[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, FLA., LA., OHIO, OKLA., UTAH

[Rick Halperin]

Feb. 3


TEXAS:

Faces of Death Row


Here is a look at the 252 inmates currently on Texas' death row. Texas, which 
reinstated the death penalty in 1976, has the most active execution chamber in 
the nation. On average, these inmates have spent 13 years, 11 months on death 
row. Though 12 % of the state's residents are black, 42 % of death row inmates 
are.

http://apps.texastribune.org/death-row/

(source: Texas Tribune)






FLORIDA:

How far should Florida go to reform death penalty? Lawmakers mull changes after 
SCOTUS decision


Florida lawmakers are considering changes in the state's capital sentencing law 
after the U.S. Supreme Court found one provision to be unconstitutional last 
month.

Legislators are debating how far to go in overhauling the law, the New York 
Times reports.

Florida law requires jurors to make capital-punishment recommendations by a 
majority vote, without informing the judge of the factual basis for their 
recommendation. The judge then considers aggravating and mitigating factors, 
and decides whether a death sentence is warranted. The judge isn't bound by the 
jury recommendation. The U.S. Supreme Court said that scheme is 
unconstitutional because the Sixth Amendment requires jurors, rather than 
judges, to find each fact necessary to impose the death sentence.

At the very least, Florida will have to change the law so that judges don't 
find aggravating factors independent of a jury's fact-finding, the Times says. 
But lawmakers are also considering other changes.

The Senate is "leaning toward" a requirement of unanimous decisions by juries 
for death sentences, the article says. The House, on the other hand, is 
considering a bill that would require at least 9 of 12 jurors to agree for a 
death-sentence recommendation and all jurors to agree on aggravating factors. 
The Villages Daily Sun investigated jury votes in cases of prisoners currently 
on death row. Jurors were not unanimous in death-sentence recommendations in 75 
% of the cases.

(source: ABA Journal)





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

Death penalty ruling may impact Manatee triple murder case


There are new developments involving a triple murder case in Manatee County. A 
recent ruling by the U.S Supreme Court may impact Andres Avalos Junior's case.

Avalos is charged with 3 counts of 1st degree murder. He's accused of killing 
his wife, Amber, Denise Potter and Reverend James "Tripp" Battle, in December 
of 2014.

Prosecutors plan to seek the death penalty; however, Avalos' attorneys have 
filed a motion. The motion states that due to the ruling by the supreme court 
that Florida's death penalty process is unconstitutional, the state has no 
right to seek the death penalty against Avalos.

A hearing is set for march 22nd.

(source: WWSB news)






LOUISIANA:

Judge to rule if death penalty will be allowed in LSP Trooper murder case


KPLC in Lake Charles is reporting that a Calcasieu Parish judge could rule 
Wednesday on whether the death penalty will be allowed in the trial of Kevin 
Daigle. Daigle, 54, is charged with the 1st-degree murder of Louisiana State 
Police Trooper Steven Vincent and the 2nd-degree murder of Daigle's former 
roommate Blake Brewer.

In August, Vincent responded to a pickup truck in a ditch that matched "the 
description of a previously reported reckless vehicle," the state police said.

Daigle armed with a shotgun fired at Vincent, hitting him in the head, police 
said.

During Vincent's 13-year tenure with the state police, he received 13 awards 
and commendations.

He is survived by his wife and 9-year-old son.

While being interviewed by State Police, Daigle led investigators to believe an 
altercation occurred between him and his roommate which led to Brewer???s 
death.

Daigle has previously been booked into the Jeff Davis Parish jail at least 12 
times, dating to 1987. His arrest history includes bookings for theft, battery, 
drugs and DWI.

(source: KPLC news)






OHIO:

Ohio executions disproportionately African-American, especially if the victim 
is white


A Cleveland man hopes to see Ohio's death penalty abolished so that no one else 
experiences what he went through.

Kwame Ajamu was sentenced to death and later exonerated.

"I spent 3 years, 7 weeks and 8 hours on death row for a crime that I didn't 
do," Ajamu told an audience of about 40 Tuesday at a panel discussion on the 
death penalty in the University of Akron???s Student Union Theater.

