[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----FLA., MISS., NEB., ARIZ., USA

[Rick Halperin]

Feb. 24



FLORIDA:

Florida leads in death penalty exonerations


Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court pushed Florida a step closer into the future 
by forcing it to part with an antiquated way of convicting people of capital 
crimes.

It ruled that the state's system for allowing judges to overrule jurors in 
deciding whether to mete out the death penalty was unconstitutional.

While state law allows juries in capital cases to recommend a death sentence or 
life in prison without parole, judges are allowed to toss out jury 
recommendations. In Florida, judges have disregarded jury recommendations some 
300 times since 1972 - the year capital punishment was reinstated.

[my note----the death penalty was reinstated on July 2, 1976]

Florida is the only state besides Alabama that allows this.

What's more is that the high court's ruling has sent lawmakers scrambling to 
revamp a key part of the law that governs how the death penalty is imposed. 
Instead of requiring only a simple majority of jurors to vote to sentence 
someone to die, legislators are now considering a 10-2 vote.

But even if that happens, Florida will still be part of an anachronistic trio. 
Florida, along with Delaware and Alabama, are the only states that don't 
require a unanimous jury vote for a death sentence.

While the Supreme Court's decision may mean that some death sentences could be 
reconsidered, or that it may become tougher for people to be sentenced to 
death, it still doesn't touch the real problem with the state's death penalty - 
that problem being that too many people wind up being wrongfully convicted by 
many of those same jurors because their lawyers didn't represent them well or 
for a host of other reasons.

"That doesn't solve Florida's problem of innocent people going to death row," 
Mark Elliott, director of Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, 
told me. "The death penalty still discriminates against people who can't afford 
a lawyer ...

"The number 1 thing that people on death row have in common is at the time of 
their arrest, they didn't have good legal representation."

Inadequate legal defense, combined with other issues, such as witness 
misidentification, perjury and official misconduct, continues to be a factor in 
wrongful convictions.

According to information from the website of the Innocence Project of Florida, 
of the 57 people exonerated in Florida since 1989 after being convicted of 
violent crimes, bad lawyering played a role in 11 of those cases.

Then there's this: Of the 156 people freed from death row since 1976, 26 were 
in Florida - which makes it the top state when it comes to exonerations.

And this:

"In awarding damages in civil cases, jurors have to be unanimous," Elliott 
said. "They all have to agree ...

"But when it comes to the death penalty, they don't all have to agree. So 
basically, we have the lowest bar for the ultimate penalty."

That's not right.

While it's good that the recent court ruling has caused the state to change how 
it determines who receives a life sentence and who winds up on death row, it 
does virtually nothing to deal with the systemic problems that continue to make 
Florida tops when it comes to exonerations.

It does nothing to ensure that poor defendants receive the kind of legal 
representation that they deserve when they are being tried for a crime that 
could send them to prison for the rest of their lives or to ultimately be 
executed by lethal injection.

In short, it does nothing to deal with the fact that many people are in prison 
or on death row who never should have been there in the first place.

No matter whether a judge or a jury gets to decide.

(source: Opinion, Tonyaa Weathersbee; The Florida Times-Union)






MISSISSIPPI:

Man indicted in mysterious Mississippi burning death of Jessica Chambers


For 14 months, a town of 500 in northwest Mississippi grappled with the 
mysterious burning death of one of its daughters, Jessica Chambers, a 
19-year-old who left her mother's house in pajama pants, reportedly to clean 
her car. She never returned.

When police found her later the night of December 6, 2014, not far from her 
mother's Courtland home, her car was on fire and Chambers had burns over 98% of 
her body. She said something to a firefighter -- authorities wouldn't say what 
-- before she was rushed to a hospital, where she died the next day.

Courtland and Panola County residents didn't get all their answers Wednesday, 
but they learned that a man being held in Louisiana in connection with another 
homicide victim was indicted this week in Chambers' death.

Quinton Tellis, 27, faces a capital murder charge in her slaying, said John 
Champion, district attorney for Mississippi's 17th Circuit Court. The charge is 
capital murder because her death occurred during the commission of another 
crime, 3rd-degree arson, he said.

Champion added he was "very, very confident" that there would be no additional 
charges or suspects.

