[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, PENN., GA., FLA., OHIO, USA

[Rick Halperin]

Sept. 23



TEXAS:

Jury selection underway in Williams murder case


It is day 2 of jury selection in the Eric Williams murder case.

Williams and his wife, Kim, have been charged with capital murder for the 
slayings of Kaufman County Assistant District Attorney Mark Hasse on Jan. 31, 
2013, and Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McLelland and his wife, 
Cynthia, on March 30, 2013.

3 prospective jurors were interviewed on Monday - the 1st day of jury selection 
- in the Auxiliary Court at the Rockwall County Courthouse by members of the 
prosecution and defense teams, 2 men and 1 woman.

The process to seat 12 people is slated to take weeks with the trial set to 
begin on Dec. 1. The trial itself may take between 2 and 3 weeks with the 
possibility of jurors being sequestered once deliberations begin.

Dallas County Criminal Court No. 7 Judge Michael Snipes is overseeing the case 
but had to step aside on Monday to attend to cases on his docket back in 
Dallas. Snipes was appointed to hear the case in 2013 after 422nd District 
Court Judge B. Michael Chitty recused himself.

Snipes was replaced by Judge Webb Baird of Paris who handled the rest of the 
day's proceedings.

During the first day of jury selection, the prospective jurors were questioned 
about their views on the death penalty, as well as should a defendant be given 
life without parole, and whether they had seen news of the killings in the 
media.

"Philosophically, I believe in the death penalty, but I would not want to pull 
the switch," the 1st prospective juror said.

When pressed further about pulling the switch by prosecutor Jerri Sims, he said 
it was a hard question to answer because of his Christian beliefs.

"Can you do it or not?" Sims asked.

He said he could.

He also was asked about news of the killing in the media.

"I don't pay attention to local news," he said. "I think [I heard about] a 
judge and his wife being killed in Kaufman County. I don't know their names."

Sims also asked him about his thoughts on gun control.

"I think it is unconstitutional," he said. "The Constitution is clear in my 
opinion."

Sims asked him if he owned guns, and he said he had rifles, shotguns and 
handguns.

"Does that make me a gun nut?" he asked. "Maybe."

He also said law enforcement is becoming too militarized, and that police have 
too much power.

Williams defense attorney Matthew Seymour questioned the 1st prospective juror, 
first keying in on media coverage.

Seymour asked, based on publicity surrounding the case - which was moved to 
Rockwall County from Kaufman County after Snipes granted a change of venue - 
asked the juror if he had formed an opinion.

"No sir," he said.

Seymour then questioned him about the death penalty as the only form of 
punishment in a capital murder case.

"If [a defendant] committed a murder and continues to be a threat to the public 
... I would have some questions," he said. "I am not sure how you would judge 
that with certainty. I don???t think the death penalty should be the only 
appropriate punishment."

The prospective juror said Timothy McVeigh deserved the death penalty because 
of the women and children he murdered in Oklahoma in 1995.

"That rises to a different level," he said. "He planned it and it took a long 
time. It seemed evil. It is hard to reconcile in my mind how he could do that. 
It is an intentional act of evil that consumed his mind. That appears to be 
different than a normal murder."

Prosecutor Tom D'Amore and defense attorney Doug Parks questioned the 2nd 
prospective juror.

That juror did not hesitate when questioned about the death penalty. He said he 
strongly believes in it as a form of punishment and has no problem with lethal 
injection as the method.

The 2nd prospective juror also said he can be fair and listen to both sides of 
the case because he has the ability to listen to the facts.

"I could not say guilty if not proven beyond reasonable doubt," he said.

The candidate said he had heard about the case through the media.

Parks asked him whether he recognized anyone on the list of witnesses set to 
testify during the Williams murder trial.

The prospective juror said he did not know the people. He also said he did not 
know the victims in the case.

Parks said he was concerned about the candidate's strong stance on the death 
penalty.

