[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TENN., ARK., MO., COLO., UTAH, ARIZ., WASH.

[Rick Halperin]

July 17




TENNESSEE:

Lethal injection trial: Bloody foam shows drugs cause pain, panic for 
condemned, expert says



The next person executed by Tennessee will almost certainly suffer symptoms 
similar to drowning, if the state uses the lethal injection drugs it intends to 
purchase, attorneys for 33 death row inmates argued Monday in court.

An expert medical witness testified in Davidson County Chancery Court that 
autopsies of previously executed inmates showed evidence the inmates suffered 
symptoms also typically found in drowning, after injection of toxins into the 
body or after exposure to toxic gas.

The argument is key to this case: if death row inmates are essentially drowning 
during an execution, their attorneys say the state is conducting 
unconstitutional torture.

The outcome of this case may have immediate ramifications. Tennessee plans to 
execute Billy Ray Irick on Aug. 9. The 59-year-old Knox County man has been 
convicted of the 1985 rape and murder of a 7-year-old girl.

Central question: When does execution become torture?

Attorneys for the death row inmates used expert witness Dr. Mark Edgar to 
explain why they believe certain lethal injection drugs cause torture.

Edgar, a pathologist at Emory University, analyzed 27 autopsies of inmates 
executed around the country using a drug called midazolam. Tennessee plans to 
use a form of midazolam as the 1st of 3 drugs in its execution protocol.

The Tennessee Department of Correction argues midazolam renders an offender 
unconscious and unable to feel pain. The next two drugs stop the heart and the 
lungs, according to the department.

Later in this trial, the state plans to call a different medical expert who 
will testify the use of the proposed 3-drug protocol does not amount to 
torture.

However, Edgar said his autopsy analysis repeatedly found evidence offenders 
were able to feel immense pain throughout their executions.

He based that conclusion on finding evidence in 23 of 27 autopsies reviewed of 
a condition called pulmonary edema.

In layman's terms, Edgar explained someone suffering from pulmonary edema shows 
signs of bubbles, froth or foam in the lungs or airways.

"I was struck by the abnormalities in the lung," Edgar said, referencing his 
takeaways from his analysis of the autopsies.

"In addition to that, the majority of them - over 85 % of them - showed 
pulmonary edema."

These very small bubbles, foam or froth can cause immense pain and terror, 
Edgar said.

"It's a medical emergency, and it's a state of extreme discomfort," Edgar said, 
describing the pain and panic induced by the final stages of pulmonary edema. 
'Death penalty abolitionists' blamed for blocking Tennessee executions

During a 15-minute cross-examination, attorneys with the Tennessee attorney 
general asked Edgar about a Georgia case where he also testified. In that case, 
he testified about an analysis of autopsies where the state used pentobarbital, 
a different drug.

In those cases, he also found evidence some of the inmates suffered from 
pulmonary edema.

To start the trial, the state argued death penalty abolitionists have prevented 
Tennessee from obtaining pentobarbital to use in its execution. Many states 
have been unable to obtain the drug because the manufacturer objects to its use 
in executions.

Attorneys for the death row offenders argue Tennessee did not do enough to 
obtain pentobarbital. Using pentobarbital would result in less of a chance of 
pain when an inmate is executed, the attorneys stated in their opening trial 
brief. They argue midazolam has a different impact on an offenders body, 
allowing for pain that pentobarbital largely prevents.

On Monday, an attorney for the death row offenders alluded to this argument 
after the attorney general's cross examination. She asked Edgar if an inmate 
put to death using pentobarbital or midazolam would feel pain from pulmonary 
edema, if the medication had not rendered the inmate unable to feel pain.

(source: The Tennessean)

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

Tennessee's Catholic bishops urge governor to halt upcoming executions



Bishops J. Mark Spalding of Nashville, Richard F. Stika of Knoxville and Martin 
D. Holley of Memphis have written to Gov. Bill Haslam urging him to "use your 
authority as governor to put an end to the fast-track executions planned" in 
the state of Tennessee in the upcoming months.

"It is within your power to establish your legacy as a governor of Tennessee 
who did not preside over an execution on your watch," the state's 3 Catholic 
bishops wrote.

The last person to be put to death by lethal injection in Tennessee was Cecil 
Johnson in 2009, when Phil Bredesen was governor. The state has carried out a 
total of 6 executions since 1976, 5 of those during Bredesen's tenure.

In Tennessee, the governor has sole authority to grant clemency to death-row 
inmates.

There are currently 62 men and 1 woman on Tennessee's death row.

The next man scheduled to be executed by the state is Billy Ray Irick Aug. 9. 
Irick, 59, who has a history of serious mental illness, was convicted in 1986 
of the rape and murder of a 7-year-old Knox County girl named Paula Dyer, and 
has been on death row for more than three decades.

