[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GA., MO., OKLA., COLO., CALIF., USA

[Rick Halperin]

July 23



GEORGIA:

Jamie Hood expresses no remorse as death penalty phase of his trial begins, 
victims' families testify


When addressing jurors who will decide if he gets the death penalty, Jamie Hood 
on Wednesday expressed no regrets for gunning down 2 Athens-Clarke County 
police officers in 2011.

Though convicted of another murder, he also continued to deny he was 
responsible for the 2010 shooting death of Athens resident Kenneth Omari Wray.

As he did throughout his four-week trial, Hood blamed perceived police 
brutality and corruption for making him pull the trigger on Senior Police 
Officer Elmer "Buddy" Christian III and SPO Tony Howard.

"I didn't kill Buddy Christian the person, I killed Buddy Christian the police 
officer," Hood told the panel of 9 men and 3 women.

As part of the sentencing phase, jurors heard victim impact statements. They 
listened to victims' loved ones, friends and coworkers tell of the loss they've 
experienced as a result of Hood's actions.

Some jurors were moved to tears when listening to Christian's family members.

Melissa Christian-Griffeth spoke of marrying her high school sweetheart and 
planning to grow old with her family, which included children Wyatt, 2, and 
Callie, 5.

"How can I summarize a story that wasn't meant to end so soon," she said.

The slain officer's father, Elmer "Buddy" Christian Jr., told jurors the basic 
goal of a father is to guard and protect their children. "I failed to do that," 
he said, recalling how he had told his wife nothing bad would happen to their 
son as a police officer.

He said he was most proud of his son for the decent man he became, following 
his footsteps to be come active in their church as a deacon and Sunday school 
teacher.

Caroline Christian was unable to speak of her son without crying, and her voice 
quavered throughout her victim impact statement.

After jurors were shown photographs chronicling her son's journey from 
childhood to manhood, she said, "I can't put my arms around a memory."

Ruby Jordan wanted to know why she had to suffer the loss of her only son.

"How could this man murder my son outside of my home," she said. "What was the 
purpose of this cold-blooded action?"

Jordan spoke of Wray's 3 young children who will grow up without a father. 
Jurors were shown photographs of Wray and his children, including one at a 
"princess ball" at Chase Street Elementary School.

Hood, who is allowed to cross-examine witnesses in the penalty phase of his 
trial, said to Jordan, "I just want to look you in the face and tell you I'm 
not the man who shot your son."

Hood had no questions and made no statements to Christian's survivors.

Howard told jurors being shot in the face and shoulder by Hood left him gripped 
by fear and self-doubt.

"At one point I was afraid to face the men and women who wear the badge," 
wondering if he could have done things differently so that he and Christian 
wouldn't have been shot, he said.

In addition to lasting emotional scars, Howard spoke of having permanent 
hearing loss. In the trial, jurors learned Hood shot Howard at point-blank 
range.

Shirlisa Howard told jurors she at first hadn't known if it was her husband to 
whom people referred when talking about an officer that was killed. She 
remembered watching his blood drip onto the floor of the emergency room when 
the wounded officer was unable to breathe through his nose because a bullet had 
shattered his sinuses.

The former Clarke County sheriff's deputy said she had to leave a job she loved 
at the local jail and experienced her own health issues in the aftermath of her 
husband getting shot. Her husband told jurors it was due to "smart comments" by 
inmates that she was subjected to.

Representing himself, Hood will call on witnesses of his own in an attempt to 
convince jurors to spare his life.

To get the death penalty, Western Judicial Circuit District Attorney will have 
to prove at least one aggravating factor in the murders of which Hood was 
convicted, as well as a kidnapping with bodily injury charge. When 
deliberating, jurors must decide if any mitigating factors presented by Hood 
outweighed the aggravating factors.

1 aggravating factor would be Hood shot the officers while they were trying to 
lawfully arrest him, Mauldin explained to the jury.

Hood shot the officers after Howard tried to arrest him because he was the 
suspect in a kidnapping earlier in the day.