Ajamu, formerly known as Ronnie Bridgeman, frequently wiped away tears as he 
recalled his experiences. He, his brother, Wylie Bridgeman, and their best 
friend, Ricky Jackson, were all exonerated after being sentenced to death for a 
1975 murder in Cleveland. Ajamu was released from prison on parole in 2003, 
while Bridgeman and Jackson both were incarcerated for nearly 40 years. A judge 
declared them innocent in 2015 and all 3 were compensated by the state.

"They came into this neighborhood that is all black and left out of the 
neighborhood with three of its occupants," said Ajamu, who was 17 when he was 
arrested. "We wouldn't be back for 40 years. So many moments in life. 17 years 
in prison. Now, all of the seniors are gone. I'm a senior. My brother is a 
senior."

The panel discussion, called The Death Lottery: How Race Impacts the Death 
Penalty in Ohio, was part of UA's Rethinking Race forum, going on through Feb. 
12.

The panelists, each with personal experience dealing with capital punishment 
cases, provided context for a newly released report that found racial, gender 
and geographic disparities in Ohio's death penalty process.

Convicted murderers executed in Ohio are disproportionately black, and 
executions also are disproportionate if the victim is white and the murderer is 
black.

"This study shows white lives matter and black lives don't," said the Rev. Jack 
Sullivan Jr., executive director of Murder Victims Families for Reconciliation, 
a national organization working to end the death penalty.

Sullivan said "until all lives matter," he thinks the death penalty should be 
abolished in Ohio. His younger sister was murdered in Cleveland in 1997, with 
the person responsible never caught. Still, his group doesn't think the death 
penalty is the answer, especially because of racial problems in the justice 
system.

"As hurt as we have been, we don't see any hope for us in the execution of 
those accused for killing our loved ones," he said. "The death of the convicted 
person will not bring back our loved ones.

Short of getting rid of the death penalty, Franklin County Common Pleas Judge 
Stephen McIntosh discussed some of the 56 recommendations for improving Ohio's 
capital punishment process recently made by the Ohio Supreme Court's death 
penalty task force, which he co-chaired.

The recommendations included requiring testing in capital cases to be done at 
accredited labs, specifying that interrogations of defendants facing the death 
penalty must be video taped, excluding people with mental illnesses from being 
executed, and establishing a statewide capital litigation fund to help pay for 
death-penalty cases in counties that can't afford them.

"Sometimes, whether you will be charged with a capital case depends on where 
you are in Ohio," McIntosh said.

Abraham Bonowitz, who heads Ohioans to Stop Executions, urged those who 
attended the event to consider writing to their state lawmakers and the 
governor to urge them to adopt the task force???s recommendations. He provided 
fliers on the recommendations and postcards to send to lawmakers and Gov. John 
Kasich.

After the discussion, Judi Hill, president of the Akron chapter of the NAACP, 
said she plans to share the information at her organization's next meeting. She 
thinks the NAACP needs to be doing more on the local, state and national levels 
to push for changes in the criminal justice system.

"Conversation, we can do," she said. "We need to take it a step further."

The discussion also made an impression on students who attended.

"My eyes were pretty much opened," said Marissa Mariner, 17, a student at 
Akron's STEM high school who also is taking classes at UA. "I've been a strong 
believer that there should be a death penalty. Now, I'm questioning my own 
beliefs."

(source: Akron Beacon Journal)






OKLAHOMA:

Getting executions right is focus for Oklahoma AG's office


5 executions are now pending in Oklahoma, after the state Court of Criminal 
Appeals agreed last week to hold off on setting execution dates for 2 more 
death row inmates. The move by the court was proper and not surprising.

That's because the next time Oklahoma executes an inmate, everything about the 
procedure must be beyond reproach. That didn't happen in recent examples, 
leading Attorney General Scott Pruitt to investigate via a multicounty grand 
jury.

That work is ongoing. Meantime, Pruitt says he would like to see the state 
Department of Corrections work to obtain a license from the U.S. Drug 
Enforcement Agency, and for the state to consider establishing a compounding 
pharmacy. They are ideas that have merit.

Because the DOC does not have a license from the DEA, it cannot store execution 
drugs at the state prison in McAlester. Thus, the drugs used in executions are 
delivered to the prison on the day those executions are to be carried out.

