[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----ALA., OKLA., NEB., CALIF., USA

[Rick Halperin]

Nov. 9




ALABAMA:

Death sentence challenged in 2004 Dothan capital murder case


A man convicted of capital murder in the 2004 beating death of a 64-year-old 
cancer patient is challenging his death sentence on multiple grounds, but state 
prosecutors believe a judge and jury relied on overwhelming evidence in seeking 
death and that the challenge should be dismissed.

Hearings were held Tuesday in the case of David Phillip Wilson, who was 
convicted and sentenced to death in 2008 for the killing of Dewey Walker in 
April 2004. Wilson and others were convicted in connection with Walker's death, 
but prosecutors alleged it was Wilson who beat Walker with a baseball bat and 
used a cord to strangle Walker during the murder.

Wilson was charged with murder in the course of a robbery and murder in the 
course of a burglary, both of which made Wilson eligible for the death penalty. 
Prosecutors also argued at trial that the circumstances surrounding Walker's 
death were particularly heinous, atrocious and cruel, an aggravating factor 
juries and judges can use when considering death for a defendant.

Wilson, through his attorney David Schoen of Montgomery, argued there were 
significant arguments that could have been made at trial by Wilson's 
then-defense attorneys that may have persuaded a jury and/or judge to conclude 
the death penalty was not applicable or reasonable.

Schoen made several arguments Tuesday, including:

--A co-defendant, Catherine Corley, wrote a letter from jail claiming she - and 
not Wilson - may have delivered the fatal blows to Walker. Schoen argued that 
defense counsel did not have Corley's letter at the time of the 2008 trial and 
certainly would have used it to craft a defense that may have allowed Wilson to 
avoid the death penalty.

Alabama Assistant Attorney General Richard Anderson argued that defense counsel 
did have a police report that alluded to the Corley letter, and the mere 
receipt of the police report by defense counsel barred Wilson from being able 
to make a post-conviction claim.

--Ineffective assistance of counsel. Schoen recited several instances in which 
Wilson's attorneys should have made arguments beneficial to the case. Schoen 
cited trial testimony about blood spatters from a Dothan police sergeant who 
worked the crime scene. Schoen said counsel should have objected to the blood 
splatter testimony because a police sergeant is not a blood splatter expert. 
Schoen said the testimony was used by prosecutors to argue the crime was 
particularly heinous, atrocious and cruel.

Further, Schoen argued that counsel should have challenged the police sergeant 
about the blood testimony itself. Schoen said defense counsel should have asked 
if samples of the blood were collected and tested to indicate if, in fact, the 
material believed to be blood was actually blood.

Schoen also said counsel should have hired a DNA expert to test the bat used in 
the crime as well as gloves Wilson wore during commission of the crime to 
determine whether any of Wilson's DNA could be found on the bat.

Schoen said the arguments that should have been raised go to the heart of the 
case against Wilson.

"Did he kill Walker? Did he intend to kill Walker? Did he act in a heinous, 
atrocious and cruel manner?" Schoen said during arguments in front of Circuit 
Judge Kevin Moulton on Tuesday.

Schoen further argued Wilson's statement to police should have been suppressed 
because of his mental state at the time and that police did not have probable 
cause to come into Wilson's home to detain Wilson after the crime.

Anderson argued that preceding case law favors the prosecution and that, even 
if some of Wilson's claims survive, there is overwhelming evidence to suggest 
Wilson participated in the murder and that it occurred during a robbery and 
burglary, which would make him eligible for the death penalty.

A police investigation revealed Walker's custom van, replete with stereo 
equipment estimated to be worth $20,000, was missing. A search for the van and 
the stereo equipment led investigators to Matthew Marsh. Investigator Tony 
Luker interviewed Marsh, and then interviewed Catherine Corley and another 
person named Michael Jackson. These interviews led Luker to Wilson.

Marsh, Corley and Jackson all pleaded guilty to their roles in the murder.

Walker was suffering from cancer at the time of the murder.

(source: Dothan Eagle)






OKLAHOMA:

Oklahoma voters approve ballot measure affirming death penalty


Voters have passed an amendment to the Oklahoma Constitution meant to safeguard 
the state's ability to carry out executions.