He told jurors during the trial he shot Howard because he felt he would be 
killed, like his brother who was killed by a police officer a decade earlier. 
He said he shot Christian because the officer witnessed him shoot Howard, and 
"it was kill or be killed."

In opening statements to the jury Wednesday morning, Mauldin asked for the 
punishment Hood himself asked for after he surrendered to authorities for the 
police shootings.

Quoting Hood from his videotaped confession, Mauldin said, "I get what I 
deserve. I can't blame nobody if y'all want to send me to the death chair."

Also testifying for the prosecution Wednesday were relatives and coworkers of 
Howard. SPO Jerry Johnson was in the vicinity of where Hood shot Howard, who is 
Johnson's brother-in-law. He spoke about having survivor's guilt and 
2nd-guessing himself on what he might have done differently.

Joseph "Jack" Lumpkin, who was police chief at the time of the shootings, spoke 
of anguish and grief experienced by himself and members of the police 
department, many of whom required counseling.

Christian-Griffeth was the final prosecution witness. Hood told the judge he 
would not begin presenting his case until Thursday morning.

"It's been rough on me," he said. "I need to lick my wounds."

He also asked for a mistrial in the penalty phase, complaining that too many 
photographs of the slain police officer were shown to the jury to elicit an 
emotional response.

Among those on Hood's list of witnesses is George McKeehan, who authorities say 
was robbed by Hood at gunpoint in 1997 when McKeehan was working as a pizza 
delivery man while attending the University of Georgia. Hood was convicted of 
armed robbery and served 12 years in prison. He maintained in the 
guilt-innocence phase of his trial he was wrongly convicted, and the victim was 
coerced into identifying him.

"I called (McKeehan) back because I want to look at him in the face when I talk 
to him about it," Hood told jurors.

Another potential witness on the list is Dr. Debra Gunnin, a forensic 
psychologist from East Central Georgia Regional Hospital who examined Hood 
following his arrest for shooting the 2 officers.

During the trial, Hood told jurors he chose to represent himself because his 
former attorneys from the Georgia Capital Defender Office wanted him to be 
declared mentally incompetent and accept a plea deal for the murders.

(source: Athens Banner-Herald)






OHIO----Vienna Convention issues//foreign national

Mexico opposes request for execution date for man accused of killing Ohio 
girlfriend's family


The government of Mexico is opposing an Ohio prosecutor's request to set an 
execution date for a man convicted of killing 4 members of his girlfriend's 
family and sentenced to death in 3 of the 1991 slayings.

Mexico says Jose Trinidad Loza was never allowed to consult with a Mexican 
consulate and was the subject of bias early on, including a crime scene 
detective who used an ethnic slur to describe him.

The Mexican government's court filing Monday also says seeking to put Loza to 
death will aggravate already tense relations between the 2 countries over the 
issue of executing Mexican nationals.

The prosecutor of Butler County in southwest Ohio says the 43-year-old Loza has 
run out of state and federal appeals and should be executed.

(source: Associated Press)






MISSOURI:

Missouri should abandon death penalty


Americans are unfortunately accustomed to seeing some degree of racial 
disparity in the criminal justice system. But when we look at the death 
penalty, as I did in my study "The Impact of Race, Gender and Geography on 
Missouri Executions," disparities are taken to a level that should shock the 
consciousness of any American.

Very few homicides eventually result in the killer being executed. In Missouri, 
in the "modern" period (since the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty, 
with safeguards against its arbitrary and capricious use, in 1976), more than 
11,000 Missourians have been victims of homicide, but the number of executions 
from 1977 through 2014 is 80. The rate of executions per 100 homicides 
state-wide is therefore 0.7 %.

In St. Louis city, however, where almost 4,500 homicides have occurred, the 
rate of executions per homicide is just 0.18. In St. Louis County, where there 
have been about 1,000 homicides, there have been 23 executions, giving a rate 
of 2.3 %: more than 10 times higher than within the city limits.

Most counties in the state have never seen an execution, but just 4 
jurisdictions (out of 93) have accounted for a majority of the executions in 
the entire state.

Geographic disparities are huge, but the truly astounding numbers relate to the 
race and gender of the victim.

