[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----MASS., PENN., OHIO, ARK.

[Rick Halperin]

June 10



MASSACHUSETTS:

Extend death penalty to other homicides


I believe your article mentioning Gov. Baker's desire to reinstate the death 
penalty related to only those who kill police officers.

I agree with that; however I believe the death penalty should go beyond that -- 
to the perpetrators of all senseless homicides. Yes, there has been no death 
penalty in the state of Massachusetts for decades. Perhaps that can be related 
to the increase in horrific crimes.

Deinstitutionalization also ended decades ago. Should we look at that as well, 
and get the psychological help necessary to help human beings function? Let's 
look at the whole picture to help prevent harm.

ROSE B. McGARRY

Tyngsboro

(source: Letter to the Editor, Lowell Sun)






PENNSYLVANIA:

Here's How Far Some Justices Go to Defend the Death Penalty


A judge shouldn't be allowed to vote in a case involving a capital sentence 
when he was formerly the prosecutor who sought the death penalty in the same 
case. That sounds obvious, and the Supreme Court said so on Thursday.

But 3 justices dissented, suggesting that the answer might not have been 
obvious after all. The dissents show how deeply divided the court really is 
over the death penalty - and how far the conservative justices are prepared to 
go in its defense.

The facts of the case go back to 1984, when Terence Williams, who had just 
turned 18, participated in the beating and murder of 56-year-old Amos Norwood 
in Philadelphia. The prosecutor in Williams's case wanted to seek the death 
penalty, and asked approval from the Philadelphia district attorney, Ronald 
Castille. Castille approved in 1986, writing on the letter of request, 
"Approved to proceed on the death penalty."

At the sentencing phase of the trial, the prosecutor argued that Williams had 
murdered Norwood for no better reason than that the stranger had offered him a 
ride. The randomness of the crime was used as evidence that Williams would be 
dangerous if he was ever allowed to go free, and the jury chose the death 
sentence.

In 2012, Williams filed a petition in Pennsylvania court offering new evidence. 
His co-defendant now was willing to testify that he had told prosecutors that 
Williams was in a sexual relationship with Norwood, his victim. If that was 
true, then the killing might not have been random, as prosecutors had claimed.

A Pennsylvania trial court stayed the execution. Prosecutors asked the state 
supreme court to lift the stay for a procedural reason, saying defense lawyers 
hadn't filed petitions on time as defined by Pennsylvania law.

At the time, the chief justice of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court was none other 
than Ronald Castille, who had approved the death penalty request as district 
attorney almost 30 years before. Williams's lawyers asked him to recuse himself 
from the appeal. Castille refused.

Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote Thursday's Supreme Court opinion, holding that 
Castille's participation deprived Williams of due process of law. The logic was 
simple: for Castille to act as prosecutor and judge in the same case violated a 
basic principle of fairness, namely that "no man can be a judge in his own 
case."

Having made a "critical" decision on the case, Kennedy wrote, Castille might be 
"psychologically wedded" to the death penalty and therefore might not be 
open-minded about the appeal.

The 2 dissents are noteworthy. The 1st, by Chief Justice John Roberts, was 
joined by Justice Samuel Alito. In it, Roberts disparaged Kennedy's opinion as 
resting "on proverb rather than precedent."

Roberts then argued that under existing precedent, recusal is only required 
when a judge has previously decided precisely the same question. He claimed 
that the issue in Williams's appeal was different than the ones raised in 
seeking the death penalty in the first place; the only question was whether 
Williams's petition should be rejected because it wasn't filed on time.

Roberts emphasized that judges' recusal decisions should be presumed 
legitimate. He cares about the institution of the courts, and so it's perhaps 
understandable that he was eager to defend the Pennsylvania judge.

But the opinion is otherwise unconvincing. In death penalty appeals, technical 
issues like timeliness are often proxies for the underlying issue of whether 
the death penalty should have been applied. If prosecutors were told that 
Williams and his victim were lovers, and yet told the jury that the attack was 
random, that would impugn the honesty of the district attorney's office when 
Castille was district attorney.

What's really going on is that Roberts and Alito don't want capital sentences 
blocked on what they consider technicalities.

Justice Clarence Thomas was willing to say so more explicitly. His separate 
dissent argued that state post-conviction proceedings, common in death penalty 
cases, actually should be held to a lower due-process standard than trials for 
guilt or innocence. "The specter of bias alone in a judicial proceeding is not 
a deprivation of due process," Thomas wrote.