In balloting Tuesday, voters approved Question 776, which empowers the 
Legislature to approve any method of execution not prohibited by the U.S. 
Constitution. It also prohibits death sentences from being reduced due to an 
execution method being banned and exempts the death penalty from being deemed a 
cruel or unusual punishment under Oklahoma law.

2 pro-death penalty legislators developed the ballot measure after a pair of 
botched executions in 2014 and 2015. 1 inmate struggled against his restraints 
as he died and the other was given a drug not listed in the state's execution 
protocol.

Opponents said the amendment wasn't necessary because the death penalty is 
already legal in Oklahoma.

(source: Sun-Sentinel)






NEBRASKA:

Nebraska keeps death penalty


The Legislature took it away. But on Tuesday, Nebraska voters handed back 
execution as an option for judges and juries to consider for the most heinous 
murders.

Even as support for the death penalty among states is said to be waning -- the 
lowest it has been in decades, according to a Pew Research Center poll -- 
Nebraska voters said by a convincing margin they want to keep it.

A 100,000-plus vote margin, considered a landslide, reinforces that the vast 
majority of Nebraskans want the death penalty option, said Nebraskans for the 
Death Penalty spokesman Chris Peterson.

Bob Evnen, who has worked for the past 17 months on behalf of repealing the 
law, said he hopes the unicameral Legislature will respect the will of the 
people and cooperate with the governor to establish a successful, humane method 
of carrying out the death penalty.

"We also hope that the judiciary will look for ways to end interminable appeals 
while maintaining the due process rights of defendants," he said. "We know that 
this can happen, because it happens in other states."

Stephen Griffith, director of Nebraskans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, 
said Nebraskans across the political spectrum worked together to call for its 
end.

"But it's still a broken system," he said. "And we look forward to continuing 
this conversation with Nebraskans."

Sen. Ernie Chambers, who has worked more than 40 years to eliminate capital 
punishment, said Monday the circumstances that led him to fight for the repeal 
of the death penalty had a hiatus with the Legislature's action. With the 
return of those circumstances, he plans to renew his efforts.

"And I will have a bill to repeal the death penalty ready for introduction in 
January," he said.

Nebraska's Catholic bishops said they, too, will continue to call for repeal of 
the death penalty.

The referendum, which gained more than enough signatures in summer 2015 to get 
the question on the ballot, passed despite being outspent nearly 5-to-1 by the 
opposition, Peterson said.

The Retain A Just Nebraska campaign spent about $2.2 million compared to about 
$450,000 by the referendum campaign.

Even with a green light to put the death penalty back into play, opponents 
believe it will be a long time, if ever, before an execution takes place. 10 
men are on death row, most with remaining appeals.

The last time Nebraska executed a man was in 1997. The state has since put its 
electric chair in storage because its use was found to be unconstitutional by 
the Nebraska Supreme Court. Lethal injection has become the execution protocol, 
but has never been used and the state has had trouble getting the necessary 
drugs.

Lincoln attorney and longtime death penalty opponent Alan Peterson said several 
legal issues could prevent any potential execution.

For one, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a Florida case the U.S. Constitution 
requires juries to make those decisions. In Nebraska, judges decide one or more 
statements of fact in death penalty sentencing.

"These and other issues may take years to resolve, and the lack of acceptable 
lethal drugs is just one of many additional barriers to Nebraska killing anyone 
for a long time, if ever," Alan Peterson said.

Officials have said they are working on a new drug protocol that would allow 
the state to carry out the death penalty, but many opponents say that's 
unlikely because of the difficulty in getting the drugs.

Gov. Pete Ricketts dug into his own bank account to donate $300,000 to 
Nebraskans for the Death Penalty. His father, Joe, donated another $100,000.

On Friday, the governor said that over the past several weeks, he has stepped 
up conversations with Attorney General Doug Peterson and Corrections Director 
Scott Frakes about a thorough review of the capital punishment protocols used 
in other states.

"My administration will continue to review potential protocol changes," 
Ricketts said.