In their letter to Haslam, the bishops called for mercy, including for those 
who have committed terrible crimes. "We join with many other religious 
denominations in firm opposition to the execution of even those convicted of 
heinous crimes," they wrote.

The bishops thanked Haslam for meeting with them in the past, and for his 
willingness to learn more about the Catholic Church's opposition to capital 
punishment and the foundations of that teaching.

In their letter, the bishops recalled the story of St. John Paul II's visit to 
St. Louis in 1999, when he called for an end to the death penalty as both cruel 
and unnecessary. The pope said, "It is simply not necessary as the only means 
to protect society while still providing a just punishment for those who break 
civil laws," the bishops wrote in their letter. "Rather than serving as a path 
to justice, the death penalty contributes to the growing disrespect for human 
life."

The bishops' letter to the governor comes at the same time that a trial begins 
over Tennessee's new lethal injection protocol. More than 30 death-row inmates 
filed suit against the state, contending that the new 3-drug combination - 
midazolam, vecuronium bromide and potassium chloride - used in the 
lethal-injection protocol amounts to cruel and unusual punishment.

Tennessee has not used this 3-drug cocktail to carry out an execution before, 
but similar or identical drug combinations were used in botched executions in 
other states, according to the death-row inmates' attorneys.

The lethal-injection drug trial began July 9. With that underway and Irick's 
execution date set for Aug. 9, the state's capital punishment system is facing 
renewed scrutiny. The state's Catholic bishops are not the only ones voicing 
their opposition to it.

The national organization Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty 
earlier this month named Nashville resident Hannah Cox its new national manager 
and is expanding its coalition of conservative lawmakers and constituents who 
are "questioning whether capital punishment is consistent with conservative 
principles and values due to the system's inefficiency, inequity and 
inaccuracy."

Cox, formerly with the Beacon Center of Tennessee, a free-market think tank, 
said in a statement, "Ending the death penalty aligns perfectly with my 
conservative beliefs because it eliminates the risk of executing innocent 
people, reduces costs to taxpayers, and is consistent with valuing life."

3 men have been released from Tennessee's death row in recent years after they 
were proven innocent. Paul House, who was exonerated by DNA evidence after 
spending 22 years on death row, has written an open petition to ask the state 
not to pursue Irick's execution or any execution, noting the risk of executing 
an innocent person.

In June, the American Bar Association released a study titled "Potential 
Cost-Savings of a Severe Mental Illness Exclusion from the Death Penalty: An 
Analysis of Tennessee Data," which noted that the state could save an estimated 
$1.4 million to $1.8 million per year by adopting a ban on capital punishment 
for defendants with severe mental illness.

The report stated that if defendants with severe mental illness were excluded 
from the death penalty, this "could result in cost savings because a subset of 
individuals could face expensive capital prosecutions and decades of appeals 
would become ineligible" for capital punishment.

(source: Theresa Laurence is a staff writer for the Tennessee Register, 
newspaper of the Diocese of Nashville----cruxnow.com)








ARKANSAS:

Judge asks court to hear case over execution demonstration



An Arkansas judge prohibited from handling execution-related cases after he 
participated in an anti-death penalty demonstration is asking a federal appeals 
court to reconsider a panel's decision to dismiss his lawsuit challenging his 
disqualification.

Pulaski County Circuit Judge Wendell Griffen asked the full 8th Circuit U.S. 
Court of Appeals on Monday to take up the case that stemmed from the 
demonstration last year, which occurred the same day he blocked Arkansas from 
using a lethal injection drug over claims its supplier had been misled by the 
state. During the demonstration, Griffen was strapped to a cot and wore an 
anti-death penalty button.

A 3-judge panel of the appeals court earlier this month dismissed Griffen's 
lawsuit against the state's 7 Supreme Court justices over their order 
disqualifying him from death penalty cases.

(source: Associated Press)








MISSOURI:

Missouri man escapes death penalty in murder of SW Missouri 12-year-old



39-year-old Bobby Bourne was charged after 12-year-old Adriaunna Horton was 
kidnapped from a Golden City park in August of 2013 and her body was found 
later in some woods Southeast of the community.

During a hearing Friday in circuit court in Lamar, Bourne was sentenced to 
consecutive terms of life in prison for child kidnapping and life without 
parole for 1st-degree murder.

Barton County prosecutor Steven Kaderly says the state would have preferred to 
seek the death penalty, but Horton's family members agreed to take it off the 
table because of their concerns about the lengthy appeals process in 
death-penalty cases. Bourne had been scheduled for trial beginning August 6th 
in Lamar.

