[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----MO., OKLA., NEB., CALIF., USA

[Rick Halperin]

April 23



MISSOURI:

MU professor critical of secrecy in Missouri execution protocol



A University of Missouri journalism professor wants more transparency in 
Missouri's execution process.

The identities of those who carry out executions are protected by law in states 
that allow capital punishment, but many states also have laws protecting the 
identities of the makers of lethal injection drugs. Professor Sandra Davidson 
says these laws prevent transparency and Missouri is not alone.

"This umbrella of secrecy has been broaden, so that also now in Missouri, it is 
being interpreted as including the source of execution drugs," said Davidson. 
The State of Missouri says that law also covers the identity of the makers of 
its lethal injection drugs because they are part of the "execution team." 
Davidson said doctors and anesthesiologists are not taking part in executions, 
and many pharmacists are also considering it to be a violation of ethics to 
take part in the process.

Davidson said she understands why executioners' identities are kept private, 
but argues protecting the identities of execution drug makers is extending the 
umbrella of secrecy too far.

"I would like to see more transparency in the system, I would like to see the 
public know where these drugs are coming from," said Davidson. "The problem is 
one of public oversight. These executions are done in the name of all of us, 
but yet we have no transparency in the system."

Davidson said Missouri has not had a track record of botched executions, but 
reports in other states have been made public about lethal injections taking 
too long to work. Davidson said these kinds of executions could be classified 
as cruel and unusual punishments, but the public does not know for sure because 
the information about how those drugs work is kept private.

Davidson said Missouri, like many other death penalty states, has altered its 
lethal injection protocol because of a nationwide shortage of execution drugs.

"More and more states are having to turn to compounding pharmacies, which are 
not as heavily regulated as regular pharmacies by the FDA," said Davidson. "So, 
the question becomes where are these drugs coming from, and also then, what 
about their efficacy?"

Davidson said the hope might have been that lethal injection would be more 
humane, but examples of botched executions in other states leave that in doubt. 
There have been multiple suggestions made as to how Missouri should change its 
execution process to get around the problems with execution drugs. One Missouri 
lawmaker has proposed the use of firing squads. Attorney General Chris Koster 
has suggested the state manufacture its own execution drugs or return to using 
lethal gas.

Missourinet reached out the Governor Jay Nixon's office for comment, but it 
declined. Missouri Department of Corrections Communications Director David Owen 
also declined comment and only cited Missouri law, which says "any portion of a 
record containing identifying information related to a member of the execution 
team is privileged and not subject to discovery, subpoena, or other means of 
legal compulsion, or subject to disclosure."

(source: missourinet.com)








OKLAHOMA:

Mental Exam Ordered for Man Accused in Deadly Machete Attack



A judge has ordered a northern Oklahoma man accused of nearly beheading a 
19-year-old friend to undergo a psychological and physical evaluation.

21-year-old Isaiah Marin is charged with 1st-degree murder in the Oct. 29 
machete attack that killed Jacob Andrew Crockett in Stillwater, about 65 miles 
northeast of Oklahoma City. A police affidavit says Crockett had multiple stab 
wounds and his head was "mostly severed" from his body.

Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.

Marin's attorneys last week filed an application requesting the competency 
exam, saying he is not capable of standing trial.

Payne County District Judge Katherine Thomas reviewed the application Monday 
and ordered the tests.

(source: Associated Press)








NEBRASKA:

Nebraska highlights growing movement against death penalty - on the right; 17 
Republican lawmakers seek abolition of capital punishment in the state as 
Christians, conservatives and libertarians band together for change



A growing coalition of Christian, fiscally conservative and libertarian 
lawmakers are pushing to repeal the death penalty in some of America's reddest 
states. And after years of working against state-sponsored executions, 
historically a Democratic platform, some conservatives say they believe the 
efforts are gaining traction.

The push for reform was on full display last week in Nebraska, as 17 Republican 
lawmakers in the 1-house legislature advocated for passage of abolition bill 
LB268.