(source: Lincoln Journal Star)

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

Nebraskans vote overwhelmingly to restore death penalty, nullify historic 2015 
vote by state Legislature


Nebraskans wielded their veto power on Tuesday, voting overwhelmingly to 
restore the death penalty and nullify a historic 2015 vote by state lawmakers 
to repeal capital punishment.

Rural voters carried the day, voting to "repeal the repeal" by margins as large 
as 4-to-1 in counties outside Lincoln and Omaha.

Douglas County, seen as a key stronghold of death-penalty opposition, appeared 
to narrowly support restoring the death penalty, while Lancaster County was the 
only county in the state to support retaining the death penalty repeal.

Officials with Nebraskans for the Death Penalty said Tuesday's vote affirmed 
their belief that if voters were given the chance, they would vote to keep the 
death penalty for the most heinous murders.

"The Legislature made a big mistake on a very important issue," said Bob Evnen 
of Lincoln, a co-founder of the pro-capital punishment group, which conducted 
the successful petition drive that placed the death penalty referendum on 
Tuesday's ballot.

State Sen. Colby Coash of Lincoln, a leader with the anti-death penalty group, 
Retain a Just Nebraska, said he was disappointed with the outcome but not the 
effort.

"This debate was worth having," Coash said.

Some voters, he said, may have been swayed by recent, high-profile murders, 
citing the case of Nikko Jenkins, who killed 4 people in Omaha shortly after 
his release from prison in 2013. A trial this fall in Omaha, which ended with 
Dr. Anthony Garcia being found guilty of the gruesome slayings of four people 
connected to Creighton University's pathology department, also was a factor, he 
said.

"It's really hard to look at those kinds of crimes and not have an emotional 
response," Coash said.

State Sen. Ernie Chambers, who sponsored the bill to repeal the death penalty, 
said Tuesday night that the vote demonstrated to him that Nebraska remains a 
"hidebound and backward state."

"I have been in this activity too long to be surprised by what happened 
tonight," he said. "It will not dishearten me, it will not deter me."

Chambers said he would be introducing a new bill in January to get rid of the 
death penalty.

Tuesday's vote marked the 2nd time lawmakers had been rebuffed in an effort to 
repeal the death penalty. In 1979, then-Gov. Charlie Thone vetoed a repeal 
bill, and the Legislature lacked the votes to override it.

Nebraska, a conservative, law-and-order state, gained the national spotlight 
after the Legislature's landmark vote and subsequent narrow override of a veto 
by Gov. Pete Ricketts.

At the time of the repeal vote, Nebraska stood as the 2st conservative state to 
do away with capital punishment since North Dakota in 1973. A group of 
conservative senators, citing the high cost of the death penalty and its rare 
use, joined with Chambers in voting to repeal the ultimate penalty.

But the victory proved short-lived.

Shortly after the Legislature's vote, Nebraskans for the Death Penalty formed 
to put the issue before the state's voters.

Using contributions from the governor, his parents and others, Nebraskans for 
the Death Penalty collected more than 143,000 signatures of voters during the 
summer of 2015.

Ricketts, whose family owns the Chicago Cubs and the online brokerage firm TD 
Ameritrade donated $300,000 of his own money to aid the pro-death penalty 
group, according to the most recent campaign spending reports. His father, Joe, 
pitched in $100,000, and his mother, Marlene, donated $25,000.

Those donations were among the $1.3 million spent through early November by 
Nebraskans for the Death Penalty.

Retain a Just Nebraska also got some high-profile help, collecting $2.7 million 
through mid-October. Its contributors included Hollywood actress Susan 
Sarandon, who gave $1,500. One of its major donors was a Massachusetts 
organization, the Proteus Action League, which gave $650,000 this year and 
$600,000 last year.

Death penalty opponents also argued capital punishment could possibly take an 
innocent person's life. They pointed to the case of the Beatrice 6, in which 6 
people were wrongly convicted in the 1985 rape and slaying of a Beatrice woman. 
Several of the 6 said their fear of the death penalty factored into their 
decision to falsely confess.