Whereas crimes with black male victims constitute 52 % of all Missouri 
homicides, just 12 % of the victims in execution cases were black males. White 
females represent just 12 % of all homicide victims, but they are 37 % of those 
where the killer was later executed. Whites in general represent just 36 % of 
the homicide victims, but 81 % of the victims in cases associated with 
executions.

To put it in its starkest terms, the odds of execution for a killer of a black 
male are 0.22 %, but they are 1.74 for killers of white males and 3.01 for 
killers of White females (they are 0.67 where the victim is a black female). In 
other words, the odds of execution for killers of white females are 14 times 
greater than those whose victims are black males.

With black males constituting the majority of all homicide victims, it is clear 
that the Missouri death penalty is certainly not designed to protect those 
lives. Apparently, those particular lives just don't matter as much as other 
ones do.

We can quibble about racial disparities that are measured by a few percentage 
points. But the results of my study are not like that. These are stark results 
with effects measured by orders of magnitude. They clearly show that Missouri's 
death penalty system is plagued by vast racial and geographic disparities.

They demonstrate that, in the application of the ultimate punishment, the state 
cannot, or in any case does not, treat all of its citizens fairly and 
impartially. This is particularly troubling given that Missouri tied Texas last 
year in carrying out the most executions of any state in the country.

The scope of geographic bias, and particularly the racial inequities that are 
reflected in this comprehensive assessment of all Missouri executions in the 
modern period, should give all Missourians pause. A system that is so 
arbitrary, so capricious, and tainted by astounding levels of racial 
disparities should be abandoned.

Missouri had 10 executions in 2014, and 5 so far in 2015, marking a sharp 
increase in its use of capital punishment. Other states, by contrast, have been 
moving away from the death penalty or abolishing it altogether.

Missouri should recognize that its death penalty system is capricious with 
respect to geography and biased with respect to race. These troubling facts 
about the death penalty in Missouri suggest that it has sorely failed the 
people and should be abandoned.

(source: Frank R. Baumgartner is the Richard J. Richardson Distinguished 
Professor of Political Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel 
Hill and the author of "The Impact of Race, Gender and Geography on Missouri 
Executions," released July 16----The St. Louis American)






OKLAHOMA:

Local Amnesty group hosts death penalty workshop featuring human rights 
activist Rick Halperin


The Oklahoma chapter of Amnesty International will host a comprehensive 
workshop on the death penalty on Saturday, July 25, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The 
free training event will be held at Oklahoma City University, in the Walker 
Center for Arts & Sciences, Room 151. Parking is available at NW 26th and 
Florida Avenue. Amnesty International (AI) is a global movement of over 7 
million people who fight injustice and advocate for human rights.

The daylong training session will be led by Dr. Rick Halperin, director of the 
Embrey Human Rights Program at Southern Methodist University. Halperin also 
serves as the Regional Death Penalty Abolition Coordinator of Amnesty 
International and is former chair of Amnesty USA's board of directors.

The Embrey Program educates students and concerned people around the world to 
understand, promote, and defend human rights.

Halperin is a recognized international authority on the death penalty, 
genocide, slavery, human trafficking, and torture.

He has served on the Board of Directors for several organizations, including 
the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, Human Rights Initiative, 
Capital Punishment Investigation and Education Services, Jefferson-Titus 
Refugee Foundation, Center for Survivors of Torture and the International 
Rescue Committee.'

The workshop agenda will include a brief history of the death penalty in the 
United States. It will cover issues such as race, innocence, deterrence, the 
politics of the death penalty and death row conditions. Oklahoma's role in 
lethal injection as a method of state-sponsored executions will also be 
reviewed.

Participants will be provided with resources from Amnesty International and 
other groups for advocacy work to abolish the death penalty. Opportunities to 
join with others to end executions in Oklahoma will be discussed.

"The need for this workshop is especially keen in Oklahoma with our state's 
death penalty record, and Oklahoma's central role in the historical development 
and continuation of lethal injection as a method of state-sponsored execution," 
said AI Oklahoma Death Penalty coordinator Rena Guay.

