[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, MD., GA., MO., ARIZ., CALIF.

[Rick Halperin]

Dec. 8



TEXAS:

Suspect Could Face Death Penalty in West Side Double Murder


Police have named a suspect in connection with the brutal murders of 2 people 
on the city's west side on Sunday, News Radio 1200 WOAI reports.

Detectives say Christopher Bernard Doss is charged with Capital Murder-Multiple 
Persons, a charge that potentially carries the death penalty. He remains at 
large and is the object of a manhunt.

Police say when a 34 year old woman, believed to be an ex girlfriend of Doss, 
was walking to an SUV in front of her home in the 2300 block of Delgado Sunday 
afternoon, when Doss walked up behind her, grabber her around the throat, and 
then shot her several times in the chest.

Doss then allegedly opened fire into the SUV, shooting the woman's boyfriend to 
death, and then shot and killed the family dog.

2 girls, an 8 year old and a 15 year old, were also present. The 8 year old, 
identified as Yessenia Vasquez...was hit by broken glass and suffered injuries. 
The 15 year old was not hurt.

(source: WOAI news)






MARYLAND:

Appeals court hears arguments from death row inmate


Maryland's 2nd-highest court is weighing the future of Jody Lee Miles, 1 of 4 
men left in limbo on death row after lawmakers abolished the death penalty.

Lawyers for Miles and state Attorney General Doug Gansler agree that Miles 
can't be executed because the state no longer has the authority to carry out 
the death penalty. But in arguments before the Maryland Court of Special 
Appeals in Annapolis on Monday, Miles' lawyers and Gansler offered different 
suggestions of what should happen next.

Miles' lawyers are asking for his case to be sent to a lower court for a new 
sentencing hearing, and they hope a jury would be able to consider either life 
in prison or life in prison without the possibility of parole. Gansler said 
Miles' sentence should be changed to life in prison without the possibility of 
parole.

Miles was convicted of the robbery and murder of musical theater director 
Edward Joseph Atkinson on the Eastern Shore in 1997.

Maryland's death penalty had been on hold since 2006, when a court threw out 
the state's regulations for lethal injection, and new regulations were not 
written. Then in 2013, state lawmakers abolished the death penalty.

"The sentence of death can no longer be carried out," said Robert Biddle, one 
of the lawyers representing Miles.

There's no indication when the court will rule.

Outgoing Gov. Martin O'Malley, meanwhile, has signaled that he may be weighing 
whether to commute the sentences of Miles and the other 3 men on death row. He 
has spoken with some of the victims' families in recent weeks, but has not 
indicated whether he will take action.

(source: Baltimiore Sun)






GEORGIA----impending execution

Georgia Is About To Execute An Intellectually Disabled Man Whose Lawyer Was A 
Drunk Felon


Robert Wayne Holsey's attorney during his capital trial was an alcoholic who 
admitted to drinking up to a quart of vodka every night while he was 
representing Holsey at trial. While the trial was going on, the lawyer was also 
facing a lawsuit from a client he had taken over $116,000 from. Eventually, the 
attorney lost his law license and was sentenced to three years in prison over 
the dispute with this client. During the period when he was preparing for 
Holsey's trial, the attorney got into an argument with his neighbors that 
culminated in him threatening them with a gun while screaming "N*gger, get the 
fuck out of my yard or I'll shoot your black ass." Holsey is African American.

In 2006, perhaps due to the shambles the lawyer's life was rapidly descending 
into, a Georgia state judge determined that Holsey's attorney "failed to 
prepare and present any meaningful mitigation evidence as a defense to the 
death penalty" during the phase of Holsey's trial that determined that he would 
be sentenced to die. Perhaps most damningly of all, the attorney "advised the 
trial judge at a pre-trial hearing that I.Q. and mental retardation were not 
going to be issues at trial." A Georgia law provides that a defendant may be 
found "guilty but mentally retarded," and that capital defendants who receive 
this verdict cannot be executed. Several years after Holsey"s conviction, the 
Supreme Court held that "death is not a suitable punishment for a mentally 
retarded criminal." (The term "mentally retarded," though widely viewed as 
offensive today, used to be the clinical term for the disability now known as 
"intellectually disability.")