"I know many of you, when you went door to door, you said to the constituent 
you talked to: 'You send me to Lincoln, [Nebraska,] and when I get down there 
I'm going to find government programs that don't work, and I'm going to get rid 
of them,'" Senator Colby Coash told fellow lawmakers. "And that's exactly what 
LB268 does ... We can get justice without this method."

The bill passed its 1st hurdle with a 30 to 12 vote in favor of repeal, 
potentially enough to override Republican governor Pete Ricketts' veto threat. 
2 more successful votes are needed to send the bill to the governor's desk, and 
there is strong opposition, including filibuster threats, to overcome. Still, 
conservative advocates said they believe it is one of the most promising 
developments in decades.

"We're probably in the best position we've been in since the bill passed in 
1979," said Stacy Anderson, the conservative executive director of Nebraskans 
for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, about the last time the state's 
legislature passed an abolition bill. "From the conservative standpoint, the 
death penalty fails on all of our core values."

National support for the death penalty has dropped over the last 20 years, 
falling to 56% in favor of capital punishment and 38% opposed, according to a 
March poll by Gallup. But Republicans are still the most likely group to 
support capital punishment, with 77% in support of the death penalty.

Still, conservative activists point to the 10% decrease in Republican support 
over 20 years, growing support for life without parole as an alternative to the 
death penalty, and the issue's low priority ranking among voters.

The most widely cited reasons for opposing the death penalty seem in line with 
some of the most fervent strains of American Republicanism: fiscal 
conservatism, pro-life principles and small government ideals.

And with increasing scrutiny on states that continue to execute prisoners 
despite a shortage of lethal injection drugs, the issue appears poised to 
continue to attract attention.

"It's a government program that risks innocent life, costs more than the 
alternative, and is certainly not about limited government," said Marc Hyden, 
an outreach specialist with Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty.

"When I'm first speaking, I think conservatives give me kind of a weird look," 
said Hyden. "But about halfway through the presentation, it starts clicking 
with them - that this is a program that just doesn't mesh with conservative 
ideals."

The campaign has seen growing interest in red states such as Georgia, Kentucky, 
Kansas and Tennessee, both Hyden and abolitionists said.

In Montana, a fiercely conservative state, a death penalty abolition bill made 
it out of the House judiciary committee for the 1st time perhaps ever, 
according to death penalty abolition advocates there.

"I was shocked," Moore told the Missoulian. "I didn't expect it to come out of 
committee." At the time that the bill passed to the floor, a stunned Moore 
described it as having "a tiger by the tail".

The abolition bill failed in a vote on the house floor, but many see its 
progress out of the judiciary committee as nothing short of stunning.

"We were very excited," said Jennifer Kirby about the bill's progress. "It's 
about time."

(source: The Guardian)








CALIFORNIA:

Convicted drug dealer faces possible death penalty in killing 20th Century Fox 
executive



A convicted drug dealer could face the death penalty after being indicted 
Wednesday on a capital murder charge in the killing of a 20th Century Fox 
executive.

John Creech pleaded not guilty in Los Angeles Superior Court to the elevated 
charge after prosecutors brought new allegations that he lay in wait to kill 
Gavin Smith 3 years ago.

Creech was previously charged with 1st-degree murder in the death of Smith, 
whose remains were found in a shallow grave in the desert last fall.

Creech, 42, is serving an 8-year prison sentence for selling or delivering 
drugs.

Creech's lawyer has said his client defended himself when attacked by Gavin 
Smith and could have caused a fatal injury.

Smith, 57, vanished in May 2012 after leaving a friend's home in Ventura 
County. His Mercedes-Benz was found 10 months later in a Simi Valley storage 
facility linked to Creech. Smith's blood and body tissue, including skin stuck 
to the car's seat, were found inside.

Smith, a former UCLA basketball player and father of 3, had worked for Fox's 
movie distribution department and was branch manager for several theatres.

Smith was believed to have had a romance with Creech's wife after meeting her 
in drug rehabilitation, a law enforcement official previously told The 
Associated Press.