"The death penalty has been used as a tool in elections, as it will be with the 
2016 state question 776. Politicians refuse to responsibly address the many 
issues in the criminal justice system that regularly cause people to be 
convicted and sent to death row who are later proven to be innocent," Guay 
continued. "Evidence seems to show that Richard Glossip is one such case, yet 
Oklahoma is so enamored of its execution spectacle, I fear that no facts will 
be considered to prevent murdering a possibly innocent man."

AI opposes the death penalty in all cases without exception regardless of the 
nature of the crime, the characteristics of the offender, or the method used by 
the state to kill the prisoner.

According to the website, the death penalty is the "ultimate, irreversible 
denial of human rights. It violates the right to life as proclaimed in the 
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the right to be free from cruel, 
inhuman and degrading punishment."

Halperin once said, "Many people were raised to believe that the death penalty 
is correct and just and fair. We have little reason to doubt the teachings of 
our schools, our civic and faith leaders or even our parents. As we grow older 
and form our own opinions on many issues, including this one, we can learn 
that, in fact, they were wrong - which is not easy to admit."

(source: The City Sentinel)






COLORADO:

The One Person Who Can Save James Holmes From Death


The sentencing phase of the trial of James Holmes, the young man who stormed a 
screening of The Dark Knight in July 2012 and opened fire, begins Wednesday, 
and all eyes are on the death penalty. Holmes was convicted last week on 24 
counts of 1st-degree murder - 2 counts for each victim - and prosecutors are 
set on going after the harsh sentence. Yet there's 1 very important person in 
Colorado who may block the death penalty for James Holmes, even if the 
27-year-old is sentenced to death.

Despite repeated, strong calls for Holmes' execution from survivors of the 
deadly July 2012 shooting, the Los Angeles Times pointed out that there's 1 
person in Colorado who may end up saving Holmes from the lethal-injection 
chamber: Gov. John Hickenlooper. The Democratic governor, who's currently 
serving his 2nd term, has made it clear that no one will be executed in 
Colorado while he's in office.

But why would Hickenlooper's personal (and political) opinion on the death 
penalty matter in this case, even if a jury recommends the sentence? Colorado 
is essentially a de facto non-capital punishment state, which means that even 
though capital punishment is technically on the books, it's hardly ever used 
and has strict, conditional guidelines. Hickenlooper must sign a so-called 
"death warrant" before any execution can take place.

And the governor, who is anti-capital punishment, has made it clear in the past 
that he would never sign a "death warrant." In fact, Hickenlooper has even 
granted an "indefinite reprieve" to 1 mass shooter, Nathan Dunlap, according to 
the Los Angeles Times. It's still unclear if Hickenlooper would grant Holmes 
the same type of reprieve, but a "death warrant" would never make it past the 
governor's desk.

Although Colorado has only executed 1 person since the U.S. Supreme Court 
reinstated the death penalty in 1978, several mass shootings have renewed the 
death-penalty debate in the Centennial State. Currently, just 3 people, 
including Dunlap, who killed 4 people at a Chuck E. Cheese's in Aurora, sit on 
the figurative death row. (Colorado doesn't have a physical death row.)

Capital punishment became a major talking point of the 2014 gubernatorial 
election, where Hickenlooper was attacked by Republican challenger Bob Beauprez 
for indefinitely staying Dunlap's execution. But Hickenlooper, who scraped by 
during this last election, has refused to give up his conviction that the death 
penalty is arbitrary and flawed.

"If the state of Colorado is going to undertake the responsibility of executing 
a human being, the system must operate flawlessly," Hickenlooper wrote in his 
2013 executive order staying Dunlap's execution. "Colorado'sa system for 
capital punishment is not flawless. ... It is a legitimate question whether we 
as a state should be taking lives."

(source: bustle.com)






CALIFORNIA:

Jury in death penalty case expected to continue deliberations today after juror 
falls ill


In a trial already plagued by delays, another setback occurred Wednesday when a 
juror in the death penalty case against a Fairfield man accused of a Vallejo 
officer's death went home sick.

