[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TENN., ARK., WYO., MONT., ARIZ., WASH., USA

Tue Feb 19 09:09:02 CST 2019

February 19

TENNESSEE:

Sgt. Daniel Baker Act: Plan to fast track death penalty cases up for review

The Senate Judiciary Committee will review a plan that would fast track death 
penalty cases.

Legislation named for fallen Dickson County Sheriff's Sgt. Daniel Baker would 
provide automatic state Supreme Court death penalty reviews, skipping 
Tennessee's Court of Criminal Appeals.

Baker was a Dickson County Sheriff's Deputy when he was killed in the line of 
duty in 2018.

Prosecutors have said they're seeking death sentences for 2 people awaiting 
trial in Baker's fatal shooting. His cruiser was set on fire with his body 
inside.

Under current law, death penalty cases are eventually reviewed by the Tennessee 
Supreme Court. Before that, it's appealed to a lower court.

This bill would get rid of the Court of Appeals review altogether, speeding the 
process along.

The bill's supporters include House Speaker Glen Casada and Senate Speaker 
Randy McNally, who said justice delayed 20 and 30 years isn't justice at all. 
(source: WTVF news)

ARKANSAS:

High Court won't hear anti-death penalty Arkansas judge suit

The Supreme Court is leaving in place a decision dismissing a lawsuit filed by 
a judge in Arkansas who was barred from overseeing execution-related cases 
after he participated in an anti-death penalty demonstration.

The justices said Tuesday that they wouldn't get involved in the lawsuit filed 
by Pulaski County Circuit Judge Wendell Griffen.

Griffen participated in an anti-death penalty demonstration outside the 
governor's mansion in 2017 during which he was photographed laying on a cot 
wearing an anti-death penalty button. Earlier that day, Griffen blocked 
Arkansas from using a lethal injection drug over the claims that the state 
misled a medical supply company.

Arkansas' highest court removed Griffen from that case and prohibited him from 
hearing death penalty cases. Griffen sued but a federal appeals court dismissed 
the case.

(source: Associated Press)

WYOMING:

Despite new support, death penalty repeal fails in Senate

A proposal to repeal the death penalty failed in the Wyoming Legislature on 
Thursday after drawing far more support from state lawmakers than ever before.

The 18-12 vote in the state Senate ended a fairly long run for a bill that 
failed early each of the past 5 legislative sessions. This year, concern about 
the death penalty’s costs amid tight state budgets won over new repeal 
supporters.

“I finally decided that I can’t go home and feel good about explaining to 
people all of those myriad of cuts we’ve made to the state budget and then 
defend expenditures like this, which have gone on for years and years and 
years,” argued Sen. Bill Landen (Casper).

Ultimately, concern about going too easy on those who commit the worst crimes 
kept the bill from passing after it passed the House 36-21. The trend in parts 
of the U.S. is leniency toward criminals including murderers, argued Sen. Eli 
Bebout (Riverton), in floor debate.

“As things progress, and pretty soon people get more and more lenient in those 
cases, then these people may walk. I’m just not in favor of this,” Bebout said.

Wyoming faces a tight fiscal outlook because of a drop in revenue from the 
state’s coal, oil and natural gas industries. Repeal advocates pointed to the 
high cost of death-penalty cases for the state Public Defender’s Office, which 
according to the bill’s fiscal note would save about $750,000 a year by not 
having to take additional required measures to defend people facing the death 
penalty.

Repeal proponents also tried to appeal to conservative reluctance about placing 
too much trust in government. Death-row convicts have been exonerated 164 times 
since the penalty’s reinstatement in the U.S. in 1976, argued bill co-sponsor 
Sen. Brian Boner (Douglas).

“This is far too much authority to rest in government. Sometimes we wonder if 
whether our government can deliver the mail correctly,” Boner told the Senate. 
“This is something that we have to get right each and every time.”

Death-penalty advocates countered it can help bring closure for victims and is 
appropriate for the most heinous crimes.

“I don’t think we’re thinking about these people that see these heinous crimes 
being committed and the pain that they go through. I don’t think we see the 
closure in it, with what we’re talking about,” said Sen. Anthony Bouchard 
(Cheyenne).

Wyoming currently has no convicts facing the death penalty since a federal 
judge in 2014 threw out a death sentence for murderer Dale Wayne Eaton, who 
spent 10 years on death row. Wyoming’s only execution since the U.S. reinstated 
capital punishment was in 1992.