(source: Associated Press)

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

Gavin Smith Case: Accused murderer eligible for death penalty



John Creech, a convicted drug dealer accused of murdering Fox executive Gavin 
Smith, was charged with one count of capital murder Wednesday. He is eligible 
for the death penalty.

A Grand Jury indictment was unsealed in Los Angeles County Superior Court and 
charges Creech with the special circumstance of lying in wait in the murder of 
Smith.

Smith, 57, was last seen May 1, 2012 leaving a friend's home in Ventura County. 
In February 2013, his black Mercedez-Benz was found in a Simi Valley storage 
unit that belonged to Creech.

Last October, Smith's remains were found in a shallow grave in a remote area 
just south of Palmdale.

Creech, 42, was arrested in connection to Smith's murder in January. He is 
currently in prison serving an 8-year sentence for the transportation and sale 
of drugs.

Prosecutors will decide at a later date to seek the death penalty or life in 
prison without the possibility of parole. A pretrial hearing is scheduled for 
April 27 in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

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

Sirhan Sirhan sentenced to die, April 23, 1969



On this day in 1969, Sirhan Sirhan, a Palestinian immigrant born in Jerusalem 
into a Christian family in 1944, was sentenced to die in the gas chamber after 
being convicted of killing Sen. Robert F. Kennedy (D-N.Y.).

Sirhan's sentence was commuted to life in prison in 1972 after the California 
Supreme Court abolished the death penalty. He currently is imprisoned at the 
Richard Donovan Correctional Facility near San Diego.

On June 5, 1968, Kennedy, having just won California's Democratic presidential 
primary, was making his way toward the Ambassador Hotel kitchen in Los Angeles 
to greet supporters when Sirhan shot him at close range with a .22 caliber 
revolver. Kennedy died the following day at age 42.

Sirhan was convicted of murder after a 3-month trial. His lawyers sought to 
show that Sirhan had acted impulsively and was mentally unstable. But when 
Judge Herbert Walker admitted into evidence pages from 3 of the journal 
notebooks that Sirhan had kept, it became clear the murder was premeditated.

In 1989, Sirhan told David Frost: "My only connection with Robert Kennedy was 
his sole support of Israel and his deliberate attempt to send those 50 bombers 
to Israel to obviously do harm to the Palestinians." He has maintained since 
then that he has no memory of committing the crime. At a 2003 hearing, in an 
attempt to win Sirhan a new trial, his lawyer claimed Sirhan had been 
hypnotized in a conspiracy.

Sirhan's parole requests have been denied more than a dozen times. His next 
hearing is scheduled for 2016 when he will be 72. Although he and his family 
came to the United States when he was 12, Sirhan has retained his Jordanian 
citizenship.

(source: politico.com)








USA:

Manufacturer Asks Prisons To Return Supply Of Controversial Lethal Injection 
Drug



Death penalty states are continuing to deal with the fallout after a major U.S. 
drug manufacturer announced that it will no longer sell corrections departments 
a sedative used for lethal injections. The company also asked departments to 
return any supply of the drug they had purchased.

The Arizona Department of Corrections confirmed to the Arizona Republic Tuesday 
that Akorn, an Illinois-based drug company that manufactures midazolam, asked 
the department to return the supply it purchased in 2014. The sedative -- which 
is commonly given prior to surgery -- is the 1st drug used in 3-drug lethal 
injections, while states with a single-drug protocol commonly use the sedative 
pentobarbital.

A spokesman with the Alabama Department of Corrections also confirmed to The 
Huffington Post Wednesday that "our department did receive a letter??? from 
Akorn. However, he would not say whether any of the department's midazolam 
supply had been purchased from Akorn, and therefore whether it had returned any 
chemicals to the manufacturer.