The news came to attorneys shortly after jurors in the trial for Henry Albert 
Smith Jr., 41, arrived at 9 a.m. Wednesday for read back of testimony. Smith is 
accused of a Nov. 17, 2011, bank robbery and police pursuit that resulted in 
the shooting death of veteran Vallejo police Officer Jim Capoot.

Wednesday's delay comes after jurors went home early last Thursday after a 
juror reported a severe headache. The jury has opted not to deliberate on 
Friday's, however, when they returned Monday, their deliberations were halted 
by the judge.

That was due to a hearing in which prosecutors successfully argued to remove a 
juror from the panel. Based on information provided by his fellow jurors, Judge 
Peter B. Foor found the juror had expressed a bias against law enforcement.

That partially set deliberations back as the panel's last alternate juror was 
called in to join the deliberations.

Last week, a juror in the case underwent emergency heart surgery and was 
replaced by an alternate. Each time an alternate juror comes in to deliberate, 
the deliberations are started from the beginning.

The first day of deliberations was also scratched after a juror was stranded 
out of state with car trouble following the Independence Day weekend.

Additional delays have also occurred throughout the trial.

A sick juror delayed a 2nd day of closing argument 3 weeks ago.

Illness even extended to the bench as the judge presiding over the case found 
himself ill at one point.

2 weeks into the prosecution's case, Foor came down with a sudden illness that 
required him to be hospitalized. That illness turned out to be pneumonia, and 
the trial was delayed a week while Foor recovered.

Jurors are expected to return today to continue their deliberations.

Trial testimony indicated Capoot engaged in a high speed pursuit of a suspected 
bank robber the afternoon of Nov. 17, 2011.

That pursuit ended on Janice Street in North Vallejo, where Capoot chased the 
suspect on foot.

The pursuit and foot chase were captured on a video camera mounted to the 
windshield of Capoot's patrol car.

One of Capoot's fellow officer's testified it was Smith driving the vehicle 
Capoot pursued that day and subsequently chased on foot down the street.

However, moments after Capoot went out of view, gunshots rang out. Capoot's 
fellow officers quickly located him in a backyard, having been shot 3 times, 
according to testimony.

Smith was apprehended several homes away from the shooting scene after an 
officer noticed a man hop a fence onto Janice Street.

Inside his left front pocket, according to law enforcement testimony, was a 
loaded .40 caliber Glock semi-automatic pistol.

Smith is charged with murder of a peace officer with an enhancement for the use 
of a gun, robbery and being a felon in possession of a firearm. Prosecutors 
have alleged special circumstances to include: murder during the commission of 
a robbery; murder to avoid lawful arrest; and murder perpetrated against a 
peace officer lawfully performing their duty.

(source: The Reporter)






USA:

Dylann Roof indicted on hate crime charges in Charleston shooting


A federal grand jury in South Carolina has indicted Dylann Roof, the suspect in 
last month's shooting at a historic black church in Charleston, S.C., on 
federal hate crime charges.

Attorney General Loretta Lynch announced the 33-count federal indictment 
Wednesday during a press conference in Washington.

"To carry out these twin goals of fanning racial flames and exacting revenge 
[for perceived wrongs against white people], Roof further decided to seek out 
and murder African Americans because of their race," Lynch said in a statement.

"An essential element of his plan, however, was to find his victims inside of a 
church, specifically an African-American church, to ensure the greatest 
notoriety and attention to his actions," she said.

Roof, 21, already faces state charges including nine counts of murder, three 
counts of attempted murder and a weapons charge in the shooting at Emanuel AME 
Church in mid-June.

He could face the death penalty in South Carolina, and the federal charges 
include some that carry the federal death penalty, according to The New York 
Times.

However, Lynch said Wednesday that "no decision has been made" yet on whether 
federal prosecutors would pursue the death penalty.

Officials have linked Roof to a racist manifesto found on the Internet days 
after the June 17 shooting that left nine people dead and that sparked fresh 
debate on the symbolism of the Confederate flag.

Roof was seen in photos on the website holding a Confederate flag and a gun, 
and reportedly confessed to the shooting and told police he wanted to start a 
race war, according to CNN.

