[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, N.H., PENN., N.C., GA., FLA., ALA.

[Rick Halperin]

March 1



TEXAS----execution

Man executed in Texas for killing estranged wife’s family



A Texas inmate was executed Thursday evening for the killings nearly 30 years 
ago of his estranged wife's parents and her brother, who was a police officer.

Billie Wayne Coble received lethal injection at the state penitentiary in 
Huntsville for the August 1989 shooting deaths of Robert and Zelda Vicha and 
their son, Bobby Vicha, at separate homes in Axtell, northeast of Waco.

Coble, 70, once described by a prosecutor as having "a heart full of 
scorpions," was the oldest inmate executed by Texas since the state resumed 
carrying out capital punishment in 1982.

He told the 5 witnesses he selected to be in attendance that he loved them, 
then again said: "That'll be $5." Coble nodded to the witnesses and added, 
"take care."

He gasped several times and began snoring.

As Coble was finishing his statement, his son, a friend and a daughter-in-law 
became emotional and violent. They were yelling obscenities, throwing fists and 
kicking at others in the death chamber witness area.

Officers stepped in and the witnesses continued to resist. They were eventually 
moved to a courtyard and the 2 men were handcuffed.

"Why are you doing this?" the woman asked. "They just killed his daddy."

While the witnesses were being subdued outside, the single dose of 
pentobarbital was being administered to Coble. He was pronounced dead 11 
minutes later at 6:24 p.m.

Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokesman Jeremy Desel said the 2 men were 
arrested on a charge of resisting arrest and taken to the Walker County Jail.

The U.S. Supreme Court earlier Thursday turned down Coble's request to delay 
his execution.

His attorneys had told the high court that Coble's original trial lawyers were 
negligent for conceding his guilt by failing to present an insanity defense 
before a jury convicted him of capital murder.

A state appeals court had previously rejected Coble's request to delay 
Thursday's execution and the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles turned down his 
request for a commutation.

Coble "does not deny that he bears responsibility for the victims' loss of 
life, but he nonetheless wanted his lawyers to present a defense on his 
behalf," his attorney, A. Richard Ellis, said in his appeal to the Supreme 
Court.

In Coble's clemency petition to the Board of Pardons and Paroles, Ellis said 
his client suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder stemming from his time 
as a Marine during the Vietnam War and was convicted, in part, due to 
misleading testimony from two prosecution expert witnesses on whether he would 
be a future danger.

Coble was the third inmate put to death this year in the U.S. and the second in 
Texas, the nation's busiest capital punishment state.

"This is not a happy night," McLennan County District Attorney Barry Johnson 
said. "This is the end of a horror story for the Vicha family."

J.R. Vicha, Bobby Vicha's son, said it would be a relief knowing the execution 
finally took place after years of delays.

"Still, the way they do it is more humane than what he did to my family. It's 
not what he deserves but it will be good to know we got as much justice as 
allowed by the law," said J.R. Vicha, who was 11 when he was tied up and 
threatened by Coble during the killings.

Prosecutors said Coble, distraught over his pending divorce, kidnapped his 
wife, Karen Vicha. He was arrested and later freed on bond.

Nine days after the kidnapping, Coble went to Karen Vicha's home, where he 
handcuffed and tied up her three daughters and J.R. Vicha. He then went to the 
homes of Robert and Zelda Vicha, 64 and 60 respectively, and Bobby Vicha, 39, 
who lived nearby, and fatally shot them. After Karen Vicha returned home, Coble 
abducted her and drove off, assaulting her and threatening to rape and kill 
her. He was arrested after wrecking in neighboring Bosque County following a 
police chase.

Coble was convicted of capital murder in 1990. In 2007, the 5th U.S. Circuit 
Court of Appeals ordered a new trial on punishment. On retrial in 2008, a 
second jury sentenced him to death.

Crawford Long, the former first assistant district attorney in McLennan County 
who helped retry Coble in 2008, said his "heart full of scorpions" description 
of Coble was fitting.

? "He had no remorse at all," said Long, who retired in 2010.

J.R. Vicha, 40, still lives in the Waco area. He eventually became a prosecutor 
for 8 years, a career choice inspired in part by his father, who was a police 
sergeant in Waco when he was killed. His grandfather was a retired plumber and 
his grandmother worked for a foot doctor.

Vicha, now a private practice lawyer, is working to get a portion of a highway 
near his home renamed in honor of his father.

"Every time I run into somebody that knew (his father and grandparents), it's a 
good feeling. And when I hear stories about them, it still makes it feel like 
they're kinda still here," Vicha said.

(source: Associated Press)

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

Texas death row inmate's son arrested for outburst during father's execution



Billie Wayne Coble's son pounded on the execution chamber windows, cursing and 
shouting "no" as he watched his father die.

It was just after 6:20 p.m., and the 70-year-old triple killer was about to 
become the oldest Texan executed in the modern era of capital punishment.

The aging Vietnam veteran who murdered his in-laws in an apparent rash of 
vengeance offered a only a short final statement before he was pronounced dead, 
according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

"That will be 5 dollars," he said. "I love you, I love you, and I love you."

It's not clear what he meant, though it could be a reference to his nickname: 
$5 Bill.

But as soon as he finished speaking, the witness room erupted into chaos.

Gordon Coble started banging on the glass, and his son Dalton joined in the 
furor. Both men - along with another relative - were removed from the room 
before the execution ended, and the 2 ended the night in the Walker County 
Jail, facing resisting arrest charges.

It was a dramatic and unexpected end to a decades-long saga.