The attorney's failure to introduce evidence that could have spared Holsey from 
a death sentence is expected to be addressed at a last-minute clemency hearing 
that takes place on Monday. Holsey's best path to escape execution, however, 
most likely stems from the fact that, as someone who is probably intellectually 
disabled, he should be ineligible for the death penalty.

There is significant evidence showing that Holsey is intellectually disabled. 
Several experts testified in subsequent proceedings, where Holsey was 
represented by different counsel, that Holsey has "significantly subaverage 
intellectual functioning with an IQ of approximately 70," according to Holsey's 
current attorneys. An IQ of 70 or less is one of the standards clinical 
psychologists use to measure intellectual disability. Yet Holsey is scheduled 
for execution on Tuesday and, unless a court or a clemency board rethinks a 
state law that hobbles the constitutional ban on executing the intellectually 
disabled in Georgia, Holsey's execution is likely to proceed.

Although Georgia law does permit intellectually disabled inmates to argue that 
they are ineligible for execution, the state supreme court reads the state's 
law to only permit such inmates to win this argument if they are "found beyond 
a reasonable doubt to be retarded." The "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard is 
an extraordinarily high evidentiary burden - it is the standard prosecutors 
must overcome in order to obtain convictions because our Constitution requires 
the state to overcome a high burden before denying anyone of life or liberty - 
and it is not typically imposed on people who have themselves been accused of a 
crime. Indeed, Holsey's lawyers argue that Georgia's decision to impose this 
burden on intellectually disabled inmates is "unique" among the states.

Applying this rigid standard, the state judiciary has thus far refused to grant 
Holsey relief from his death sentence. Until recently, moreover, it appeared 
that they were free to do so. Although the Supreme Court ostensibly forbade 
executions of the intellectually disabled in its 2002 decision in Atkins v. 
Virginia, that opinion contained a significant loophole. Atkins, left "to the 
State[s] the task of developing appropriate ways to enforce the constitutional 
restriction upon [their] execution of sentences." As a result, it appeared that 
Georgia might have the authority to place a burden on intellectually disabled 
inmates that many of them would not be able to overcome.

Earlier this year, however, in a case called Hall v. Florida, the Court began 
to close this loophole. Hall recognized that "[i]f the States were to have 
complete autonomy to define intellectual disability as they wished, the Court's 
decision in Atkins could become a nullity." Though "the States play a critical 
role in advancing protections and providing the Court with information that 
contributes to an understanding of how intellectual disability should be 
measured and assessed," they do not have "unfettered discretion to define the 
full scope of the constitutional protection."

This language in Hall suggests that the Supreme Court has grown frustrated with 
state laws that create too many barriers between intellectually disabled 
inmates and their constitutional rights. The most important question in 
Holsey's case, however, is likely to be whether the justices' frustration 
extends to Georgia - or, alternatively, whether the Georgia courts are willing 
to preempt this question by eliminating the requirement that Holsey prove his 
case beyond a reasonable doubt.

(source: thinkprogress.org)






MISSOURI----impending execution

Missouri prepares to execute convicted killer Paul Goodwin; would be state's 
10th this year


Missouri is preparing for its final execution of 2014, a year in which the 
state has rivaled Texas with its use of the death penalty.

Paul Goodwin is scheduled to die by injection at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday for the 
1998 killing of a 63-year-old St. Louis County woman with a hammer. He would be 
the 10th person put to death in Missouri this year - the most since the death 
penalty was instituted. Already, the state has tied for the record set in 1999.

33 people have been executed in the U.S. this year, Texas topping the list with 
10. Texas, Missouri and Florida have combined for 27 of them.

An appeal from Goodwin's attorney to the U.S. Supreme Court raises concerns 
about Missouri not disclosing the name of compounding pharmacy from which it 
obtains the pentobarbital used for executions. The Missouri Attorney General's 
office, in a response, notes that the court has already denied similar 
petitions in previous executions.