Earlier this month, a judge in Charleston set his trial for the state charges 
to begin in July 2016.

(source: thehill.com)

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

Prosecutors say Holmes deserves to die for theater shootings


James Holmes should be put to death for the Colorado theater shooting because 
he deliberately and cruelly killed 12 people, including a 6-year-old girl, 
prosecutors told jurors Wednesday.

The same jurors who convicted Holmes of murder and attempted murder last week - 
swiftly dismissing his claim that he was legally insane during the attack - 
must now decide whether to sentence him to death or life in prison without 
parole.

Prosecutor Rich Orman made the case for death, showing jurors photos of each 
person killed and reading each person's name.

"The defendant killed, and you have convicted him of killing, Jonathan Blunt," 
he began.

When he came to the youngest, 6-year-old Veronica Moser-Sullivan, he reminded 
jurors that she "had 4 gunshot wounds to her little body."

The defense offered no counter-argument, effectively conceding that prosecutors 
had met the first of several requirements for the death penalty: That at least 
1 aggravating factor was present in the massacre.

The jurors have the final say on Holmes' sentence, but they also have a major 
influence how the proceedings unfold. After each phase of the process, they 
meet to decide whether they've heard enough to make a decision. And with no 
counterpoint from the defense on aggravating factors, jurors immediately began 
deliberating whether prosecutors had made that part of the case beyond a 
reasonable doubt.

Sentencing is expected to last a month, and could be even more heart-wrenching 
and polarizing than the 11-week trial that resulted in convictions on murder, 
attempted murder and other crimes for his July 20, 2012, attack.

The attempted murder convictions were for the 58 people he wounded and another 
12 who were injured in the mayhem he caused. But jurors will decide sentences 
for only the 12 people he murdered; sentencing for the lesser convictions is 
set by law.

Assuming jurors agree, the defense will lead the next phase, trying to show 
that mitigating factors make it wrong to execute him. This is where the 
personal values of each juror becomes paramount. They must consider whether the 
extent of his mental problems should outweigh the lifelong suffering Holmes 
caused by opening fire on the audience in a crowded Batman movie premiere.

His lawyers will cite defense experts who diagnosed Holmes with schizophrenia 
and other disorders, and could call his parents, neighbors, a college roommate 
and officials from charities where Holmes volunteered to testify.

Already, a 5th-grade teacher who gave videotaped testimony early because he was 
unavailable during sentencing repeatedly referred to Holmes as "Jimmy" and 
described him as a bright student with a big smile.

Jurors would then deliberate for a 2nd time, to decide whether, beyond a 
reasonable doubt, the mitigating factors so outweigh the aggravating factors 
that Holmes deserves life without parole rather than execution. If so, the 
trial ends there, without the death penalty.

If jurors decide the mitigating factors don't outweigh the aggravating ones, 
the sentencing will move into a 3rd and final phase, as many people expect it 
to.

Victims and their relatives would then describe the impacts of Holmes' crimes. 
Prosecutors could then offer more heartbreaking accounts, ranging from people 
Holmes maimed to the father of the 6-year-old victim.

Holmes also will have opportunities to testify during each phase, but he said 
Tuesday that he did not want to, at least during the 1st phase.

The panel of 9 women and 3 men will have fewer instructions to guide them and 
will instead use their own personal and moral values in sentencing.

"It is going to be intense," said Denver defense attorney Iris Eytan, who 
represented Holmes initially but is no longer involved in the case. Holmes' 
lawyers "will call anybody who James Holmes has had interaction with that can 
say he has a serious mental illness."M

Their work will be challenging because, by most accounts so far, Holmes has not 
had a difficult life, Eytan said. He was raised by loving, middle class parents 
in California, graduated with honors from the University of California, 
Riverside, and was accepted into a prestigious doctoral neuroscience program at 
the University of Colorado.

"But what he does have is, his lawyers can show how he has been fine his whole 
life, how he has contributed to society his whole life and how mental illness 
broke him in such a severe way," Eytan said.

(source: Associated Press)