Back in the summer of 1989, Coble was distraught over the disintegration of his 
3rd marriage when he kidnapped his estranged wife and killed her parents and 
brother before attempting to kill himself.

But the Waco man, now 70, had no priors and, as he racked up years of good 
behavior in prison, his attorneys argued that a pair of experts for the state 
got it wrong at trial when they offered testimony claiming he'd be a future 
danger even behind bars.

"That Coble will be executed on such discredited testimony is unconscionable," 
Brian Stull, an ACLU attorney who previously handled the case, wrote two days 
before the execution. "The example of his case already shows all who are 
willing to look why the death penalty is never justice, and why it should be 
abolished once and for all."

Raised in an orphanage, Coble went on to serve in Vietnam as a machine gunner 
involved in combat. Afterward, his sister said he came back "different," 
according to court records, and he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress and 
bipolar disorder.

He married Karen Vicha the summer before the murders. But after a bizarre and 
violent outburst when Coble hid in the woman's trunk and then kidnapped her, 
Vicha pressed charges and their marriage began to fall apart.

A few days after he made bail, Coble showed up at Vicha's house. She wasn't 
home, so Coble handcuffed her kids and tied them up, then left to ambush the 
rest of the family, according to court records.

He shot to death Robert and Zelda Vicha, as well as their son Bobby, a local 
police officer.

"Karen, I've killed your momma and your daddy and your brother," he boasted to 
his wife when she returned. "They are all dead, and nobody is going to come 
help you now."

After letting the woman kiss her children goodbye, Coble kidnapped her, 
pistol-whipped her till she bled, and drove to a deserted field where he 
threatened to rape her, according to court records.

As he left the field, a sheriff's patrol car started following them. Coble 
began stabbing Vicha's chin and face as he was driving, then rammed into a 
parked car in an apparent effort to kill himself, saying he didn't want to die 
in prison.

He was arrested at the scene of the wreck and sentenced to death by a McLennan 
County jury the following year.

Over the course of three decades of appeals, Coble and his lawyers raised 
claims of everything from unreliable expert testimony and the use of hearsay to 
bad lawyering and prosecutorial misconduct.

In 2007, he won a retrial over questions about jury instructions rscegarding 
mitigating circumstances. He went back to court for a new punishment phrase of 
trial in 2008, but was re-sentenced - again to death - when a jury still found 
him a future danger despite nearly 2 decades of good behavior behind bars.

But during his 2008 resentencing, a state expert testified about Coble's future 
dangerousness - and his defense team later challenged that finding by arguing 
that the testimony was "junk science."

The expert - Austin psychiatrist Dr. Richard E. Coons - had testified in 1990 
that Coble would commit future acts of violence in prison. But instead he 
behaved on death row, seemingly refuting the professional prediction. Yet in 
2008, prosecutors called him to testify again.

"Dr. Coons admitted that his methodology could not be traced to a particular 
textbook or professional journal, nor could he cite even one authority or 
article that supported it," his legal team wrote. "Coons had never gone back to 
check prison records of those he had testified against to see if his 
predictions were accurate, and consequently had no idea of his own accuracy 
rate."

The state also at one point relied on testimony from A.P. Merillat, who told 
jurors about the violence in prisons and how it would be impossible to make 
sure he wasn't a future danger there. An appeals court later determined that 
parts of Merillat's testimony were fabricated.

But still, courts agreed with prosecutors who argued that even without the 
questionable testimony, there was enough evidence of future danger to net a 
death sentence.

This year, Coble's lawyer filed a plea for clemency.

"He is now 70 years old, in poor health, and has an almost blemish-free prison 
record for the past 30 years," attorney Richard Ellis wrote. "His execution 
would serve no valid purpose."

The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles turned his request down on Tuesday, 
leaving him with a final appeal in front of the U.S. Supreme Court. In that 
claim, Coble's attorney argued that the Waco man's trial attorneys shouldn't 
have admitted his guilt because Coble asked them not to. Last year, the same 
concern came up in a Louisiana case - and the high court sided with the 
condemned prisoner. In Coble's case they did not.

"It's disappointing," Ellis said. "He was executed on the basis of junk science 
and perjury."

Coble was the 2nd man executed in Texas in 2019. There are 5 more executions on 
the calendar, including a June death date for Harris County killer Dexter 
Johnson.

(source: Houston Chronicle)

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

Executions under Greg Abbott, Jan. 21, 2015-present----42

Executions in Texas: Dec. 7, 1982----present-----560

Abbott#--------scheduled execution date-----name------------Tx. #

43---------Mar. 28----------------Patrick Murphy----------561

44---------Apr. 11----------------Mark Robertson----------562

45---------Apr. 24----------------John King---------------563

46---------May 2------------------Dexter Johnson----------564

47---------Sept. 4----------------Billy Crutsinger--------565

(sources: TDCJ & Rick Halperin)

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

USA----countdown to nation's 1500th execution

With the execution of Billie Wayne Coble in Texas on February 28, the USA has 
now executed 1,493 condemned individuals since the death penalty was 
relegalized on July 2, 1976 in the US Supreme Court Gregg v Georgia decision. 
Gary Gilmore was the 1st person executed, in Utah, on January 17, 1977. Below 
is a list of scheduled executions as the nation approaches a terrible milestone 
of 1500 executions in the modern era.

NOTE: The list is likely to change over the coming months as new execution 
dates are added and possible stays of execution occur.