Death penalty states have faced dwindling supplies of chemicals used for lethal 
injections in the past several years, as manufacturers make their supplies 
unavailable to prisons. In March, Akorn announced it would no longer directly 
ship to prisons and condemned the use midazolam for executions, saying:

Akorn strongly objects to the use of its products to conduct or support capital 
punishment through lethal injection or other means. To prevent the use of our 
products in capital punishment, Akorn will not sell any product directly to any 
prison or other correctional institution and we will restrict the sale of known 
components of lethal injection protocols to a select group of wholesalers who 
agree to use their best efforts to keep these products out of correctional 
institutions.

The same day, the company also sent letters to attorneys general and the heads 
of corrections departments in death penalty states like Kentucky and Alabama, 
requesting they return any remaining supply of drugs procured through Akorn for 
a refund.

Neither Akorn nor the Arizona Department of Corrections immediately returned 
requests for comment.

In the 32 states that have the death penalty, lethal injections are comprised 
of either a three-drug combination or a single drug. As companies like Akorn 
join major drug manufactuers like Hospira and refuse to supply prisons 
directly, corrections departments have increasingly turned to local compounding 
pharmacies to mix chemicals for lethal injections. At the same time, states are 
fighting to keep the identities of drug suppliers a secret from the public.

Other states have approved backup methods for capital punishment, should they 
run out of the necessary chemicals or the lethal injection methods are found 
unconstitutional by courts: Oklahoma recently legalized a new form of the gas 
chamber, while Utah brought back the firing squad.

Professor Rick Halperin, director of the Human Rights Program at Southern 
Methodist University in Texas, told The Huffington Post that it's unlikely that 
departments will actually send back the Akorn products, especially since the 
drug company has no authority to enforce the request.

"I'd be shocked if they complied with it. I think it's naive to think that 
states would return that drug if they're hell-bent on killing people with it," 
Halperin said. "I don't think any states are going to suddenly find the moral 
conscience to willingly return a supply of [hard-to-find] drugs."

Despite the controversy, the role of midazolam drug manufacturers in the lethal 
injection debate could soon become irrelevant: In just 1 week, the U.S. Supreme 
Court will hear arguments on whether midazolam can be legally used in 
executions at all.

Halperin said drug manufacturers getting ahead of the SCOTUS decision "makes 
good press" and the intentions may be good, but it's "too little, too late."

"Drug companies should have stopped supplying prisons long ago," Halperin said. 
"They should have had some professional ethics long before this," he said. 
"Where was this morality on their part decades ago? I don't think the good 
intention of drug manufacturers now in 2015 lets them off the hook."

(source: Kim Bellware, Huffington Post)

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

Tsarnaev sentencing gauges shift on death penalty----When jurors return with a 
sentence, it will likely be read as a judgment on the death penalty itself



In recent years, public support for the death penalty in the U.S. has waned. A 
March Pew Research poll found that 56 % of Americans favor the sentence for 
those convicted of murder - a decline of 6 % points since 2011. Since the 1976 
reinstatement of the death penalty, support for it peaked at 78 % in 1996. As 
the appetite for the death penalty has diminished - spurred, in part, by 
revelations of wrongful convictions - juries have become more reticent to hand 
down the ultimate punishment. In 2014 judges and juries issued 72 death 
sentences, the fewest in the 40 years of the modern death penalty, according to 
data compiled by the nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center.

Moreover, executions actually carried out stood at a 20-year low of 35.

A sentence of life without parole for Tsarnaev, who was found guilty of all 30 
counts he was charged with, would be an indication of where the country is 
headed on the issue, said Robert Dunham, the executive director of the Death 
Penalty Information Center.

"On the level of severity of murders, this ranks pretty high. If the jury, 
given those facts and the enormous effort made by the federal government to 
obtain death penalty, ends up rejecting the death penalty, that is pretty 
significant," he said. "It would reflect the sea change in public attitude 
about the death penalty in the last generation."

Even with the horrifying nature of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's weeklong rampage in 
Boston with his older brother, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, during which they killed 4 
people, injured 260 and left Bostonians locked down in their homes during a 
prolonged manhunt, residents of the city and the rest of the state have shown a 
reticence to embrace the death penalty.