"If [someone] commits a crime heinous enough for the death penalty, I am all 
for it - a crime where an individual has thought out, planned and executed it 
without remorse," he said. "If a defendant is put to death, he will not commit 
a 2nd crime."

Once the candidate left the courtroom, Parks objected to him being chosen as a 
juror. Baird denied the motion.

The 3rd prospective candidate was questioned by prosecutor Toby Shook and 
defense attorney John Wright.

When asked whether she believes in the death penalty, she said she did.

"I believe there is a place for it, yes," she said. "A society without laws or 
punishment goes awry."

Having said that, and prompted by further questioning by Shook, she admitted 
her take on the death penalty is more philosophical.

However, she also said if she was put in a position to make a choice based on 
the law, she would do it.

"Would l like it?" she asked. "No. I would not take it lightly."

Wright then took his turn on preparing to question the prospective juror, but 
before he was able to ask any questions, the proceedings were stopped and she 
was excused.

Baird told each of the prospective jurors he or she would be notified by 
Wednesday or Thursday whether they would be a juror in the Williams case.

(source: Terrell Tribune)






PENNSYLVANIA:

Death penalty backed by Supreme Court in midstate rapper's murder


More than 4 years after the slaying, the state Supreme Court has backed the 
death sentence for a 25-year-old Lancaster man who shot and killed a local 
rapper May 2010 outside a concert in Columbia.

The high court's ruling, issued Monday, means the case of Jakeem L. Towles now 
goes to the governor's office for possible signing of an execution warrant.

Towles was convicted of 1st-degree murder by a Lancaster County jury in May 
2012 for the killing of 20-year-old hip-hop musician Cornell "Young EZ" 
Stewart, of Columbia. The same jury deliberated for two days before deciding 
that Towles deserved the death penalty.

In the Supreme Court's opinion, Justice J. Michael Eakin noted that the 
sequence of events that led to the murder began when Towles grabbed the 
microphone as Stewart and another artist, John Wright, were performing. Towles 
and Wright began fighting. Security officers broke up the brawl and took Towles 
out the front door of the fire hall and led Stewart and Wright out the back 
door.

Moments later, Towles retrieved a pistol he had hidden in a nearby alley and 
opened fire on Wright and Stewart. 1 of the 3 shots Towles fired hit Stewart in 
the head, killing him, prosecutors said.

Multiple witnesses identified Towles as the gunman.

In appealing to the Supreme Court, Towles argued that he was intoxicated and 
had not formed a specific intent to kill, when he fired at Stewart and Wright. 
Prosecutors must prove such an intent to secure a 1st-degree murder conviction.

Towles also claimed that prosecutors improperly kept black or Hispanic female 
candidates off his jury panel, and a defense expert should have been permitted 
to testify regarding Towles' level of intoxication on drugs and alcohol and its 
effect on his judgment at the time of the slaying.

Eakin rejected all those arguments. The justice concluded, for example, that 
prosecutors objected to several black and Hispanic female jury prospects based 
on non-racial and non-gender grounds, citing issues such as the women's stated 
uneasiness with the death penalty.

Also, Eakin found the evidence showed Towles acted with malice and a specific 
intent to kill when he pulled the trigger.

(source: pennlive.com)

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

Jury selection continues in York County death penalty case


The death penalty case for Timothy Matthew Jacoby will begin next week in the 
York County Court of Common Pleas after a jury is selected this week.

Because of the magnitude of the penalty Jacoby, 41, faces, jury selection takes 
longer than usual, said Kyle King, spokesman for the York County District 
Attorney's Office.

"The questionnaire (potential jurists are asked) is a lot longer in death 
penalty cases," King said. "That's what makes it longer."

The jury selection process got under way Friday and resumed Monday. It is 
expected to wrap up on Tuesday, he said.

Presiding Judge Gregory M. Snyder is off the remainder of this week, so 
Jacoby's trial is scheduled to start Monday, King said.

