug compounded into 
a usable form.

Compounded drugs are small, specially mixed batches of drugs that are not 
subject to the same federal scrutiny as regular doses of the drugs.

Ohio updated its execution rules this week to require the testing of compounded 
drugs before their use.

It's unclear from where Ohio hopes to obtain drugs. Other states, including 
Nebraska, have turned to a manufacturer in India, according to documents 
obtained from the Nebraska prisons department by the American Civil Liberties 
Union.

"I presently have a batch being manufactured for 2 states that have placed an 
order" for sodium thiopental, Chris Harris, the CEO of West Bengal, India-based 
Harris Pharma, told the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services in an 
April 15 email. Harris was checking to see if Nebraska wanted to place an order 
as well. He did not return an email seeking comment.

Smith said the Ohio prisons agency has not communicated with Harris Pharma.

In Nebraska, the issue is temporarily moot: On May 28, Nebraska lawmakers 
abolished the death penalty over the governor's objections. Death penalty 
supporters are looking at ways to reinstate the law.

(source: Associated Press)

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

Ford, Vaughn sentenced for death of New Franklin couple


Summit County Common Pleas Court Judge Tom Parker sentenced Shawn Ford, 20, of 
Akron, to death for the murder of Margaret Schobert, 59, June 29, according to 
Summit County Prosecutor Sherri Bevan Walsh.

Parker also sentenced Ford to life in prison without parole for the murder of 
her husband, Jeffrey Schobert, 56, and 8 years in prison for the attack on 
their daughter, Chelsea Schobert. Both sentences, which are the maximum 
allowed, are to be served consecutive to the death sentence, according to 
Walsh.

"This was a brutal, vicious crime," said Walsh. "Shawn Ford broke into the 
Schobert's home and savagely beat Jeff and Peg with a sledgehammer. When he 
didn't get what he wanted, Ford took his aggression out on these 2 caring 
people - people who were devoted to their family and community. We do not take 
cases like this or this sentence lightly."

According to Walsh, in the early morning hours of April 2, 2013, Ford, who was 
18 at the time, along with accomplice Jamall Vaughn, who was 14 and also from 
Akron, broke into the Schobert's New Franklin home. Ford hit Jeffrey Schobert 
to death with a sledgehammer, then used Jeffrey Schobert's cell phone to lure 
Margaret Schobert back home from the hospital where their daughter, Chelsea, 
was recovering after being stabbed in the neck by Ford. Ford then beat Margaret 
Schobert to death with the sledgehammer when she arrived home.

Jeffrey Schobert worked for Hanna Campbell & Powell LLP in Fairlawn, and he and 
his wife were involved in a number of community activities.

On Oct. 22, 2014, a Summit County jury found Ford guilty of 5 counts of 
aggravated murder, all special felonies; 2 counts of aggravated robbery, 
felonies of the 1st degree; aggravated burglary, a felony of the 1st degree; 
grand theft, a felony of the 4th degree; and felonious assault, a felony of the 
2nd degree (for the attack on Chelsea Schobert).

On Oct. 31, 2014, jurors recommended the death penalty for Ford in the 
aggravated murder of Margaret Schobert and life in prison without parole for 
the aggravated murder of Jeffrey Schobert.

A hearing was held last week to determine whether Ford was mentally fit for the 
death penalty, and Parker ruled he was.

Parker sentenced Vaughn, now 16, the next day, June 30, to life in prison, with 
parole eligibility after 25 years, for his role in the Schoberts' murders. He 
pleaded guilty to 2 counts of aggravated murder, 1 count of aggravated robbery 
and 1 count of aggravated burglary. Vaughn was not eligible for the death 
penalty because he is a juvenile, according to Walsh.

"The viciousness of this crime was shocking. Vaughn had the opportunity to 
either stop Ford or walk away. But he did neither," said Walsh. "The brutal 
nature of these crimes, especially when Vaughn had the ability to save the 
Schoberts' lives, is disturbing. I thank the jurors and Judge Parker for 
ensuring justice for the Schoberts and their family."

(source: akron.com)