Only 33 % of surveyed Massachusetts voters said they favor the death penalty 
for Tsarnaev, according to a Suffolk University poll released this week. Among 
Boston voters, a poll conducted by Boston's WBUR radio station found that only 
27 % of respondents said they supported the death penalty in the case. The Bay 
State abolished the punishment in 1984, but it is an option for Dzhokhar 
Tsarnaev because he is being tried in federal court.

Views among the victims and their family members have been mixed, but some have 
said they strongly prefer life without parole.

"We understand all too well the heinousness and brutality of the crimes 
committed. We were there. We lived it," Bill and Denise Richard, the parents of 
8-year-old Martin Richard, who was killed in the bombing attack, wrote in an 
editorial in The Boston Globe. "We know that the government has its reasons for 
seeking the death penalty, but the continued pursuit of that punishment could 
bring years of appeals and prolong reliving the most painful day of our lives."

Tsarnaev's federal trial was always going to be a capital case. Potential 
jurors who said they were categorically opposed to the death penalty were 
dismissed.

"You have a jury, by the very nature of the manner which it is selected, is 
incapable of reflecting the conscience of the Boston community," Dunham said. 
"Will they be influenced by their perception of the public attitude of the 
death penalty? They're not supposed to be, but they may be."

Douglas Berman, a law professor at Ohio State University's Moritz College of 
Law who specializes in criminal sentencing, said that jurors, consciously or 
unconsciously, are inclined to do what they believe public wants when it comes 
to sentencing in such a highly charged, emotional case.

"I certainly think ... the national mood and the Massachusetts mood and the 
Boston mood may free the jury up in some sense not to worry quite so much about 
what the community might think if they were to return a life sentence rather 
than a death sentence," he said. "I do think it's hard to avoid the sense 'If I 
get this wrong, I will be forever as one of those jurors that got this wrong.'"

Berman said that prosecutors, arguing for capital punishment, will emphasize 
the heinous, premeditated nature of the crimes and the widespread destruction, 
whereas defense attorneys, seeking life imprisonment, will focus on mitigating 
factors for Tsarnaev, who was a teenager at the time of the bombing and was, 
according to the defense, following the orders of his older brother.

Regardless of the specific merits of those arguments, because it is such a 
high-profile terrorism case, the sentence will likely be interpreted as a 
larger statement on society's view of the appropriate kind of punishment for 
the worst of the worst when there is little ambiguity regarding guilt.

A death sentence requires unanimity among the 12 jurors. "It'll be easier to 
read a death verdict than a life verdict. It would be a repudiation of all the 
arguments for something less than death," Berman said. "A life verdict just 
leaves you with some certainty - which one of those arguments against death 
swayed 1 juror or multiple jurors?"

(source: Al Jazeera)

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

Death penalty doesn't serve any real purpose



More than 2/3 of the countries in the world have now abolished the death 
penalty in law or practice, according to the Amnesty International website.

The website also states that, in 2010, "the overwhelming majority of all known 
executions took place in 5 countries China, Iran, North Korea, Yemen and United 
States."

Some death penalty opponents feel nobody deserves to die, no matter how vicious 
the crime and the criminal.

Those who are for it believe the worst of the worst deserve to die.

According to the Council of State Government article, "Lethal Injection Drug 
Shortage," written by Jennifer Horne, "Texas has 317 inmates on death row, but 
only enough of a key lethal injection drug to execute 2 of them."

Death penalty opponents feel as though these drugs, often untested, might cause 
a condemned killer to feel pain as he dies.

I, too, am against the death penalty.

The reason I am against it is because I feel as though having the death penalty 
solves absolutely none of our problems.

In Kevin McSpadden's Time magazine article, "America's Largest Death Row Has 
Run Out of Room," he writes, "708 out of 715 death row cells at San Quentin are 
occupied."

He continues to write that California has not seen an execution for nearly a 
decade and, with an anticipated 20 new arrivals per year, it has run out of 
room for inmates.

Since we live in a country that has always had capital punishment, most 
Americans can't imagine what it would be like not to have it.