1494-------Mar. 28------------Patrick Murphy------------Texas

1495-------Apr. 11------------Mark Robertson------------Texas

1496-------Apr. 24------------John King------------------Texas

1497-------May 2--------------Dexter Johnson------------Texas

1498-------May 16-------------Donnie Johnson-----------Tennessee

1499-------May 29-------------Cleveland Jackson--------Ohio

1500-------July 10--------------Kareem Jackson----------Ohio

1501-------Aug. 14-------------Gregory Lott---------------Ohio

(source: Rick Halperin)








NEW HAMPSHIRE:

House bill proposes end to death penalty in New Hampshire



The state legislature will vote soon on a bill that would repeal the death 
penalty in New Hampshire.

The legislature previously voted last year to pass an identical measure, which 
was vetoed by Republican governor Chris Sununu.

House Bill 455 would change the state’s punishment for capital murder from 
death to life imprisonment without parole. Under current New Hampshire law, the 
death penalty can be applied in cases of the killing of an on-duty law 
enforcement officer; murder for hire; murder associated with felonious sexual 
assault, certain drug offenses or home invasion; and murder committed by an 
individual already serving a life sentence without parole.

New Hampshire currently has one individual on death row for the murder of a 
police officer, but the bill is a “go forward” law, according to Rep. David 
Meuse (D-Rockingham), meaning that the current inmate could still be executed 
if the new law passes.

The bill was approved by 11-6 in the criminal justice and public safety 
committee with an ought to pass recommendation, according to Meuse, who is a 
member of the committee.

While the bill has a near-even split of Democratic and Republican sponsors and 
has garnered widespread bipartisan support, there is still strong debate over 
the measure.

Proponents of the bill see the death penalty as an antiquated and ineffective 
form of punishment.

“The death penalty is really the only law we have in New Hampshire where the 
sole focus is on retribution,” Meuse said. “The focus is not on rehabilitation, 
it’s not about public safety, it’s not really about justice or deterrent of 
crime. It’s basically a government form of revenge.”

Rep. Mary Jane Mulligan (D-Grafton) said that the bill contains a moral 
hypocrisy “to kill someone because they killed someone.”

“As Mahatma Gandhi said, ‘An eye for an eye will make the world go blind,’” 
Mulligan said.

Those supporting the measure also looked to the practical issues associated 
with an execution in New Hampshire.

In addition to not having a death chamber in the state, constructing the 
facilities needed to carry out an execution in New Hampshire would cost around 
1.7 million dollars, Meuse said. According to Mulligan, this financial burden 
would be borne by New Hampshire taxpayers.

Mulligan also said that there is no evidence that the death penalty deters 
anyone from committing a crime.

“There is data that suggests the murder rate went down in North Carolina after 
[the state] stopped ... using the death penalty,” she said.

However, those opposing the measure view the death penalty ase a necessary 
instrument to deter those already serving life sentences without parole from 
committing further crimes.

“If you have a person in jail with life without parole, that person could kill 
somebody else in the jail, another prisoner or a guard, and not have it any 
worse than they did the day before,” Rep. Dave Testerman (R-Merrimack) said.

Testerman also noted that there is a high bar for serving the death penalty in 
New Hampshire.

“New Hampshire is very judicious in its use of the death penalty,” he said. “It 
is only used in the most heinous of cases.”

Kelly Ayotte, a former U.S. senator and New Hampshire attorney general, was the 
lead prosecutor against the state’s only death row inmate, Michael Addison. 
Ayotte testified against the bill before the criminal justice and public safety 
committee and similarly argued that without the death penalty, criminals who 
had already committed crimes worthy of a life sentence would face no deterrent 
from committing further crimes, as was the case when Addison killed Manchester 
police officer Michael Briggs in 2006.

In the committee hearing, around 5 people testified against the bill while 
nearly 50 testified in favor of the measure, Meuse said.

However, Testerman noted that the testimonies may not reflect the nuances of 
capital punishment in New Hampshire because many people who testified were from 
states where the death penalty “is maybe not as judiciously used” as it is in 
New Hampshire.

“I just think that the death penalty is something we need to have in our 
books,” Testerman said. “We need to be very judicious about it, and I think we 
are.”

Testerman also called out pro-abortion legislators who oppose the death penalty 
as “willing to take the life of an innocent but not a convicted person.”

Despite their differences in opinion, Meuse, Mulligan and Testerman agreed that 
HB 455 would likely pass the House and move onto the Senate, where it is also 
likely to pass. If confirmed by the Senate, the bill would then go to Sununu’s 
desk.

“The question will be whether or not the governor will veto it, and I suspect 
he will,” Testerman said.

A vote of 2/3 of the legislators in each house is required to override the 
expected veto.

“I don’t believe [the legislature] can override the veto when it comes back to 
the House and Senate,” Testerman said.

However, Meuse said he was “cautiously optimistic” there would be enough votes 
to override the veto after the 2018 elections.

(source: thedartmouth.com)








PENNSYLVANIA:

Death penalty upheld for ‘Greensburg 6’ roommate Melvin Knight



A Westmoreland County judge has upheld the death penalty imposed against 1 of 
the 6 Greensburg roommates convicted in the 2010 torture slaying of a mentally 
disabled woman.

Common Pleas Court Judge Rita Hathaway ruled evidence presented in a sentencing 
trial last November was sufficient to support a jury finding that condemned 
Melvin Knight to death by lethal injection.

Knight, 29, formerly of Swissvale, Allegheny County, pleaded guilty in 2012 to 
1st-degree murder for the stabbing death of 30-year-old Jennifer Daugherty. 
Prosecutors said Knight and 5 roommates held Daugherty captive for more than 2 
days, during which time they tortured and finally killed her. Bound in 
Christmas lights and garland, her body was stuffed in a trash can that was left 
under a truck in a snow-covered parking lot.