Allegations: Jacoby is accused of fatally shooting 55-year-old Monica Schmeyer 
in her Manheim Township home during a botched burglary in 2010, authorities 
have said.

Southwestern Regional police officers responding to a 911 hang-up call found 
Schmeyer dead in her 3414 Trone Road home about 3 p.m. March 31, 2010. She died 
of a gunshot wound to the head and suffered other traumatic injuries during or 
prior to the attack, police have said.

Nothing appeared to have been taken from the home, located in a secluded wooded 
area, according to police.

Jacoby faces charges of 1st-degree murder, burglary, receiving stolen property, 
illegal possession of firearm by a felon and tampering with evidence, according 
to court records.

Jacoby remains in York County Prison without bail on the murder charges.

He's also serving a 4- to 8-year prison sentence for a previous case in which 
he was charged with illegal firearm possession and receiving stolen property.

(source: York Dispatch)






GEORGIA:

Arraignment delayed for dad accused in hot car death


Channel 2 Action News has learned court officials have postponed the 
arraignment of Ross Harris.

The man accused of murdering his toddler son by leaving him in a hot car for 7 
hours was expected in a Cobb County courtroom Thursday.

Grand jurors indicted Harris on murder and multiple other felonies for the 
death of his son in early September.

Cobb County District Attorney Vic Reynolds said that indictment started the 
clock on another big decision.

"Whether or not the state seeks the death penalty in this case will be made on 
or before that arraignment date in the next 2 or 3 weeks," Reynolds said.

But the arraignment, set for Thursday, has now been postponed until sometime in 
October.

Defense attorney Phil Holloway told Channel 2's Ross Cavitt the new arraignment 
date is important in the timeline.

"There's a lot of things that need to happen right after an arraignment, for 
example, the defense has only 10 days to file any pre-trial motions they need 
to file," Holloway said.

Holloway, who's been following the Harris case closely, said the delay might 
give the DA more time to decide on the death penalty, but it's perhaps a bigger 
advantage to Harris' attorney, Maddox Kilgore, who right now has his hands 
full.

"The attorney for Mr. Harris is currently conducting another trial, another 
murder trial. He's going to need some downtime to prepare for an arraignment 
and to get his motions ready and things like that so he doesn't miss any 
deadlines," Holloway said.

(source WSB TV news)






FLORIDA:

Killer begging for death is just an act


At first blush you might think a convicted killer saying he won't lose sleep if 
sentenced to death is pure bravado.

There's a strong chance killer James Herard is not joking. He may really 
believe he doesn't care if a Broward judge imposes the death penalty for his 
part in instigating a point-blank murder during a Delray Beach Dunkin Donuts 
robbery in 2008.

Herard can't know what he is talking about. It's one thing to talk tough during 
a court hearing, but being strapped into a gurney is a whole different venue.

Herard may feel differently when he reaches Florida's well-used death chamber.

He may dream of receiving a simple injection followed by a good long nap. 
That's assuming it works. At this point Florida is experimenting with the 
poison cocktail it administers to the condemned. A peaceful process is not 
promised and no longer guaranteed.

Florida is also very serious about putting killers to death as fast as 
possible. Lawmakers recently passed speedy execution laws to clean death row 
out faster. Florida already is one of the most prolific states still using 
executions to deter criminals like Herard, which obviously doesn't work.

Herard doesn't seem to care about any of that.

Right now, his head is all about being a gang member.

Prosecutors say Herard was in a Crips "body count" contest when he convinced a 
fellow thief to shoot a man in the back in a Delray Beach doughnut shop 6 years 
ago.

Since being arrested, Herard has barked in response to judge's questions. He's 
laughed out loud as victims testified. He's dared his sentencing judge to 
impose the death penalty.

Herard is acting as tough as he can.

In the worst neighborhoods, crime and abuse steal many childhoods. The gangs 
take the rest.

And so often, when surrounded by drinking and drugging buddies, the gang life 
seems romantic. Like you're part of a family. Like in the movies. But should 
Herard reach Florida's death chamber, he will be there all alone.