A group of retired judges was among those calling for an end to capital 
punishment, but death penalty supporters countered with their own group of 
Nebraska sheriffs and prosecutors who said that for the most heinous crimes, 
death was the most appropriate sentence.

"It's not about vengeance, it's about justice," said Pierce County Sheriff Rick 
Eberhardt, who collected more than 3,000 signatures to help put the death 
penalty referendum on the ballot.

On Tuesday night, the sheriff sat quietly in a meeting room at Omaha's Marriott 
Regency Hotel with 3 members of the family of Evonne Tuttle, who was shot and 
killed along with 4 others during a botched bank robbery in Norfolk in 2002. 
The 3 gunmen all are on Nebraska's death row.

It wasn't a celebration, said Eberhardt and the others, but affirmation that 
the state's residents still support the death penalty.

"It was the right thing to do," said Christine Tuttle, Evonne's 32-year-old 
daughter, of Tuesday's vote.

"We're going to get justice. It's going to happen," said Evonne's mother, 
Vivian, of Ewing, Nebraska.

Evnen said he hoped the significant margin in favor of restoring the death 
penalty would convince state lawmakers that they need to work with Ricketts, 
instead of against him, to adopt a new death penalty protocol.

Coash, however, said that Tuesday's vote hasn't changed a thing. Nebraska, he 
said, still lacks the drugs needed to carry out a lethal injection execution.

"It doesn't fix the problems that the Legislature saw," he said.

(source: Omaha World-Herald)






CALIFORNIA:

Death Penalty Recommended for Hemet Man Accused of Killing Wife, Child ---- A 
RivCo jury on Tuesday weighed in on the punishment for a convicted felon who 
killed his wife and 5-year-old daughter.


A jury Tuesday recommended capital punishment for a convicted felon who killed 
his wife and 5-year-old daughter, as well as raped and slashed his 
ex-girlfriend, during back-to-back attacks in East Hemet.

After deliberating less than a day, a Murrieta jury unanimously decided that 
Johnny Lopez be sentenced to death for the 2013 slayings of 36-year-old Joanna 
Angel Barrientos Lopez and his daughter, Mia.

Riverside County Superior Court Judge John Monterosso scheduled formal 
sentencing for Jan. 13 at the Southwest Justice Center.

The defense has already filed a motion for a sentence reduction to life without 
the possibility of parole. Monterosso has the authority to go against the 
jury's recommendation, but such instances are rare.

The defendant was found guilty Oct. 19 of two counts of first-degree murder, 
along with one count each of attempted murder, forcible rape, burglary and 
being a felon in possession of a firearm. Jurors also found true a special 
circumstance allegation that Lopez took multiple lives in the same crime.

The same panel weighed evidence and arguments in his penalty trial, which began 
immediately after the guilt phase.

Lopez was arrested on Nov. 9, 2013, shortly after the attacks at two separate 
locations in the unincorporated community of East Hemet.

According to court documents, the defendant confessed to sheriff's detectives 
that he had carried out the killings to get rid of his "baggage" -- an apparent 
reference to the victims.

Investigators said that on the night of Nov. 9, Lopez fatally shot his 
daughter, whom he'd sired in a prior relationship, then turned the gun on his 
wife, who walked into the room after hearing the gunfire.

Both victims were shot twice in the head with a 9mm pistol. They were later 
discovered in the living room of Lopez's single-story house in the 26000 block 
of Girard Street.

After the shootings, the defendant drove to his ex-girlfriend's home at 41060 
Sunset Lane, less than a mile away, and forced his way inside via a window. 
Carrying an axe and knife that he'd stolen from a nearby property, he subdued 
the 30-year-old victim, whose identity was not released, and sexually assaulted 
her, according to the prosecution.

"According to his confession, he used the knife to slit her throat," Deputy 
District Attorney Burke Strunsky told City News Service in 2014.

When Lopez walked out of the house with blood on his hands, a neighbor called 
911, and a sheriff's deputy arrived moments later.

The deputy saw Lopez standing outside the victim's residence with blood on his 
clothes and approached him, at which point the defendant bolted.

The lawman deployed pepper spray to stop Lopez, who put up a fight, culminating 
in the deputy striking him with his baton, prompting the convicted felon to 
surrender according to investigators.