(source: KTTN news)








COLORADO:

Prosecutors face strict deadline in latest death-penalty bids in Coronado High 
killings



Prosecutors must clear an early hurdle in their plan to pursue the death 
penalty against the alleged shooters of 2 slain Colorado Springs teenagers: a 
ticking clock in the defendants' speedy trial rights.

Attorneys for Diego Chacon, 20, and Marco Garcia-Bravo, 21, want to stick with 
back-to-back trial dates set for October, they said at a joint hearing Monday.

That's a tight window for prosecutors to build the kind of cases necessary to 
win the state's ultimate sanction.

"It's a little bit of a game of chicken," said local defense attorney Phil 
Dubois, who isn't affiliated with the cases. "They're putting pressure on the 
prosecutors."

It's a risky approach, Dubois said, because if prosecutors scramble to meet the 
deadline, it leaves the defense teams with precious little time.

But the gambit could force the prosecution into abandoning its bid for death. 
That's because defendants are entitled to trials within 6 months of being 
arraigned - part of a constitutional guarantee that generally trumps other 
considerations. Chacon and Garcia-Bravo were arraigned in April, 6 months from 
their October trial settings.

Although judges are inclined to grant trial postponements if defense attorneys 
can't be ready in time, prosecutors have a far tougher time asking for more 
time when speedy trial rights are in play, lest judges open ripe grounds for 
appeal.

The issue arose during the first court appearance for Chacon and Garcia-Bravo 
since prosecutors filed the required notice 2 weeks ago to seek death. That 
decision came only days after the 4th Judicial District Attorney's Office 
suffered defeat in its first capital case in a decade, when a jury threw out 
the death penalty against Glen Law Galloway after convicting him in a 
double-murder.

Chacon and Garcia-Bravo are accused of taking turns pulling the trigger during 
the gang-related executions of 15-year-old Derek Greer and 16-year-old Natalie 
Cano-Partida in March 2017. Both were students at Coronado High School.

In discussing trial logistics, lead prosecutor Jim Bentley raised the 
possibility of arranging for a different judge to preside over one of the 
trials. Attorney Joshua Tolini, who represents Chacon, argued to 4th Judicial 
District Judge Larry E. Schwartz that nothing in the law would require him to 
"bend over backwards" to accommodate the prosecution's plans.

Tolini said he would ask for a postponement only if he felt he couldn't meet 
his ethical obligations to present the best defense possible.

Schwartz scheduled a round of 5 pre-trial motions hearings in late August, 
without resolving the conundrum of how to try both men without violating their 
constitutional guarantees.

The Galloway case involved about a year of pretrial arguments from the time 
prosecutors announced they would seek his death. Jury selection alone took more 
than 2 months, and the trial lasted about 8 weeks.

Whether both sides can be ready remains to be seen, but Dubois predicted: 
"There's no way in the world this case is going to trial in October, not if 
they want to seek death."

Prior to Galloway, prosecutors last sought the death penalty against Colorado 
Springs cop killer Marco Lee, but he pleaded guilty and received a life 
sentence in prison.

District Attorney Dan May attended Monday's hearing but declined to address the 
recent spate of death penalty filings, telling this reporter, "I can't talk 
about it."

May's office said the death penalty component of the Galloway trial cost 
$109,000, an estimate that critics say fell far short of system-wide impacts of 
a death penalty case, which are estimated in the millions of dollars.

The decision to seek death against Chacon and Garcia-Bravo also put the 
District Attorney's Office in conflict with the American Bar Association, which 
called on prosecutors in February to rule out the death penalty against killers 
who were younger than 21 at the time of the crime.

The nonbinding recommendation by the nation's largest professional association 
of lawyers cited "the growing medical consensus that key areas of the brain 
relevant to decision-making and judgment continue to develop into the early 
20s."

(source: Colorado Springs Gazette)








UTAH:

Death penalty sought for parents accused of killing daughter, covering her in 
makeup



Warning: Details in this article may be upsetting to readers

Prosecutors will seek the death penalty against a Utah couple accused of 
taunting their malnourished 3-year-old daughter with food before she died.

The state filed the notice Tuesday in the case of 25-year-old Miller Costello 
and 23-year-old Brenda Emile.

The Ogden couple is accused of recording cellphone videos of themselves 
taunting Angelina Costello as her condition worsened before her July 2017 
death.

According to Fox 13, the couple was arrested July 6 after police received a 911 
call reporting the girl was not breathing. Prosecutors say she had been dead 
for some time when police arrived.

She had bruising, contusions, lacerations, burns, open sores and abrasions all 
over her face, hands, legs, head and neck.