Thomas has the honesty to say what he thinks, namely that the Constitutional 
right to due process doesn't have full weight once a defendant has been 
convicted. He's wrong, and thank goodness the other justices don't agree. But 
his opinion sheds light on his own death penalty intransigence.

Hard cases make bad law, according to the adage. The Williams case isn't hard. 
But the death penalty makes it so. And the court's conservatives seem prepared 
to make bad law to emphasize their desire to see capital defendants executed.

(source: Noah Feldman, Bloomberg News)






OHIO:

Suspect to be arraigned on charges in Ohio cop's slaying


A suspect in the fatal shooting of an Ohio police officer is scheduled to be 
arraigned on charges that could carry the death penalty upon conviction.

44-year-old Lincoln Rutledge was indicted earlier this week on charges 
including aggravated murder, attempted murder, felonious assault and aggravated 
arson. His arraignment is set for Friday.

Rutledge is accused of shooting Columbus SWAT officer Steven Smith in the head 
while officers were trying to arrest him on an arson warrant.

The 54-year-old Smith was shot April 10 while standing in the turret of a SWAT 
vehicle. He died 2 days later.

Ohio law includes killing a police officer as a factor that can lead to capital 
punishment.

Public defenders who have been representing Rutledge haven't responded to 
messages seeking comment on the indictment. (source: Associated Press)






ARKANSAS:

Court: Wertz should get new sentence


It took 20 years to bring Steven Wertz to justice.

It took 40 minutes to find him guilty.

It took only an hour to sentence him to death.

Over a 2-week period jurors were told Wertz was a war hero, had been awarded 
the Bronze Star and was also a police officer.

He was not.

That was in July 2007.

Since then, the convicted murderer who was sentenced to death by lethal 
injection has used various arguments to the higher court to get a change in 
sentencing that would remove Wertz from death row.

And Circuit Judge Harold Erwin, who heard all aspects of the case, ruled he 
would remain there.

The Arkansas Supreme Court affirmed his convictions on direct appeal.

In 2007, Special Prosecutor John McQuary had sought the death penalty against 
Wertz, who was charged with another man - James Guthrie Burr Snyder Jr. of 
Georgetown, Kentucky - in the 1986 deaths of Terry Watts, 25, and his wife, 
Kathy, 22, of Ash Flat.

Thursday, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Wertz, reversing the death 
penalty over a technicality. Wertz filed a motion arguing a single set of 
penalty-phase verdict forms on the 2 counts of capital murder constituted a 
defect or breakdown in the appellate process.

The Supreme Court agreed.

The 12-page ruling rehashes the case involving the deaths of Terry and Kathy 
Watts.

It talks about how during the guilt phase Wertz told Snyder that "anyone in the 
home over the age of 8 would need to be eliminated as a possible witness." 
Prior to deliberation, the jury was given 2 sets of verdict forms, one for 
Terry Watts, the other for Kathy Watts. They rendered a verdict of guilty on 
each count.

According to Arkansas law, in deliberating death, there are there forms in 
addition to the verdict form. The 1st involves aggravating factors beyond a 
reasonable doubt. The 2nd deals with existing mitigating factors. The third 
means aggravating has to outweigh mitigating to justify death.

In this case, after the jurors found Wertz guilty, they were given a single set 
of the forms. The jury found that aggravating circumstances existed beyond a 
reasonable doubt at the time of the capital murder. On Form 2, they found there 
was no evidence of mitigating circumstance and on Form 3 the circumstances 
justify a sentence of death. Form 4 was to give the jury the option of life 
without parole or death.

The jury voted unanimously to sentence Wertz to death.

The court stated the single submission "makes it impossible to determine 
whether the jury applied the aggravator to Terry's murder, Kathy's murder, or 
both murders."

It goes on to say, "The submission of a single set of forms was an error that 
impacts the validity of the death sentence imposed by the jury."

The document also notes that no objection to the verdict forms was made at 
trial.

"The motion to recall the mandate is granted, the sentence of death is 
reversed, and the matter is remanded for re-sentencing on both capital murder 
convictions."

3 judges dissented with that motion.

Justice Paul E. Danielson said he felt that the "error in this case, if there 
was one at all, occurred during the guilt phase." He said it is unclear that 
Wertz was actually convicted on both counts.

Danielson said, "My review of our cases addressing capital murder convictions 
reveals a person charged with causing 2 or more deaths was historically charged 
with, tried for, and convicted of only 1 count. Accordingly, I question whether 
Wertz was properly charged and tried under the statute."

He went on to say, "I would order supplemental briefing from the parties on the 
issue of whether a double-jeopardy violation occurred."

(source: Batesville Daily Guard)