I believe that people are afraid that if they abolished the death penalty, the 
crime rates would suddenly rise rapidly.

This is obviously not true and having the death penalty does not deter people 
from committing crimes.

America should definitely look to Europe to set an example.

According to theguardian.com article, "Europe taught America how to end the 
death penalty. Now maybe it finally will," Europe has been trying to bring its 
anti-death penalty stance to the United States.

The article states that the European Union believes that the death penalty "is 
cruel and inhuman, and has not been shown in any way to act as a deterrent to 
crime."

Basically, having the death penalty does not stop people from committing 
crimes.

There also needs to be more focus fixing the prison system in this country.

According to the Equal Justice Initiative website, "The death penalty is 
infected with racial bias."

In Ed Pilkington's guardian.com article, "Research exposes racial 
discrimination in America's death penalty capital," states that black inmates 
in Houston are more than 3 times as likely to face death sentence than whites."

Texas has the most executions to date in this country and has had 5 executions 
this year, according to Death Penalty Information Center website.

Pilkington's article was published in 2013 and he discussed an academic study 
that "exposes the extent of racial discrimination inherent in the administering 
of capital punishment in Harris County, the ground zero of the death penalty in 
the U.S."

Pilkington wrote that University of Maryland professor Raymond Paternoster, 
author of the academic study, "was commissioned by defense lawyers acting in 
the case of Duane Buck."

Buck was a death row prisoner from Houston and the Texas courts are currently 
reconsidering his 1995 death sentence.

Paternoster, whose report is based on the latest "quantitative methods," looked 
at 504 cases involving adult defendants who had been indicted for capital 
murder in Harris County between 1992-99.

This was during the time when Buck was charged for murdering his former 
girlfriend, Debra Gardner, and a man named Kenneth Butler.

Paternoster found that "Harris County juries imposed death sentences on 4 of 
the 7 African-Americans put on capital trial, while also sentencing to death 
the only white defendant."

Pilkington also wrote that although the county is only 19 % black, 
"African-Americans represent almost 50 % of the people detained in its jails, 
while 68 % of the past 34 executions to emerge from the area involved black 
inmates."

The reality is, America might not ever agree on the topic of the death penalty, 
let alone admit that it is a racially biased system.

According to deathpenaltyinfo.org, states without the death penalty have lower 
rates of homicide compared to states with the death penalty.

The North Carolina Coalition for Alternatives to the Death Penalty website says 
that the state's murder rate declined after executions stopped.

The fact that the death penalty does not stop people from killing other people 
is one of the biggest reasons I am against the death penalty.

I do not believe that killing a criminal will make their victims family feel 
better.

In order for us to change the way we think about the death penalty we need to 
change the way we think about humanity.

Killing someone because they killed another person totally defeats the purpose 
of advanced society.

(source: Commentary, Jerica Lowman; spartandaily.com)

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

Death penalty isn't justice



If ever there were a model case for the death penalty, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev would 
top the list ["Bomb victim's kin: No death penalty," News, April 18]. The 
elements of the crime and the certainty of his involvement are clear and not in 
dispute.

Should we then apply the death penalty in this case or any case that meets the 
legal standard? We should not, because the death penalty is about revenge, not 
justice, which are vastly different things.

The purpose of revenge is to satiate hatred and contempt, and to achieve 
closure. Justice is the attempt to make things right, to return to normalcy -- 
impossible in a case such as Tsarnaev's. Life for the victims and the rest of 
us will never be the same.

Revenge may be a dish best served cold; however, it should never be served by 
civilized people and their elected officials, lest they descend into the 
darkness. Justice should always be sought.

The best sentence for Tsarnaev would be life imprisonment, without parole, 
preferably in solitary confinement. This would be the most powerful statement 
we could make without crossing that pernicious line. Tsarnaev has demonstrated 
that he is not fit to live among us, so sentence him to virtual death with only 
his thoughts to keep him company.

Edward Weinert, Melville

(source: Letter to the Editor, Newsday)