(source Associated Press)

MONTANA:

Montana lawmakers consider bill to abolish death penalty

On Monday, the House Judiciary Committee heard testimony on a bill to abolish 
the death penalty in the state.

House Bill 350, sponsored by Republican Mike Hopkins of Missoula, would replace 
the death penalty with a life sentence without the possibility of parole. 
Groups like the Montana Innocence Project and ACLU of Montana support the bill.

Those groups worry about the potential for innocent people to end up on death 
row.

ACLU Advocacy and Policy Director SK Rossi said during the hearing that the 
death penalty unfairly affects people from certain ethnic and economic 
backgrounds.

“A person’s chance of being executed goes up if they are not white, not wealthy 
or not mentally sound. As I’ve said before in this committee, the only way to 
guarantee a fair system that does not put innocent people to death is to 
abolish capital punishment completely,” Rossi said.

Opponents of the bill testified Monday the state already has the ability to 
sentence murderers to life in prison without parole. Some also testified the 
only way to keep murderers from continuing to kill, even while they are in 
prison, is through the death penalty.

The last person to be killed under Montana’s death penalty was in 2006 by 
lethal injection.

(source: KTVQ news)

ARIZONA:

Death penalty decision will be made tomorrow in connection with murder of 
Nogales officer

Tomorrow, the prosecutors will decide on the death penalty in connection with 
the death of a Nogales officer.

Last year in April, officer Jesus Cordova was shot and killed while 
investigating a carjacking.

Police arrested David Ernesto Murillo.

He is facing 1st degree murder.

(source: KGUN news)

WASHINGTON:

Senate passes bill to remove the death penalty

The Senate passed a bill on Friday to remove the death penalty from Washington 
state statute and replace it with life in prison without parole.

Senate Bill 5339 passed with 28 in favor and 19 opposed, with senators Phil 
Fortunado, R-Auburn and Lynda Wilson, R-Vancouver, excused.

Republican senators Judy Warnick, R-Moses Lake, and Brad Hawkins R-Wenatchee, 
and sponsor Maureen Walsh, R-Walla Walla, voted in support of the bill. 
Democratic senators Tim Sheldon, D-Potlatch, Dean Takko, D-Longview, and Kevin 
Van De Wege, D-Sequim, voted against the bill.

The Senate passed a similar bill last year prior to the state Supreme Court 
declaring the death penalty as applied was racist and arbitrary. The bill was 
never brought to a vote in the House. House Bill 1488 is the companion to the 
bill passed in the Senate and has yet to hear public testimony.

Sen. Steve O’Ban, R-Tacoma, believes it is possible to create a death penalty 
that the Supreme Court would approve, saying the Senate has a “lack of will” to 
find a solution.

Sen. Jamie Pedersen, D-Seattle, spoke in support of the bill, citing the 
testimony that took place in the Law and Justice Committee, which he chairs.

Former state Secretary of the Department of Corrections Dick Morgan testified 
in support of the bill in committee on Feb. 5, speaking on behalf of several 
other previous DOC secretaries. Morgan said hundreds of prisoners have 
committed similar crimes and were sentenced to life without parole, yet from a 
management viewpoint they pose no greater risk than those on death row.

“There is punishment that exceeds normal imprisonment and that is placement in 
the highest security level,” said Morgan. “That basically results in no 
physical human contact with another person while that punishment is in place. 
It’s profound, it’s desocialization of an inmate if they’re violent enough, if 
the misconduct warrants it.”

During the floor debate Sen. Keith Wagoner, R-Sedro-Woolley, read a statement 
from the killer of Jayme Biendl, a correctional officer murdered in 2011 by an 
inmate already serving life in prison. Wagoner argued that if the death penalty 
is taken off the table there is no further punishment for inmates who commit 
crimes while serving life in prison.

Sen. Mike Padden, R-Spokane Valley, ranking member on the Law and Justice 
Committee, acknowledged pursuing the death penalty is difficult and expensive.

“I’m not a zealot for the death penalty,” said Padden. “I’m somewhat of a 
reluctant supporter.”

Since 1904, 78 people have been executed in Washington state, according to the 
Department of Corrections. The last execution took place in 2010.

(source: Columbia Basin Herald)

USA:

Republicans Leading New Charge to End the Death Penalty----In solidly red 
states, GOP-controlled legislatures are debating whether capital punishment is 
fiscally sensible and just; 30 states still have the death penalty, but the 
number of executions has fallen in recent years.

Republican lawmakers in at least 6 states are pushing to eliminate the death 
penalty, signaling a broader reversal by many conservatives on an issue that 
has long been a bedrock for their party.