And he'll be scared.

(source: Sun-Sentinel)






OHIO:

Counsel asks potential jurors about levying death penalty in Austin Myers 
case----Jury expected to be selected Wednesday


Jury selection continued Tuesday in Warren County as 1 of the 2 suspects 
accused of killing 18-year-old Justin Back is set to go on trial.

WLWT News 5's Karin Johnson confirms that a plea deal is in the works for 1 of 
the men accused of murdering a Warren County teen.

A "clean kill" is what investigators said 2 young men were hoping for after 
murdering a Warren County teen and detectives said their confessions are all 
caught on tape.

If Austin Myers, 19, is found guilty of aggravated murder, his life could be on 
the line.

"We will be asking for death for this individual," Assistant Warren County 
Prosecutor Travis Vieux said.

If Myers is found guilty, those same 12 jurors will decide whether he lives or 
spends the rest of his life in prison.

"You understand that if you convict (Myers) of a capital murder offense that 
death isn't automatic," Defense Attorney John Kaspar asked potential jurors 
during selection.

Much of the questioning during the last two days of jury selection centered on 
people's beliefs.

"Is it fair to say you have a religious or moral objection to the death 
penalty?" Vieux asked one potential juror.

Prosecutors also questioned whether potential jurors thought 19 was too young 
to be sentenced to death.

"You can get the privileges of being 18 in our society and you can also get the 
consequences of being 18 in our society. How do you feel about that?" Vieux 
asked.

"This is truly a life and death matter and requires a lot of you," Kaspar said 
to potential jurors. "Is there anybody who isn't going to look at this as a 
matter of life and death? Is there anyone who's not going to address that with 
that kind of seriousness?"

Court officials said they expect to have a jury seated by Wednesday. Opening 
statements were scheduled to begin in the afternoon.

Extra security will be on hand throughout the trial.

Officials said they received credible threats against Myers and co-defendant 
Timothy Mosley.

Investigators said that last winter the 2 went to the Waynesville McDonald's, 
where they hatched a plan to kill Back. They then went to Lowe's and bought 
materials to make a choking device.

The men were also accused of choking and stabbing Back inside his Wayne 
Township home before dumping his body in Preble County and firing rounds into 
it.

Mosley has agreed to testify against Myers in exchange for avoiding a possible 
death sentence.

(source: WLWT news)






USA:

Police in Death Penalty States Must Be Required to Record Interrogations


The recent exonerations of Leon Brown and Henry Lee McCollum in North Carolina 
again underscore the need to require police to record interrogations of 
suspects. McCollum and Brown, both intellectually disabled teenagers, confessed 
to raping and murdering an 11-year-old girl after interrogations that went 
unrecorded. Although both were sentenced to death, Brown's conviction was later 
reversed. At his retrial, Brown was convicted only of rape, a result which 
spared his life but ensured that he would spend the rest of it in prison.

Despite their innocence, McCollum and Brown had little chance at avoiding a 
death sentence through the courts. Their fate was essentially sealed before the 
ink could dry on the police-written confessions that they signed in the wee 
hours of the morning at the Red Springs, N.C. police station more than 30 years 
ago.

Without a recording, the police narrative became the definitive account of what 
had happened during the interrogation. Under oath before trial and at trial, 
investigators claimed that McCollum had no problems understanding his Miranda 
rights, and that they told him repeatedly that he could leave whenever he 
wanted. According to the officers, McCollum was "very cooperative" as he 
recounted in great detail - with no threats or promises or pressure of any kind 
- how he, Brown, and 2 other men raped and then murdered the girl.

The confession was filled with details that "only the true perpetrator" could 
have known, including the description of the victim's clothing, the brand of 
the beer cans and cigarettes found at the scene, the fact that she had been 
laid on top of a wooden board, and that her underwear had been stuffed down her 
throat with a stick. The confession also contained snippets of dialogue that 
made the boys sound like depraved sexual deviants before and during the sex 
act, and heartless predators afterwards when they discussed killing the girl to 
silence her. To top it off, the lead agent told the judge that McCollum had 
helped draw a map of the crime scene.