"We do feel like, at this point, that he acted alone in this case," he said.

Capital murder opens the door for a death penalty case, but Champion said he 
isn't sure whether he will pursue it. That decision will come "down the road" 
after he consults with the Chambers family, Champion said.

Longtime mystery

Until Wednesday, investigators had released few details about how the former 
high school cheerleader and her car ended up severely burned in a wooded area 
near Courtland.

That could be because authorities had ascertained so little about her death 
until late last year. Champion explained how police interviewed about 150 
people, and each agreed to cooperate, he said. That's odd in a case such as 
this, according to the prosecutor.

On 4 occasions, Champion said he thought the case had been solved, but he was 
wrong. Investigators received no information from their street sources, he 
said, and though authorities chased leads as far-flung as Tennessee, Iowa and 
eastern Mississippi, nothing panned out until they started taking a close look 
at cell phone and other data evidence.

Tellis had been a suspect early during the investigation, the prosecutor said, 
but he did not become investigators' focus until the fall.

"Things started to match up for us, and that's when we began to take a second 
look at Mr. Tellis," Champion said, adding that forensic evidence will be 
integral to driving the prosecution.

Jessica's father, Ben Chambers, a mechanic with the Panola County Sheriff's 
Office, said he'd been in close contact with investigators throughout the 
investigation, and he'd witnessed their long nights, skipped vacations and the 
rings under their eyes.

"I've seen it day in and day out. The hard work they've done never stopped," he 
told reporters, a cap bearing the sheriff's office's logo atop his head. "They 
said some day it would come, and it did. They would not give up, and I take my 
hat off to them."

The teen's mother, Lisa Chambers, did not speak at length but said she was 
satisfied an arrest had been made and was proud of the work investigators had 
done.

Asked if he had a message for Tellis, Ben Chambers said, "Whatever the law 
allows, whatever Mr. Champion does to him, that's what I hope happens to him."

Already in prison

Tellis is being held in the Ouachita Parish Correctional Facility in Monroe, 
Louisiana, almost a 4-hour drive from Jessica Chambers' hometown.

He once lived in Courtland, and that's where, Champion said, he and Chambers 
became friends. He didn't elaborate. Tellis moved from Mississippi to Louisiana 
in the summer of 2015, the prosecutor said.

Tellis was arrested in August on 3 counts of unauthorized use of an access 
card, connected to a homicide victim, whom The Clarion-Ledger in Jackson 
identified as a 34-year-old University of Louisiana-Monroe student from Taiwan.

According to a probable cause affidavit in that case, Tellis used a bank debit 
card belonging to the missing woman on April 7, the day before the newspaper 
reports her body was found, and then again on August 18 and 19, withdrawing 
$500 both times.

Authorities procured "photo evidence" and interviewed Tellis on August 20, at 
which point, "he admitted to using the Chase Bank debit card on the three 
listed transactions and stated that he was the individual seen in the ATM 
photos," the affidavit said.

It appears the suspect may be a newlywed. A wedding registry found online shows 
that Quentin Tellis was scheduled to wed Chakita Tellis in Monroe on August 8, 
the day the student's body was found.

Following the probe into the debit card, police executed a search warrant at 
Tellis' Monroe home and discovered a 1/4-pound of marijuana in his bedroom, 
packaged for sale.

The suspect "stated he sold marijuana for profit. Tellis was arrested and 
booked" on an additional charge of possession of marijuana with intent to 
distribute, according to the affidavit.

'Relay race'

Panola County officials will file a governor's warrant to have Tellis 
transferred to Mississippi, Champion said. That could take anywhere from 4 to 6 
weeks to arrive on the Louisiana governor's desk.

Tellis has an early May court date in Louisiana, and his charges there will 
need to be adjudicated before he is transferred to Mississippi. Champion 
doesn't "anticipate us having him back here anytime soon," he said.

"We're in a relay race," the prosecutor said, "and this is hurdle No. 1. We're 
nowhere near the end."

Tellis is a gang member with a rap sheet and has served time previously, the 
prosecutor said, but his gang affiliation does not appear to have anything to 
do with Chambers' killing. Nor do drugs appear to be a factor in her death, 
Champion said.