The ex-girlfriend underwent surgery and ultimately recovered.

Lopez has prior felony convictions for illegal possession of controlled 
substances and recklessly discharging a firearm.

(source: patch.com)






USA:

Americans voted to execute more people in the 2016 election


In the last decade, America has been rapidly moving away from the death 
penalty; there were just 35 executions in 2014, compared to 98 in 1999. Then 
the 2016 election happened.

California has a broken capital punishment system: out of 1,039 convicted 
murderers with death sentences, only 13 have been executed. The appeals process 
takes as long as 25 years, the Los Angeles Times reported. On Nov. 8, 
Californians had the opportunity to abolish the death penalty by voting to pass 
Proposition 62.

But Prop 62 was trailing in early returns overnight Wednesday, and instead, 
Californians appeared to favor a different way to deal with the state???s 
dysfunction on executions: speed up the process. By a slim margin as of early 
Wednesday morning, it appeared that voters would pass Proposition 66, which 
would set time limits on carrying out executions, and curb the appeals process.

(source: qz.com)

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

The Death Penalty is Alive and Well ---- Voters in 3 states approve measures to 
strengthen capital punishment.


You can hold off on those stories about the demise of capital punishment in 
America, at least as far as public opinion goes. Voters in 3 states, 2 reds and 
a blue, decisively endorsed capital punishment in a series of ballot 
initiatives decided late Tuesday into Wednesday.

In California, voters appear to have rejected a measure that would have 
repealed the death penalty and at the same time by a smaller margin endorsed a 
measure whose sponsors contend will expedite executions in the Golden State. 
The results, a crushing blow to capital abolitionists in the state and around 
the country, nevertheless guarantees years of additional litigation over the 
new procedures designed to empty the nation's largest death row.

In Nebraska, voters decisively turned on their own legislators and restored the 
death penalty. Lawmakers repealed capital punishment in 2015, citing its costs 
among other factors, but Gov. Pete Ricketts led an expensive campaign to bring 
back executions. His message clearly resonated in a state that has 10 death row 
inmates who have been in limbo for the past 18 months. The "repeal the repeal" 
movement won by margins as large as 4-1 in some counties outside of Lincoln and 
Omaha, reported the World-Herald.

Finally, in Oklahoma, a state with a chaotic recent history of executions, 
voters overwhelming shored up their state's death penalty by amending the 
constitution to confirm that capital punishment is not "cruel and unusual 
punishment" under the Eighth Amendment and to give legislators the power to 
change the methods of execution if one is declared unconstitutional.

(source: themarshallproject.org)

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

Alleged killer of pizzeria owner could get death penalty


The man accused by federal prosecutors of murdering the co-owner of Spumoni 
Gardens could face the death penalty if convicted for the June shooting.

Andres Fernandez, who appeared briefly Tuesday in Brooklyn federal court to get 
a new lawyer, is charged with killing Louis Barbati while attempting to commit 
a robbery - a federal crime that is punishable by the death penalty.

Fernandez's former lawyer Avrom Robin, who represented him at his arraignment 
last Thursday, was relieved from the case and replaced with veteran defense 
attorney Steven Brounstein.

Brounstein sits on panel of lawyers who can try "death eligible" cases.

Prosecutors will have to decide whether to pursue the death penalty in 
Fernandez's case.

Last week, feds announced he was indicted in connection with the death of 
Barbati, who was gunned down June 30 outside his Dyker Heights home with a loaf 
of bread and carrying $15,000 cash.

Fernandez, also known as "Andy," fled the scene without taking the money, 
according to court papers.

He was allegedly caught on surveillance video carrying out the murder and his 
cell phone data was traced to the scene of the shooting and outside Spumoni 
Gardens in Gravesend earlier that day, feds said.

Most recently, convicted double cop killer Ronell Wilson was taken off death 
row by a Brooklyn federal court judge that deemed him too "intellectually 
disabled' to be executed.

He was resentenced to life in prison for the 2003 murders of undercover 
Detectives James Nemorin and Rodney Andrews.

(source: New York Post)