Testifying at their trials, McCollum and Brown described a much different 
scenario. McCollum claimed that officers accused him of committing the murder, 
calling him a "black n-gger" and screaming and shouting obscenities at him as 
they waved their fingers in his face. After several hours, they presented him 
with some papers and promised he could go home if he signed and initialed them. 
McCollum complied, not knowing that he was signing a murder confession. Brown's 
story was similar, with one notable exception. He testified that 1 of the 
agents threatened that if he didn't sign the papers, he would "get the gas 
chamber." The judge credited the officers' accounts of the interrogation events 
and admitted the confessions we now know to have been false. Jurors must have 
believed them as well, because the confessions were the only evidence against 
the 2 men.

2 facts, however, emerged during the hearing that should have alerted everyone 
that something was amiss with the confessions and with McCollum's competency. 
First, McCollum named two other teens as the main instigators of this horrific 
crime. Those boys had rock solid alibis. Police quickly cleared them, and they 
were never charged. Even more telling, the lead agent provided some 
corroboration of McCollum's account. He admitted that McCollum, after signing 
his confession to the gruesome rape-murder, had tried to walk out the door, 
saying that another officer had told him he could "leave any time [he] wanted." 
The lead agent "told him things had changed and that he was now under arrest."

The confession narrative that police scripted in the earliest days of the 
investigation corrupted for more than three decades the ability of judges and 
jurors to find the truth in the cases of Leon Brown and Henry Lee McCollum. The 
details included in the confessions led jurors to impose death sentences on the 
men, and ultimately influenced higher courts to affirm those judgments. The 
fact that "an 11-year-old girl [was] raped by four men and then killed by 
stuffing her panties down her throat" was even accepted as gospel by United 
States Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia when he pointed to the McCollum 
case as exemplifying the need for the death penalty. We now know that the 
confession narrative with all of its gory detail was nothing more than a piece 
of pulp fiction.

Had the McCollum and Brown interrogations been recorded in their entirety, 
judges and juries would not have had to pick sides in a swearing contest 
between police officers and suspects over what occurred before the suspect 
confessed. A recording would have also reliably resolved crucial questions 
about whether the suspect volunteered the inside information about the crime or 
whether police officers fed him those facts. Over time, recording may also curb 
abusive behavior like threatening suspects with the death penalty or 
intimidating them by using racial slurs.

Since advocates have been agitating for this much-needed reform, the list of 
states that require or strongly encourage police to record interrogations has 
grown from two in 1994 to nearly twenty today. But the states that arguably 
need recording the most - the states that use the death penalty - are, for the 
most part, absent from this list. Of the 32 states which still have the death 
penalty on the books, only 7 -- Indiana, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North 
Carolina, Ohio, and Oregon -- require police to record interrogations. North 
Carolina is the only state on this list that is a traditional Southern 
"death-belt" state. None of the 5 states with the biggest death rows - 
California, Florida, Texas, Alabama, and Pennsylvania require recordation.

If our justice system really cared about the truth, we would insist that police 
electronically record all interrogations of suspects. In fact, we would require 
recording of interviews of witnesses, line-up procedures, and all other 
investigatory procedures where the truth can be tainted by police coercion or 
suggestion or obscured by biased or failing memories. The equipment needed to 
make such recordings is universally available and costs - compared to the 
expense of imprisoning or compensating exonerated suspects - next to nothing. 
The fact that so many law enforcement officers in death penalty states remain 
resistant to recording is evidence that they "can't handle the truth" or worse 
yet, don't care about the truth. Until they do, neither they nor the criminal 
justice system should be entrusted with carrying out the death penalty.

(source: Steve Drizin, Clinical law professor, Northwestern University School 
of Law----Huffington Post)