One of the few publicly disclosed developments before Wednesday came late last 
year when authorities told CNN affiliate WREG-TV that the FBI had rounded up 17 
suspected members of three street gangs. However, Panola County Sheriff Dennis 
Darby told the station none of those arrested was linked to Chambers' death, 
but the investigation into her killing had illuminated the gang problems in his 
county.

Mississippi Department of Corrections records indicate Tellis was convicted of 
fleeing police in 2010 and sentenced to 5 years in prison. He was later 
convicted of residential burglary in December 2011 and again in February 2012. 
He received 5 years and 8 years, respectively, on those convictions. He was 
incarcerated in June 2011, according to court records. Tellis was released from 
a Mississippi correctional facility on October 2014 after serving time for the 
burglaries, Champion said. That's 2 months before Chambers was killed.

'She just seemed normal'

On December 6, 2014, Chambers was seen at a gas station about 2 miles from her 
mother's house. Her hair was in a bun, and she was wearing camouflage pajama 
pants.

She put $14 worth of gas in the car and called her mother, saying she would be 
home right after she cleaned her car, her older sister, Amanda Prince, told 
CNN.

A store surveillance video shows Chambers prepaying for gas. She walks to the 
store's front door when something or someone catches her attention.

She waves and walks off camera briefly, comes back into the camera's view and 
enters the store as 3 men chat by the doorway. She spends about a minute at the 
counter before going back outside and pumping gas.

The gas station owner who helped her said nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

"She seemed normal," Ali Alsanai told WREG in 2014. "She didn't seem like 
something was going wrong, you know? She just seemed normal. She just pumped 
some gas, we had a talk and she left."

Champion said Wednesday he did not believe Chambers' visit to the gas station 
had anything to do with her death.

She was found later that Saturday night on a rural road near Courtland, her car 
on fire. She was not on fire when emergency responders arrived, but she had 
burns across 98% of her body.

Chambers approached one of the firefighters and spoke, Champion said at the 
time. Authorities didn't disclose what Chambers said, but Champion told 
reporters, "It has certainly given us a lead we're following up on."

Chambers died the next day at a hospital.

(source: CNN)






NEBRASKA:

Nebraska death penalty foes outline case for keeping repeal


Nebraska voters can expect to hear a lot about capital punishment before the 
November election.

Death penalty opponents on Wednesday launched the next phase of their campaign 
to urge voters to keep the death penalty off the books. Lawmakers abolished the 
death penalty in May, but a statewide petition drive suspended that action 
until voters decide.

The newly named anti-death penalty group, Retain a Just Nebraska, includes 
lawmakers, faith leaders and family members of murder victims. The group 
previously operated under the name Nebraskans for Public Safety.

Sen. Colby Coash of Lincoln said many voters mistakenly assume that restoring 
the death penalty will allow executions right away, when in reality the state 
is unlikely to execute anyone again.

"It remains a broken system. It remains a system that remains unsustainable," 
said Coash, a Republican who helped lead the repeal effort in the Legislature. 
"This campaign is about getting that message out."

The campaign will include traditional outreach to voters, including a YouTube 
ad posted online Wednesday, and personal interactions between religious leaders 
and their congregations, Retain a Just Nebraska spokesman Dan Parsons said.

Greg Schleppenbach, executive director of the Nebraska Catholic Conference, 
said leaders in his church remain "fully committed to using all of the 
resources" at their disposal to persuade the public to vote against the ballot 
measure.

Nebraskans for the Death Penalty, a group that led the petition drive, 
previously announced plans to campaign for a "yes" vote to overturn the ban.

(source: Associated Press)






ARIZONA:

Ariz. to death row inmates: Executions shouldn't go viral


The state of Arizona shot back at its death row inmates who challenged the 
state's use of paralytics in executions and are arguing that people have a 
constitutional right to see what's actually going on when someone is executed, 
Buzzfeed News reported Wednesday.

The state's method includes a three-drug protocol that is supposed to sedate 
and paralyze the person before killing them.

Death row inmates and a coalition of First Amendment organizations are arguing 
that the paralytic agent only prevents people from seeing the pain the inmates 
may experience and effectively undermines the purpose of witnesses.