Knight’s first death sentence, imposed in 2012, was overturned by a state 
appeals court.

Hathaway, in rejecting Knight’s latest appeal, ruled against defense claims 
that contended evidence of kidnapping, torture and assault were not sufficient 
grounds to support the death penalty verdict. The judge ruled on Thursday that 
the evidence showed Knight and his roommates killed Daugherty after days in 
which she was horrendously humiliated and degraded.

“As the defendants were left unsatisfied after cutting her hair until she was 
nearly bald, forcing her to drink feces, urine and bleach until nearly her 
entire body was bruised and forcing her to pen her own suicide note, Jennifer 
died gasping for air and bleeding internally from multiple stab wounds to her 
heart and lung,” Hathaway wrote.

The judge also denied a defense claim which said she erroneously allowed jurors 
to continue deliberations after they reported they were unable to reach a 
verdict. 3 hours later, jurors said Knight should be sentenced to death.

Knight is 1 of 2 men sentenced to death for Daugherty’s murder. Another jury 
found Ricky Smyrnes, 32, guilty of 1st-degree murder and sentenced him to the 
death penalty. Smyrnes, according to prosecutors, was the ring-leader of the 
group.

(source: triblive.com)

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

New Britain man accused of killing girlfriend could face death penalty



In a notice of aggravating circumstances filed prior to Thursday’s formal 
arraignment of accused killer Jason Lutey, prosecutors say the blunt force 
trauma suffered by Colleen Patterson amounted to torture.

Prosecutors will seek the death penalty in the case against a New Britain 
Borough man accused of killing his girlfriend last September.

In court filings, First Assistant District Attorney Gregg D. Shore said 
aggravating circumstances were present when Jason Lutey, 43, murdered 
46-year-old Colleen Patterson at their home in the 100 block of Keeley Avenue 
before stuffing her body into the back of a sports utility vehicle.

The offense was committed by means of torture, Shore wrote in the filing, 
referring to the blunt force trauma injuries that led to Patterson’s death.

Lutey was formally arraigned on Thursday before Bucks County Judge Gary B. 
Gilman, records show, and is expected to face trial later this year.

(source: buckscountycouriertimes.com)

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

Death penalty has fallen out of favor with Pennsylvania prosecutors



Pennsylvania’s death penalty is, by all accounts, embattled.

There hasn’t been an execution in 2 decades, even before Gov. Tom Wolf imposed 
a moratorium on them in 2015. The courts have long scrutinized death sentences, 
throwing out scores of them at appeal. And juries have become more hesitant to 
impose the state’s ultimate punishment. A long-awaited legislative study 
recently called for a host of reforms.

But a surprising factor is quietly contributing to the death penalty’s decline 
in Pennsylvania: Prosecutors are increasingly reluctant to pursue capital 
murder charges, given the high financial cost and lengthy legal battles they 
guarantee, and the improbability the sentences will ultimately be carried out.

In 2004, 40 % of murder convictions in Pennsylvania started as death-penalty 
cases, according to a review of state data by The Morning Call. By 2017, that 
number had dropped more than threefold, to 12 % of murder convictions, the 
lowest rate in 14 years.

“We are scrutinizing these decisions much more than ever before,” said Berks 
County District Attorney John T. Adams, the immediate past president of the 
Pennsylvania District Attorneys Association. “All of us are very cognizant of 
the fact that there’s a lot that we as prosecutors are asked to do as far as 
seeking the death penalty.”

The Morning Call’s figures offer a first accounting of the waning frequency 
with which the state’s 67 elected district attorneys pursue capital punishment, 
data that state government does not track. For its analysis, the newspaper 
reviewed 4,184 murder convictions in Pennsylvania from 2004 to 2017, using 
docket sheets, appellate court records and local media accounts to determine 
whether they were ever listed as capital cases.

The cases were identified through the Pennsylvania Commission on Sentencing, 
which provided every first-, second- and third-degree murder conviction 
reported to it by each county during the time period. That was supplemented 
with other murder cases identified through archived media reports, plus a 
smaller database of cases kept by the Atlantic Center for Capital 
Representation, a Philadelphia nonprofit that has tracked death-penalty 
prosecutions since 2011.

Pennsylvania limits the death penalty to cases of first-degree murder with at 
least one of 18 aggravating circumstances — for instance, the death of a police 
officer, a killing during a robbery, or a shooting that places others in grave 
risk of death. The Morning Call’s statistics focused on the beginning of those 
prosecutions and not the end: whether they resulted in plea bargains that 
avoided the death penalty, jury verdicts that rejected it, or death sentences, 
as was the case for 56 people sent to death row over the 14 years. The review 
did not account for cases that ended in acquittals, or convictions for lesser 
charges such as manslaughter.

The findings showed that in 2004, there were 309 murder convictions statewide, 
of which 123 started as death-penalty prosecutions. In 2017, there were 271 
murder convictions, of which 33 saw the filing of capital charges.

The downward trend held generally year to year, though there were occasional 
bumps. It was driven by Philadelphia, which has long dominated Pennsylvania’s 
death-penalty cases, but was also seen in the rest of the state, though some 
individual counties such as Bucks, Chester and Lancaster saw little or no 
change.

And the numbers should only fall further in the coming years, amid the tenure 
of Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner, a self-described progressive 
who took office in 2018 vowing to never pursue the death penalty.