Attorney Jennifer Herndon also has filed appeals to the Missouri Supreme Court 
and the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, along with a clemency petition to 
Gov. Jay Nixon, claiming Goodwin has an IQ of 73 and is mentally incapable of 
helping with his defense.

Herndon said Goodwin, 48, understands he is about to be executed, but lacks the 
mental capacity to articulate information that might help his cause.

"The big problem is he can't help us at all," Herndon said. "He can't 
understand what we're doing to help him, and he can't provide any information 
to be helpful."

In the mid-1990s, Goodwin lived in a St. Louis County boarding house that was 
next door to Joan Crotts, a widow. The 2 had been involved in several verbal 
confrontations.

Goodwin was evicted in 1996 after he and friends harassed Crotts, including 
throwing beer cans into her yard. Court records show that Goodwin blamed Crotts 
for his eviction, telling her, "I'm going to get you for this," according to 
testimony from Crotts' daughter.

On March 1, 1998, Goodwin entered Crotts home and confronted her. After a 
sexual assault, he pushed her down the basement stairs, and then used a hammer 
to strike her in the head several times.

Herndon said Goodwin is remorseful.

"He was drunk when he did it," she said "From the beginning he's said, 'This is 
horrible.' But he's so impaired that he doesn't really have the ability to show 
remorse like a normal adult would."

(source: Associated Press)






ARIZONA:

Day 17 of Jodi Arias trial: No trial this week, judge rules


A Maricopa County Superior Court spokesman said the next court date is an 
evidentiary hearing at 9:30 a.m. and the jury won't return until Monday, Dec. 
15.

The jury has already been off since last week as two evidentiary hearings were 
Thursday and Friday.

The defense last week tried again to get her murder conviction tossed out on 
the grounds they claim certain computer evidence was destroyed while in the 
custody of Mesa police.

Another juror, Juror No. 3, was dismissed Tuesday and defense witness and 
clinical psychologist Dr. L.C. Fonseca was back on the stand for further 
cross-examination by prosecutor Juan Martinez.

The Arias trial has garnered national - even worldwide - attention. A jury on 
May 8, 2013, convicted her of murdering her ex-lover Travis Alexander, and 
while they found her eligible for the death penalty, they could not unanimously 
agree to hand down the sentence.

Because of that, Judge Sherry Stephens declared a mistrial in the penalty phase 
of the trial.

After months of legal wrangling, a new jury was eventually impaneled, and a 
retrial of the sentencing phase began Oct. 21. It is expected to last until the 
middle of the month.

In the meantime, rumors that Arias herself will once again take the stand 
continue to swirl.

(source: KPHO news)






CALIFORNIA:

Is it time to abolish the death penalty? Panelists ponder the moral, racial and 
ethical aspects of the long-simmering debate at a Levan Institute conversation


The death penalty debate was organized by the Levan Institute for Humanities 
and Ethics.

A bumper sticker reads, "Why do we kill people who kill people to show that 
killing people is wrong?"

The question was examined during a recent panel discussion held on the 
University Park Campus. "Is It Time to Abolish the Death Penalty?" was 
organized by the Levan Institute for Humanities and Ethics, housed in the USC 
Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences.

Recent botched executions by lethal injection have renewed the debate. New 
advances in DNA technology are leading to the exoneration of more and more 
prisoners on death row. Calls of racial discrimination in the selection process 
have raised concern.

Panelist Ralph Wedgwood, professor of philosophy at USC Dornsife, specializes 
in ethics and epistemology. He argued against the death penalty, saying that 
while killing someone who is posing an imminent threat - or in self-defense - 
can be justified, executing a condemned person in prison offers no advantage to 
the public.

"The condemned prisoner is locked up in a cell, he is defenseless and poses no 
threat to anyone," Wedgwood said.

Executing a prisoner runs a high risk, he added.

"Speaking from the perspective of epistemology, I do not believe the past is 
ever utterly certain. People can be framed, evidence can be planted, memories 
play tricks on people. I don't think we can ever be certain enough to justify 
risking the extraordinary injustice of killing someone who may be totally 
innocent."