"The child victim's facial features were also sunken in, void of definition 
from muscle or fat. Some of the child victim's injuries appeared recent and 
acute while other injuries appeared to be in various stages of healing," a 
probable cause statement said.

Emile allegedly admitted to covering the child in makeup to conceal some 
injuries "so they didn't look as bad."

"It's the worst case of child abuse I've ever seen," Ogden police officer Chris 
Bishop said at the hearing, according to the Salt Lake Tribune. Another officer 
said the child "looked like a Holocaust victim."

Horrific evidence has been shown depicting what prosecutors call "a life of 
torture."

In one video shot months before the girl's death, Angelina is seen eating 
slices of an onion as blood runs from her nose. In another video, the girl is 
offered a forkful of scrambled eggs before it is taken away.

"Haha, no food for you," the mother tells the child.

Both Emile and Costello pleaded not guilty to aggravated murder charges. 
Costello has told investigators that he knew of Angelina's deteriorating 
health, but said his wife would get mad at him if he fed her.

Emile's attorney Martin Gravis has also argued there was no definitive evidence 
to suggest she caused the girl's death. A judge, though, disagreed and pointed 
to the allegation that Emile used makeup to conceal the girl's injuries.

If the couple is convicted, prosecutors would push for capital punishment in a 
separate sentencing hearing.

(source: WCVB news)








ARIZONA:

Pro-temp judges allowed to hear capital cases



A full-time judge pro tempore can hear a death penalty case while a court 
commissioner cannot, the county's top judge affirmed.

Full time judges pro tempore can, by state law, handle a death penalty case, 
Presiding Superior Court Judge Chuck Gurtler said.

Through an administrative order issued last year to comply with state statutes, 
Gurtler reversed a previous order that banned a judge pro tempore from handling 
a death penalty case.

There are 3 full-time court commissioners, including Billy Sipe Jr., who 
handles criminal cases. Doug Camacho handles domestic and juvenile dependency 
cases and newly appointed Kenneth L. Gregory will handle juvenile delinquency 
and juvenile and adult drug court and criminal arraignments.

Sipe, Camacho and Gregory are also full-time judges pro-tempore. If needed, 
they can handle a death penalty case, Gurtler said. However, Mohave County does 
not have any death penalty cases pending on its docket.

Prosecutors withdrew the death penalty against Justin James Rector in February. 
Rector is charged with 1st-degree murder, kidnapping, child abuse and 
abandonment of a dead body for the September 2014 death of 8-year-old Isabella 
Grogan-Cannella.

The county attorney's office also withdrew the death penalty against Darrell 
Bryant Ketchner in February. Ketchner, 60, is charged with 1st-degree murder 
for killing a Kingman teenager in July 2009.

(source: Mohave Valley Daily News)








WASHINGTON:

Washington voters favor death penalty alternatives



A recent poll of Washington voters found 69 % favor death penalty alternatives, 
as opposed to 24 % who support the death penalty.

Attorney General Bob Ferguson met with legislative leaders on Thursday to 
unveil findings from a new poll concerning Washington voters' thoughts on the 
death penalty.

Andrew Villeneuve, founder and executive director of the Northwest Progressive 
Institute (NPI), delivered the results during a press conference.

The poll, conducted by the NPI, surveyed 675 likely voters and asked, "of the 
following list of choices, what punishment do you prefer for people convicted 
of murder?"

10 % chose "life in prison with no possibility of parole"

46 % chose "life in prison with no possibility of parole on requirement to work 
in prison and pay restitution to the victims"

13 % chose "life in prison with the possibility of parole after at least 40 
years"

24 % chose "death penalty"

8 % chose "unsure"

Another finding that stood out was that there was not a single group or 
sub-sample that favored any particular answer.

Villeneuve claims that this poll shows that Washingtonians are ready to move 
forward with criminal justice reforms as a state that values all life. 
"Washingtonians want to make a change," he said.

After the results were revealed, Ferguson stated his thoughts on the findings.

"I'm not shocked by the numbers," he said, adding, "the public mood when it 
comes to the death penalty, the pubic views on that issue have been changing 
quickly."

Ferguson shared his background on the death penalty, stating that he had 
personal experience with the topic after talking with inmates on death row in 
Arizona.

"Public mood is shifting, we need additional legislators to help out," he said.

After making requests over the past 2 legislative sessions, Ferguson finally 
had interest from congress in the 3rd session when the senate, with bipartisan 
support, voted to repeal the death penalty earlier this year. Shortly before 
that vote, Governor Jay Inslee had put a moratorium on the death penalty.

"This poll with further signal to them that not only is this the right thing to 
do, to abolish the death penalty law in Washington state, but is precisely what 
the people of Washington state want and expect their legislature to do," said 
Ferguson.

(source: KREM news)