Critics of capital punishment say it is costly, mistake-prone and unnecessary, 
especially considering the state’s other sentence for first-degree murder: life 
in prison without parole. They say the decline in prosecutions reflects a 
national trend against the death penalty, which 6 states have abolished in the 
past decade.

“Mostly it is just a recognition that it is a failed public policy,” said Marc 
Bookman, co-director of the Atlantic Center, which advises defense teams in 
death-penalty cases. “We’re seeing it more and more coming from elected 
officials, saying it is a failed public policy.”

But to one North Catasauqua woman whose family experienced murder in its worst 
forms, life in prison is not enough for some crimes. Susan Stahler is the aunt 
of Denise Merhi, one of four people butchered in 2010 in a Northampton home by 
Michael Eric Ballard, who is on death row. Ballard was on parole for a prior 
murder when he killed Merhi, his ex-girlfriend, along with her father, her 
grandfather and a neighbor who tried to help.

“You can say what you want about the death penalty,” Stahler said. “But until 
you have a loved one murdered, you can’t share your honest opinion.”

In the death-penalty debate, there’s a divide over who is responsible for 
Pennsylvania’s impasse. Supporters of capital punishment blame an arduous 
appeals process, activist judges and what they characterize as overzealous 
tactics by anti-death-penalty lawyers.

“What do you do with a defendant who intentionally targets and assassinates 
police officers?” the Pennsylvania District Attorneys Association wrote in July 
in defense of the death penalty. “What do you do with a defendant who kills a 
grandmother and suffocates a baby in a suitcase for a few dollars? What do you 
do with a brutal serial killer that terrorizes communities?”

Greg Rowe, the association’s interim executive director, said prosecutors 
recognize the stakes are high with the death penalty, and that their decisions 
to seek it must reflect that.

“These cases are the exception, and they’re reserved for those small number of 
cases where the ultimate punishment is appropriate,” Rowe said.

Marc Bookman, co-director of the Atlantic Center for Capital Representation, a 
Philadelphia non-profit that advises defense teams in death-penalty cases.

Philadelphia attorney Marc Bookman, a vocal critic of the death penalty, says 
the decline in capital prosecutions in Pennsylvania reflects a national trend. 
"Mostly it is just a recognition that it is a failed public policy," he said.

In the 14 years analyzed by The Morning Call, 59 counties had at least one 
death-penalty prosecution. The statistics showed just how prevalent such cases 
have traditionally been in Pennsylvania: Across those years, one quarter of 
murder convictions originated as capital cases — 1,109 cases in total — even 
with the numbers in decline.

In 2004, half of Philadelphia’s murder convictions were at some point listed as 
capital cases, 69 of 134 cases. In 2017, that figure was 15 percent, 
representing 16 of 106 cases.

Outside of Philadelphia, 54 of 175 convictions in 2004 had death-penalty 
notices, or 31 %. In 2017, the number was 10 %, with 17 cases out of 165 murder 
convictions.

The downswing corresponds with a drop in the number of death sentences imposed 
by juries each year, according to state Corrections Department data. From 2004 
to 2008, more than 5 convicted murderers a year were sent to death row on 
average. In the past 5 years, there were less than 2 a year.

Death sentences are falling across the nation, said Robert Dunham, a former 
federal public defender in Pennsylvania who now heads the Death Penalty 
Information Center, a Washington, D.C., nonprofit.

“Pennsylvania reflects that pattern,” Dunham said. “What we’re seeing is that 
prosecutors have realized these cases are likely to not result in a death 
sentence.”

Lehigh Valley cases

Declines in capital prosecutions were seen in Allegheny County, which includes 
Pittsburgh, and Montgomery, which is the state’s 3rd largest county. Capital 
notices fell even in some counties that aggressively pursue the death penalty — 
including Lehigh and Northampton counties.

Lehigh County had 144 murder convictions in the 14 years, of which 60 involved 
death-penalty prosecutions. Of those capital cases, 6 out of 10 occurred in the 
first seven years analysed by The Morning Call — 36 cases in 2004-2010, versus 
24 in 2011-2017.

Lehigh County District Attorney Jim Martin said any decline was driven by the 
facts of each case, and not the climate surrounding capital punishment. In that 
time, his office won 1 death verdict, when Junius Burno was sent to death row 
in 2007 for murdering 2 men in Allentown during a botched robbery.

If there is the presence of an aggravating circumstance, his office seeks — or 
“notices” — the death penalty, Martin said.

“If there isn’t, we don’t,” he added. “Every case is different and the fact 
that there are fewer doesn’t mean there’s been a change in philosophy 
necessarily.”

While it is harder to get a capital verdict than in the past, Martin said, 
“that doesn’t lessen my obligation as district attorney to look at the facts 
and look at the law and decide whether to seek it.”

Of Lehigh County’s death penalty cases, just over 1/2 — 31 — were resolved 
through plea agreements to 3rd-degree murder, a lesser homicide charge that 
carries the prospect of parole. 3 other cases ended in third-degree murder 
verdicts at trial.

Defense attorneys have long complained that prosecutors use the death penalty 
as a club to cudgel plea bargains. A typical sentence in the Lehigh County 
third-degree murder cases was 20 to 40 years in prison and the lowest was for 8 
to 16 years, for an accomplice who testified against his co-defendants.

Martin noted the challenges his office faces prosecuting street crime in 
Allentown amid reluctant witnesses and the rise of gangs.

“I’m not denying that it gives us leverage,” Martin said of the death penalty. 
“But I am denying that we notice it to give us that leverage.”

In Northampton County, there were 60 murder convictions in the 14 years; in 26 
of those cases, prosecutors pursued the death penalty. Of those, 16 fell in 
2004-2010, compared to 10 in 2011-2017.