Wedgwood brought up legal philosopher Antony Duff, who believes that when we 
punish people, we still must regard them as human beings - they are members of 
the human family.

"I believe in punishing someone, we should always leave room for the 
possibility of their repenting for their crime, with the goal ultimately of 
reconciliation," Wedgewood said. "If you kill someone, you preclude that 
possibility."

Alone in the world

Moderator Sharon Lloyd, professor of philosophy, law and political science at 
USC Dornsife, said the topic resonates more with people now because the public 
has become more educated on the issue.

"The United States is almost alone in the civilized world in imposing the death 
penalty on its own citizens," Lloyd said. "Under the Universal Declaration of 
Human Rights, life is a human right, and for a government to kill its citizens 
is a violation of that most fundamental right."

According to Lloyd, support for the death penalty has been slowly eroding in 
the U.S., due in large part to economic concerns.

In the discussion, panelist Dan Simon of the USC Gould School of Law pointed 
out that the cost is about 100 times more to convict and sentence someone to 
death than to incarcerate them for life. He said cases of botched executions 
have raised the concern that the death penalty violates our constitutional 
right not to be subjected to "cruel and unusual punishment."

Racial bias?

Panelists - who also included USC Dean of Religious Life Varun Soni and Martin 
Levine, USC vice provost and senior adviser to the provost and Michael Brennan 
of USC Gould - touched on the issue of racial bias and how minorities and lower 
socioeconomic classes are disproportionately affected.

"One benefit to the death penalty debate is that it's focusing more attention 
on the functioning of the criminal justice system," Simon said.

Brennan, who has worked as a criminal defense attorney, noted that the system 
of capital punishment in the U.S. simply does not work. Death penalty cases can 
take as long as 20 years in the courts, becoming incredibly expensive. In the 
past 40 years, 12 people in California have been put to death, he said, costing 
$4 billion.

"The combination of too many mistakes and too much money doesn???t justify the 
few people who are actually executed in California."

The religion perspective

Soni discussed the death penalty from the perspective of religious traditions. 
He maintained that religions and their ancient texts must be malleable and 
interpreted within a modern social and technological context. In past 
civilizations, he said, justice was meted out much differently in the absence 
of modern legal and prison systems as well as scientific and DNA-based 
evidence.

But even the modern system is flawed, he said, quoting 12th-century Jewish 
legal scholar Mosheh ben Maimon, who said, "It is better and more satisfactory 
to acquit a thousand guilty persons than to put a single innocent one to 
death."

"And yet we know in our modern criminal justice system, we have not upheld this 
ideal," Soni said. "We know we have killed people who were later exonerated 
through DNA evidence."

One argument often cited by proponents asks whether a person would support the 
death penalty if it was their family member that was murdered.

"Many of us would say 'yes'," Soni said. "Of course - we are human, we are 
upset and angry. But that's why we have the criminal justice system and not a 
system of posse justice. We have substantive and procedural due process, and 
it's not up to us to mete justice."

Levine brought up what he called "the informal justice system" in our country, 
or excessive use of force.

"The formal criminal law process in America executes 30, some years maybe 100 
people. But the informal way to execute people is for a policeman to pull out 
his gun and kill a person. That's something in the order of 1,000 people a 
year."

All things considered, Levine said the "unofficial death penalty" is more 
important than the official one. Reforming the criminal justice system should 
have as much to do with the police force and its rules of engagement, and what 
can be improved systematically within law enforcement organizations.

Rise above it

Wedgwood's final comments questioned the emotional urge for retribution.

"When you really, deeply hate someone, you have a wish to destroy them. Lots of 
religious traditions have observed natural human impulses like this one, but 
nonetheless dictate that we have to rise above them."

He cited Socrates and Plato, who argued that the belief in retaliation should 
be rejected.

"In the end, the kind of certainty and level of confidence you'd need to 
justify running the risk of killing an innocent person would have to be 
extraordinarily high," Wedgwood said. "Going back to Duff's theories of 
punishment, I believe we should always hold the hope for reconciliation, 
however forlorn that might seem."

(source: USC News)