"The press, the prisoners and the people of Arizona have a right to know 
whether Arizona's execution process subjects prisoners to intense physical 
pain, and the use of a paralytic agent is just as effective in preventing the 
disclosure of that fact as if the execution occurred without any public witness 
at all."

Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich's office said last week that the First 
Amendment does not protect the right of the inmate to "die in what they 
speculate will be pain and distress, as long as people can watch."

"The First Amendment does not protect the right to create a spectacle and go 
viral," the statement said.

The state said inmates were trying to create "a spectacle with the objective of 
swaying public opinion and ultimately abolishing the death penalty."

Attorney David Weinzweig, who wrote the response for the state, said the 
department has been "forced" to change the drug protocols it uses in response 
to opponents of the death penalty. The response said people "wage guerilla 
warfare" to stop the state from "acquiring court-approved chemicals."

Arizona was forced to stop using its 2-drug protocol after the killing of an 
inmate in 2014 took nearly 2 hours.

(source: thehill.com)






USA:

Conservatives Ensure The Death Penalty's Inevitable End


As the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) approaches, it is 
important to be reminded of what conservatism really is. More than anything, it 
is about commonsense pragmatism and an uncompromising adherence to our core 
principles, including valuing life and promoting fiscal responsibility and 
limited government. Increasingly, capital punishment has been viewed through 
these principles since Conservatives Concerned about the Death Penalty launched 
at CPAC in 2013. Since then, it's been remarkable to observe how the death 
penalty conversation has shifted.

Last year, the State of Nebraska's unicameral legislature repealed its death 
penalty, and Republicans proudly led the charge. When Republican Senator Colby 
Coash was asked why he supported repealing Nebraska's death penalty, he 
explained, "People sent me [to the legislature] to find and root out government 
waste," and capital punishment certainly fits the bill. It is a program marred 
by dysfunction. It risks innocent lives, costs far more than life without the 
chance of release, fails to deter crime, and can harm murder victims' families 
by prolonging the legal process. Given these facts, it's no surprise why the 
Cornhusker State's legislature realized that Nebraska was better off without 
the death penalty.

Nebraska's repeal wasn't the only capital punishment domino to fall. 2015 was 
also a landmark year for America's declining death penalty in other ways. 
Executions, death sentences, and support for capital punishment all reached or 
neared historic lows. In a stunning reversal, Texas, which was once a hotbed of 
executions, only sentenced 3 peopleto death in 2015. These trends illustrate 
how capital punishment is slowly going out of business. States are learning 
that capital punishment is just too costly and dangerous to administer. 
However, while the death penalty steeply declined in 2015, its risks remained 
apparent. It was discovered that 6 individuals were wrongly sentenced to die, 
and each of them spent an average of 19 years on death row before their names 
were cleared.

Regardless of the death penalty's gradual descent into disuse at a national 
level, some states are still actively sentencing and executing individuals, but 
conservatives aren't standing by idly. Local conservative groups working to end 
the death penalty have formed in numerous states, including Kentucky, Missouri, 
Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Washington, with other groups 
forming. The past few years have also been marked by a growing number of 
Republican legislators introducing or co-sponsoring repeal legislation in 
Kansas, Kentucky, Nebraska, Ohio, South Dakota, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming.

If this wasn't enough proof that the landscape has changed, Americans need only 
to listen to what many conservative icons are saying about the death penalty. 
Colonel Oliver North, Jay Sekulow, Dr. Ron Paul, Richard Viguerie, and many 
others have all been outspoken advocates of repealing the death penalty. 
They've determined that capital punishment just isn't' worth the trouble, and 
they simply cannot trust the government with the death penalty.

As Conservatives Concerned about the Death Penalty returns to CPAC for the 4th 
year in a row, it does so not as an outlier within the conservative movement. 
More and more conservatives are questioning whether it really makes sense to 
give a fallible government the power that comes with the death penalty. This 
growing conservative opposition suggests that this broken government program 
may not last much longer.

(source: Opinion; Marc Hyden is the National Advocacy Coordinator with 
Conservatives Concerned about the Death Penalty.. He previously worked for the 
National Rifle Association (NRA) as a Campaign Field Representative in the 
State of Florida----The Daily Caller)