But the last decade also marked one in which District Attorney John Morganelli 
won the county’s first two death sentences in a generation. In 2011, a jury 
sentenced Ballard, the Northampton mass murderer, to death. A year later, 
George Hitcho Jr. was sent to death row for shooting Freemansburg police 
officer Robert A. Lasso in the back of the head during a police call.

Like Martin, Morganelli said his approach to the death penalty hasn’t changed, 
and that he continues to believe in it, even with executions at a standstill.

“We’re realistic that it is not going to happen,” Morganelli said. “But if we 
have a clear death-penalty case — a police officer or whatnot — we’re going to 
pursue it.”

Pennsylvania has executed just 3 men in the modern era of capital punishment, 
and all 3 were volunteers who dropped legal challenges to their sentences in 
the 1990s. The last time an inmate was put to death against his will was in 
1962.

But the death penalty has still carried a cost for taxpayers, with added 
expenses that begin before the cases go to trial and continue after the 
condemned are sentenced. Defense expenditures topped $143,000 in Northampton 
County’s most recent capital murder trial. Death row’s high security carries an 
increased corrections bill of $15,000 a year per inmate, according to a recent 
estimate by the state.

Northampton County has three pending capital cases that have yet to go to 
trial. Lehigh County also has t3.

In Berks County, there are no pending death penalty cases. Adams, who became 
district attorney there in 2008, said he has become increasingly reluctant to 
seek it, despite success in winning those verdicts: There have been 2 in his 
tenure, plus a 3rd in Berks County that was prosecuted by the state attorney 
general’s office.

Berks County had 127 murder convictions in the years The Morning Call analyzed, 
with aggravating circumstances filed in 22 of the cases. But among the 
convictions from 2011-2017, there were just 5 capital cases.

Adams points to the resources it takes to bring a death penalty case to trial, 
given the extensive investigations that defense teams must do. Because of that, 
capital trials are often delayed months or years, even as witnesses begin to go 
on with their lives, he said.

Adams also highlighted what he called the almost “overwhelming” amount of work 
it takes to uphold a death sentence at appeal, amid a stringent court process 
that can stretch decades.

“Prosecutors are only seeking it for the worst of the worst,” Adams said, 
adding that, “prosecutors throughout the state are scrutinizing the decision to 
seek it — much, much more.”

Amid that, the governor’s moratorium remains in effect, with little movement in 
the Legislature to take up capital punishment.

Wolf tied his decision to a Senate-commissioned report on the death penalty, a 
long-delayed study that was released in June after 7 years of preparation. The 
report offered a raft of potential reforms, including calls for a state-funded 
capital defender’s office, and more protections to prevent the execution of the 
mentally ill and intellectually disabled.

Wolf will continue blocking executions until the death penalty’s problems are 
corrected, said J.J. Abbott, a spokesman for the governor.

“He looks forward to working with the General Assembly on their plans to 
address the report and its recommendations for legislative changes, all of 
which he believes should be debated and considered,” Abbott said in a prepared 
statement.

Whether there is momentum to take up the death penalty — either to repeal it or 
to fix it with an eye to resuming executions — remains unclear.

State Rep. Rob Kauffman, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said he 
is open to re-examining capital punishment, considering its cost to taxpayers 
and the lack of executions. But he said it just isn’t a big topic in 
Harrisburg.

“There’s a lot that has been talked about regarding criminal justice reform, 
but this is not one of those front-burner issues,” said Kauffman, R-Franklin.

In the meantime, the number of inmates on death row continues to fall, as do 
the number of new death sentences.

In 2018, juries added only 1 killer to death row in Pennsylvania.

(source: The Morning Call)








NORTH CAROLINA:

Facing possible death penalty, Gillard said ‘deputies would have to shoot him’

A jury found Seaga Gillard guilty of two counts of first-degree murder 
Wednesday, setting up a decision on whether he will be executed for the 
killings. Gillard had been charged in the 2016 slaying of April Holland and 
Dwayne Garvey in Raleigh.

Facing the death penalty, Seaga Gillard refused to come to court for the 
conclusion of his murder trial, telling sheriff’s deputies they “would have to 
shoot him and he had nothing else to lose,” witnesses said Thursday.

As the 3-week trial drew to a close, sheriff’s deputies testified that Gillard 
briefly became defiant last week after jurors convicted him of first-degree 
murder in the deaths of April Holland, who was pregnant, and her boyfriend 
Dwayne Garvey.

>From a basement holding cell, his refusal to come to court drew an estimated 20 
deputies. At one point, a Wake County sheriff’s sergeant testified, a major 
showed him a taser, or electronic stun gun.

“It was sort of like a warning,” Sgt. Tony Edwards told jurors. “ ... Pull the 
trigger to make a noise.”

Edwards said he heard the tail end of Gillard’s statement in the holding cell, 
where he was seated, and that he said, “If he comes into the courtroom, the 
deputies would have to shoot him and he had nothing else to lose.”

Questioned by Gillard’s attorneys, deputies noted the incident did not escalate 
into violence and ended quickly without the need for even a written report. 
Gillard has sat quietly in court each day.

But prosecutors also played a recording of a call Gillard made from jail last 
Thursday in which the defendant gave a more exaggerated version of events.

“Trying to tase me?” he said in a sample from the recording. “I’m gonna knock 
you the (heck) out.”

The jury could begin deciding on death or life in prison for Gillard, 31, as 
early as Friday. His case marks a rare death penalty trial in North Carolina, 
which has not executed a prisoner since 2006. Wake County juries have opted 
against death in murder cases numerous times in recent years.