In Kansas, Kentucky, Missouri, Montana and Wyoming, Republicans in legislatures 
controlled by their party have sponsored bills this year to end capital 
punishment, citing fiscal and moral concerns. Some Republicans in New 
Hampshire, where Democrats dominate the statehouse, are backing a similar 
proposal. And a GOP lawmaker in Louisiana’s Republican legislature said he 
plans to introduce a repeal bill in the coming months.

27 Republican state legislators around the country sponsored anti-death penalty 
bills last year, compared with just 4 in 2000, according to the advocacy group 
Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty.

The about-face on an issue that has long been key to the GOP’s tough-on-crime 
credo is the latest sign of a nationwide, bipartisan shift on criminal justice 
reform.

“Conservatives pride themselves in limiting government, having fiscally 
responsible policies and believing in the sanctity of life,” said Hannah Cox, 
national manager of Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty. “When you 
look at the death penalty and say ‘Does it meet any of these qualifications?’ 
The answer is, ‘It does not.’ ”

Ms. Cox’s group has been trying to sway Republicans to change their views on 
capital punishment. She said she herself had switched sides, convinced by 
fiscal and moral arguments along with concerns about potentially killing an 
innocent person.

30 states still have the death penalty, but executions have dipped in recent 
years due to a host of factors, including shortages of lethal-injection drugs 
and growing controversy around whether they cause undue pain.

Last year, 8 states carried out 25 executions, according to the Death Penalty 
Information Center. In 1999, by comparison, there were 98 executions, the 
highest number since the death penalty was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court as 
constitutional in 1976.

Legal cases involving the death penalty are significantly longer and more 
expensive, research shows. A study found that in Kansas they typically cost 
about $400,000, compared with $100,000 for noncapital cases.

In the state that has executed the most people since 1977, Texas, there have 
been no proposals this year from GOP lawmakers to repeal the death penalty in 
the Republican-controlled legislature.

Chad McCoy, a Republican state representative in Kentucky, said he shifted his 
views on the death penalty three years ago after examining the economics of 
capital punishment at the urging of his predecessor in the legislature, an 
outspoken opponent. A Catholic, Mr. McCoy also said he had been swayed by 
discussions with a local priest.

Now Mr. McCoy, a criminal defense lawyer who is the state House Majority Whip, 
said he believes that, “If you’re going to be pro-life, it means all lives.”

Mr. McCoy introduced a death-penalty repeal bill last legislative session that 
failed, but he has revived it this year and believes it has more support.

Jared Olsen, a Republican state representative in Wyoming and lead sponsor of 
the anti-death-penalty bill there, said he was moved to change his position by 
a mixture of financial logic and lack of evidence that the practice is 
effective.

“When I looked at the cost—when it doesn’t even deter homicides—we’re 
essentially spending all this money for nothing in Wyoming,” said Mr. Olsen.

Wyoming has only executed one person since 1977 and currently doesn’t have 
anyone on death row. But Wyoming spends $750,000 a year for the state public 
defender’s office to handle capital cases, according to the bill’s fiscal note.

Bill Pownall, a Republican state representative from Wyoming, opposed the 
death-penalty repeal there. A retired sheriff, he said he felt strongly that 
certain crimes warrant capital punishment and that DNA technology could ensure 
innocent people weren’t wrongly convicted.

“I look at this as justice. It has been on the books here since statehood,” he 
said.

Earlier efforts in red states to overturn the death penalty haven’t been 
successful.

Last year, New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, a Republican, vetoed a 
death-penalty repeal bill passed by the then GOP-controlled legislature.

After Nebraska lawmakers in the Republican-dominated statehouse voted to 
abolish the death penalty in 2015, GOP Gov. Pete Ricketts vetoed the 
legislation, saying the legislature was “out of touch with Nebraskans.”

When lawmakers overrode his veto, Gov. Ricketts threw his weight behind a 
ballot measure to reinstate the death penalty that was passed by voters in 
2016.

Most proposals this year to end capital punishment in Republican-led states 
have yet to be voted on.

But in Wyoming, after passing the state house 36-21, the death penalty repeal 
was defeated in the state senate last week by a vote of 12-18. 10 Republicans 
backed the measure.

Mr. Olsen said he plans to reintroduce the bill in future sessions.

(source: Wall Street Journal)

***************** The death penalty, an American tradition on the decline 
Capital punishment has been practiced on American soil for more than 400 years. 
Historians have documented nearly 16,000 executions, accomplished by burning, 
hanging, firing squad, electrocution, lethal gas and lethal injection. An 
untold number of others have doubtlessly occurred yet escaped recognition.