Pruitt's grand jury is looking into how the wrong drug was delivered for the 
past two executions. 1 of the drugs in the state's 3-drug combination is 
potassium chloride. Instead, potassium acetate was delivered for Richard 
Glossip's execution in September. The execution was halted when the mistake was 
realized. Authorities subsequently learned that potassium acetate had wrongly 
been used in the January 2015 execution of Charles Warner, a violation of the 
state's protocol.

One question Pruitt has, he told The Oklahoman's editorial board last week, is 
"How can we do a more effective job?"

If a compounding lab isn't a possibility, he said, then some change is needed 
"that deals with these issues of access, because we can't keep doing what we're 
doing. It will continue to be a problem."

Pruitt said that if a compounding lab were created, it could allow attorneys 
for death row inmates to have access to execution drugs to ensure their 
efficacy. The current system, which keeps the drug providers secret and the 
drugs off-premises, has been a key point raised by litigants.

Oklahoma's execution protocol was overhauled in 2014 after a grisly execution 
in April of that year when Clayton Lockett writhed and groaned on the gurney 
before being declared dead 43 minutes after the procedure began. An 
investigation found numerous problems with the state's execution practices. But 
problems continued even after those practices were revamped.

The delayed executions are difficult on the families of the victims who have 
waited years for a resolution, but they're also difficult on the loved ones of 
those condemned. And, each misstep made in carrying out an execution adds 
fodder to the ongoing push to do away with the death penalty in the United 
States.

"Where we are right now as a state, if we don't make the right changes in the 
long term, it will bring about the ultimate demise of the death penalty," 
Pruitt said. He added later, "I don't think we're there yet." He's right about 
that - polling consistently shows the death penalty enjoys solid support in 
Oklahoma.

Yet Pruitt also is correct in saying that how the state responds to its current 
challenges is vitally important. He believes drug injection is the most humane 
way to carry out an execution. "So," he said, "our 1st step should be, 'How do 
we do that in the most effective way?'"

It's a question that must be answered correctly.

(source: Editorial Board, The Oklahoman)






UTAH:

Prosecutors withdraw their intent to seek death penalty in St. George killing


At the request of the alleged victim's family, the death penalty has been taken 
off the table for Brandon Perry Smith, who is accused of killing a woman in a 
St. George apartment in 2010. Prosecutors filed a motion Tuesday withdrawing 
their intent to prosecute the case as capital murder for the stabbing death of 
20-year-old Jerrica Christensen.

Smith still faces a charge of 1st-degree felony aggravated murder - which is 
punishable by a maximum sentence of life in prison without parole - but he no 
longer can be executed if convicted.

"The state is taking this action at the request of the family of the victim in 
an effort to avoid the delays associated with litigating a capital homicide 
case," Deputy Washington County Attorney Ryan Shaum wrote in court papers. "And 
to focus on bringing the case to trial as soon as possible."

Several trial dates have been set and delayed in the 6 years since Christensen 
was murdered, according to court papers. Before this most recent development, 
Smith's attorneys had been challenging the constitutionality of the death 
penalty and had sought to depose all of Utah's 29 county attorneys to determine 
why some seek the death penalty and others don't - though a judge struck down 
that request, saying if the defendant wanted to take depositions from state 
prosecutors he "must first show that his prosecution has resulted in a 
discriminatory effect."

Smith, 34, is accused of beating Christensen and cutting her throat with a 
pocket knife moments after his friend, Paul Clifford Ashton, shot and killed 
Brandie Sue Dawn Jerden and shot and wounded James Fiske.

In court papers, Smith's attorneys have said he killed the woman because he 
felt threatened by Ashton. Prosecutors have argued that Smith is cold-hearted 
and relished taking the life of a stranger.

They have alleged that several aggravating factors made the killing a 
death-penalty case: that Christensen was killed during a criminal episode in 
which two or more people were killed, that the homicide was committed incident 
to attempted kidnapping, that Christensen was killed to prevent her from 
testifying and that the homicide occurred in an "especially heinous, atrocious, 
cruel or exceptionally depraved manner."

The defendant is expected in court Wednesday for a review hearing.

Ashton, 36, was sentenced in 2013 to life without the possibility of parole for 
killing Jerden. That same week, he was also sentenced to life plus 10 years 
after pleading guilty in federal court to kidnapping a homeless man and aiding 
in his murder in 2010. He is serving both terms in federal prison.

(source: Salt Lake Tribune)