Throughout the week, defense attorneys have brought evidence describing 
Gillard’s poverty-stricken childhood in St. Lucia, where he was raised largely 
by siblings only a few years older. Food was scarce, and Gillard was once sent 
home from school for lacking socks — a dress-code violation.

Witnesses have also testified about his ability to be safely controlled if the 
jury opted for life in prison, which prompted the prosecution to bring up his 
jail behavior.

This was not the 1st time Gillard showed defiance. While the case was in jury 
selection, he declined to come to court one morning, explaining that he was 
reading a book. On Thursday, Raleigh police Det. Eric Gibney said Gillard 
initially would not allow him to photograph his tattoos as part of a search 
warrant in November.

“I told him force was an option,” Gibney said. “He said, ‘Do what you’ve got to 
do.’”

In that case, as with the incident last week, he calmed down when his attorney 
arrived.

(source: News & Observer)








GEORGIA:

A juror used the N-word. Did that taint a Georgia death sentence?



3 lawyers representing Keith Tharpe visited some of the jurors who had 
sentenced the Georgia man to death in 1991 as part of their preparations for an 
appeal. And juror Barney Gattie gave them something noteworthy to work with.

Tharpe is black, Gattie is white. Gattie told the lawyers — and signed an 
affidavit — saying that he thought “there were two types of black people.” 
First were those Gattie called "black folks" and second were those he called 
the N-word. “I felt that Tharpe, who wasn’t in the ‘good’ black folks category 
in my book, should get the electric chair for what he did.” Gattie added: 
“After studying the Bible, I have wondered if black people even have souls.”

Gattie also said that “some of the jurors voted for death because they felt 
that Tharpe should be an example to other blacks who kill blacks, but that 
wasn’t my reason.”

Remarkably, no judge has ever reviewed whether those 1998 statements indicate 
that Tharpe’s race was a factor in the jury sentencing him to death, violating 
his 6th Amendment right to a fair trial. For more than 20 years.

What’s the holdup? In part, procedural rules and laws. For the legal wonks 
among you, Tharpe’s argument and the history of his case is laid out here.

The short version is that “no impeachment” laws and court rules bar testimony 
about what occurred during jury deliberations to be cited as evidence in 
appeals, including, as laid out in the Federal Rule of Evidence, “any juror’s 
mental processes concerning the verdict or indictment.”

That changed somewhat under a 2017 court ruling, Pena-Rodriguez vs. Colorado, 
in which the Supreme Court held that the no-impeachment rule cannot apply in 
cases in which jurors later say they relied on racial stereotypes to make their 
decisions.

As SCOTUSBlog sums up the decision: “The 6th Amendment requires that the 
no-impeachment rule give way in order to permit the trial court to consider the 
evidence of the juror's statement and any resulting denial of the jury trial 
guarantee.”

Which brings us to the Tharpe case. The Supreme Court will discuss Friday 
morning whether to accept Tharpe’s appeal asking the nine justices to order a 
lower court to consider whether Gattie’s affidavit and statements — and other 
possible bias among jurors — tainted Tharpe’s trial.

Note that the issue before the Supreme Court is not whether Tharpe deserves a 
new trial, but whether a lower court must hear his argument that his 
constitutional rights were violated.

This is a matter of fundamental justice that becomes even more significant when 
the sentence at hand is death.

Capital punishment is a barbaric, medieval holdover that is arbitrarily imposed 
under an imperfect, easily manipulated system.

But if we allow the government to exert this power, we must demand that 
constitutional rights be preserved (that there is no guarantee is a strong 
argument against a system that determines who lives or dies).

The Supreme Court ought to take this case and ultimately order lower courts to, 
finally, do the right thing and hear Tharpe’s appeal.

(source: Op-Ed; Scott Martelle, Los Angeles Times)








FLORIDA:

Man guilty in kidnapping, killing of Deltona man, faces possible death sentence



A jury found Christian Cruz guilty of 1st-degree premeditated murder and felony 
murder for the beating, kidnapping and killing of a Deltona man who was wrongly 
targeted during a drug ripoff.

On Monday, that same jury will begin hearing evidence on whether to recommend 
that Cruz be put to death. All 12 jurors must unanimously agree Cruz deserves 
the death penalty for Circuit Judge Raul Zambrano to have the option of 
imposing it.

Cruz and Justen Charles were accused of bursting into an apartment at the 
Belltower Apartments in Deltona on Aug. 26, 2013, and beating and binding with 
speaker wire and duct tape 25-year-old Christopher Jemery. Prosecutors said 
they then tossed Jemery’s body into the trunk of his rental car, drove him out 
to Sanford, carried his body to some bushes in an industrial park and shot him 
in the head.

Only Cruz, who lived in Deltona but has been jailed since his arrest in 2013, 
is on trial before Zambrano at the S. James Foxman Justice Center. Charles, 30, 
will be tried separately at a later date.

Cruz, 25, was indicted on charges of 1st-degree premeditated murder, burglary 
while armed, robbery with a firearm and kidnapping. A jury of 6 women and 6 men 
began hearing testimony on Monday and deliberated for about 3½ hours Thursday 
before returning the guilty verdicts. Cruz faces the possible death sentence on 
the charges of 1st-degree premeditated murder or 1st-degree felony murder.

Cruz stood still and showed no emotion as the verdicts were read. But Jemery’s 
mother softly cried as other family members put their arms around her and 
consoled her.

Prosecutors said Cruz and Charles targeted Jemery’s apartment because a 
small-time drug dealer named Mark Walters had lived there, but the dealer had 
moved out. The pair had bought marijuana from Walters before.