We helped create the University at Albany’s National Death Penalty Archive, a 
rich repository of primary source material encompassing the long and growing 
history of the death penalty.

Capital punishment has long been and continues to be controversial, but there 
is no disputing its historical and contemporary significance. More than 2,700 
men and women are currently under sentence of death throughout the U.S., 
although they are distributed in wildly uneven fashion. California’s death row, 
by far the nation’s largest, tops out at well over 700, while 3 or fewer 
inmates await execution in 7 states.

Executions similarly vary markedly by jurisdiction. Texas has been far and away 
the leader over the last half century, with 5 times as many executions as the 
next leading state.

We established the National Death Penalty Archive to help preserve a record of 
the country’s past and current capital punishment policies and practices, and 
to ensure that scholars and the general public can gain access to this critical 
information.

The archive currently holds numerous collections from diverse sources, 
including academics, activists, litigators and researchers. We remain open to 
new donations of materials relating to capital punishment. The materials are 
stored in a climate-controlled environment and are accessible to the public.

One of our prized collections is the voluminous set of execution records 
compiled by M. Watt Espy Jr. Espy spent more than 3 decades, encompassing the 
1960s into the 1990s, traversing the countryside, collaborating with others to 
uncover primary and secondary sources documenting more than 15,000 executions 
carried out in the U.S. between the 1600s and the late 20th century. Espy’s 
data set has since been updated to include information on executions through 
2002.

The National Death Penalty Archive houses the court records, newspaper 
articles, magazine stories, bulletins, photographs and index cards created for 
each execution that Espy and his assistants painstakingly collected. These 
items vividly capture this unparalleled history of executions within the 
American colonies and the U.S.

Among those documented is the 1944 electrocution in South Carolina of George 
Stinney Jr., who at age 14 was the youngest person punished by death during the 
20th century. Seventy years later, a South Carolina judge vacated Stinney’s 
conviction, ruling that he did not receive a fair trial.

In July, after the documents are fully digitized, the National Death Penalty 
Archive will make all of Espy’s materials available online. Other papers

Another prized holding consists of nearly 150 boxes of materials from Eugene 
Wanger. As a delegate to the Michigan Constitutional Convention, Wanger drafted 
the provision prohibiting capital punishment that was incorporated into the 
state constitution in 1961.

For more than 50 years, Wanger compiled a treasure trove of items spanning the 
18th through 21st centuries relating to the death penalty, including numerous 
rare documents and paraphernalia. Among the thousands of items in the extensive 
bibliography are copies of anti-capital-punishment essays written by 
Pennsylvania’s Benjamin Rush shortly after the nation’s founding.

We also have collected the work of notable scholars. For example, the National 
Death Penalty Archive houses research completed by the late David Baldus, known 
primarily for his analysis of racial disparities in the administration of the 
death penalty; the writings of the late Hugo Adam Bedau, perhaps the country’s 
leading philosopher on issues of capital punishment; and the papers of the late 
Ernest van den Haag, a prolific academic proponent of capital punishment.

The National Death Penalty Archive additionally contains more than 150 clemency 
petitions filed on behalf of condemned prisoners, as well as materials relating 
to notable U.S. Supreme Court decisions, including Ford v. Wainwright, 
prohibiting execution of the insane, and Herrera v. Collins, in which the 
justices were asked to rule that the Constitution forbids executing an innocent 
person wrongfully sentenced to death.

On the decline

The recent history of capital punishment in the U.S. has been marked by 
declining popularity and usage. Within the past 15 years, eight states have 
abandoned the death penalty through legislative repeal or judicial 
invalidation.

The number of new death sentences imposed annually nationwide has plummeted 
from more than 300 in the mid-1990s to a fraction of that – just 42 – in 2018. 
Last year, there were 25 executions in the U.S., down from the modern-era high 
of 98 in 1999.

Meanwhile, public support for capital punishment as measured by the Gallup Poll 
registered at 56 % in 2018, compared to its peak of 80 % in 1995. Only a few 
counties, primarily within California and a few southern states, are 
responsible for sending vastly disproportionate numbers of offenders to death 
row.

What these trends bode for the future of the death penalty in the U.S. remains 
to be seen. When later generations reflect on the nation’s long and complicated 
history with the death penalty, we hope that the National Death Penalty Archive 
will offer important insights into the currents that have helped shape it.

(source: theconversation.com)