Walters was friends with Jemery and had allowed Jemery, who had recently moved 
from New Hampshire, to stay in the apartment until he got settled. Jemery had a 
girlfriend and the couple had a daughter and were planning to marry. But he had 
asked her not to stay at the apartment because he felt the area was not safe.

When Cruz and Charles burst in they found Jemery instead of Walters but that 
didn’t matter, prosecutors said. Cruz and Charles are accused of throwing 
Jemery’s bound and gagged body into the trunk of his rented Nissan. Then they 
drove to an industrial park in Sanford where they dragged him into some woods 
off a parking lot. Then Cruz and Charles are accused of shooting Jemery in the 
head with a .22-caliber pistol.

Assistant State Attorney Tammy Jacques, who is prosecuting the case along with 
Ryan Will, led jurors through the evidence in her closing, showing them 
pictures of shoe prints left in the blood on the apartment’s floor. She said 
those prints matched sneakers from Cruz and Charles.

She showed jurors a picture of an unfired .22-caliber Federal brand bullet 
found in the apartment. And she showed them a spent shell casing that was 
discovered near where the fatally wounded Jemery was found.

She also reminded them that evidence showed that Cruz’s DNA was found in the 
passenger side of Jemery’s rented Nissan. And she said Charles’ DNA was found 
on the steering wheel and gear shifter.

Jacques also showed them a picture of a strip of duct tape paramedics removed 
from Jemery. That duct tape had Cruz’s thumb print on it, Jacques said.

Cruz is represented by the father-and-son legal team of Clyde Taylor Jr. and 
Clyde Taylor III. The father, Taylor Jr., handled the closing, eliciting some 
smiles from jurors when he said he wasn’t going to use the overhead projector 
because he was more of a paper person.

Taylor Jr. referred jurors to the movie “Forrest Gump,” reminded jurors that 
the main character fought in Vietnam and always obeyed his commanding officer, 
Lt. Dan.

Taylor said that in that manner, Cruz looked up to and obeyed Charles. Taylor 
said Charles was 6-feet 1-inches tall and older than Cruz, who was 19 at the 
time of the killing. He said Charles was a hothead and a known fighter.

Taylor asked jurors to consider who would be more likely to be carrying the gun 
in such a situation: the 19-year-old or the older, larger more experienced man.

He also said that the drug-dealer who used to live in the apartment, along with 
his girlfriend, still had keys to the unit and still had some of his 
possessions there.

In her rebuttal, Jacques said there was no evidence that Charles was a hothead 
and it was immaterial whether the former resident still had keys to the unit.

Jacques said the killing happened between 2 a.m. and 5 a.m. and those times 
bookend when Cruz and Charles left a friend’s apartment, and when Cruz was 
captured on video withdrawing $440 from Jemery’s bank account at an ATM in 
Casselberry.

(source: Daytona Beach News-Jouranl)








ALABAMA:

Supreme Court Extends Eighth Amendment Protections to Prisoners with Dementia



The United States Supreme Court today ruled in favor of EJI client Vernon 
Madison, a 68-year-old man suffering from severe vascular dementia following 
multiple life-threatening strokes. The Court held that Mr. Madison, who is 
legally blind, incontinent, cannot walk without a walker, speaks with slurred 
speech, and has no memory of the crime or the circumstances that brought him to 
death row, is entitled to an assessment that recognizes that dementia and other 
mental conditions are covered by the Eighth Amendment's ban against cruel and 
unusual punishment.

"We are thrilled that today the Court recognized that people with dementia like 
Vernon Madison, who cannot consistently orient to time and place, are protected 
from execution and cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment," 
said EJI Executive Director Bryan Stevenson, who argued Mr. Madison's case. 
"Prisoners who become incompetent due to dementia and severe mental illness are 
vulnerable and should be shielded from abusive and cruel treatment. The Court's 
opinion affirming the basic principle of a humane system of justice is a 
significant victory."

In a 5-3 decision written by Justice Elena Kagan, the Court explained that the 
Eighth Amendment bars executing a person whose mental disorder makes him unable 
to reach a rational understanding of the reason for his execution.

The critical question is whether a “prisoner’s mental state is so distorted by 
a mental illness” that he lacks a “rational understanding” of “the State’s 
rationale for [his] execution.” Or similarly put, the issue is whether a 
“prisoner’s concept of reality” is “so impair[ed]” that he cannot grasp the 
execution’s “meaning and purpose” or the “link between [his] crime and its 
punishment.”

Contrary to the State of Alabama's argument in state court that this precedent 
does not apply to Mr. Madison because he is suffering from dementia rather than 
psychotic delusions, the Court held that "a person suffering from dementia may 
be unable to rationally understand the reasons for his sentence; if so, the 
Eighth Amendment does not allow his execution."

The Court reasoned that the standard "focuses on whether a mental disorder has 
had a particular effect: an inability to rationally understand why the State is 
seeking execution." The standard does not require "establishing any precise 
cause: Psychosis or dementia, delusions or overall cognitive decline are all 
the same under Panetti, so long as they produce the requisite lack of 
comprehension."

The Court returned the case to the state court for renewed consideration of 
whether Mr. Madison is competent under the Eighth Amendment. It barred the 
state court from relying on arguments or evidence tainted by legal error, 
including portions of the experts' reports and testimony that "expressly 
reflect[] an incorrect view of the relevance of delusions or memory" as well as 
other evidence that "might have implicitly rested on those same misjudgments."

(source: eji.org)