[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, PENN., S.C., GA., FLA.

[Rick Halperin]

Feb. 17



FEBRUARY 17, 2015:





TEXAS:

Witnesses Against a British Grandmother on Death Row Say Texas Prosecutors 
Blackmailed Them Into Testimony



Key witnesses against a British grandmother on death row in Texas have claimed 
that prosecutors in her 2002 trial intimidated, threatened, and blackmailed 
them into testifying against her, raising serious questions about a conviction 
which has been long protested by campaigners and the UK government.

Linda Carty was convicted for the kidnap and murder of her 25-year-old neighbor 
Joana Rodriguez, who was abducted along with her 4-day-old son by 3 men in May 
2001. The baby was found alive, yet Rodriguez was found suffocated in the boot 
of a car. It was claimed during the trial that Carty had hired the gang of men 
to steal the child so that she could raise him as her own. According to the 
Houston Chronicle, the 3 men who abducted Rodriguez and her child all had 
criminal records, but only Carty was prosecuted for capital murder.

Carty, now 56, has been on death row ever since. The US Supreme Court refused 
her appeal in May 2010.

Carty has always maintained her innocence, and campaign groups, as well as the 
British government, have highlighted serious flaws in her trial. According to 
human rights organization Reprieve, Carty was forced to accept a 
court-appointed lawyer, Gerald Guerinot, whose poor professional reputation has 
been covered in detail by the New York Times and whose astonishing tally of 
clients given the death penalty has been described by the American Bar 
Association Journal as a "possible record" in modern times. The British 
government complained that they were not notified of Carty's case, and that 
there was "ineffective assistance of counsel." It raised the issue with the 
then governor of Texas, Rick Perry, during his visit to the UK in 2013.

Yet it has now emerged that key witnesses have stepped forward with affidavits, 
signed in 2014, which allege that they testified against Carty because of 
intimidation, threats and blackmail from Harris County prosecutors. Christopher 
Robinson, who was arrested in connection to the case and was the only person to 
testify that he had seen Carty commit the murder, said that Texan District 
Attorneys Connie Spence and Craig Goodhart had "threatened me and intimidated 
me, telling me I would get the death penalty myself if Linda Carty did not get 
the death penalty." The affidavit, available via the Houston Chronicle, goes 
onto say that "they (Spence and Goodhart) were alternating between coaching me 
and threatening me to get me to say their version."

Former Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agent Charles Mathis also produced 
an affidavit, stating that Carty worked as a confidential informant for him. 
The affidavit alleges: "Shortly after the initial investigation I was contacted 
by DA (District Attorney) Connie Spence. Spence called me on the telephone and 
I told Spence that I did not want to testify against Linda."

The affidavit goes on to state: "I told Spence that I had known Linda for a 
long time and I knew that Linda did not have it in her to kill anyone. Spence 
provided me with no option to testify against Linda: Spence threatened me with 
an invented affair that I was supposed to have with Linda."

A spokesman for the Harris County District Attorney's Office told VICE News: 
"We are not commenting on the allegations or the case at this time due to 
pending litigation."

In light of the new testimony, Carty's lawyers are asking for an evidentiary 
hearing, a request being considered by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.

Clare Algar, executive director of Reprieve said: "If Linda is not granted a 
new hearing, she faces the death penalty based on lies extracted by prosecutors 
desperate to secure an execution at any cost. The behavior of prosecutors in 
this case has been so appalling it takes the breath away. They have stooped to 
targeting the marriage of one witness with invented slurs, while using the 
threat of death to force another to produce the lies they needed for 
conviction. Linda's last hope is that Texas recognizes that she deserves a new 
- and this time fair - trial."

A former teacher, Carty was born in St. Kitts when it was a British colony, and 
holds a UK passport.

A spokesman for the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office told VICE News: "While we 
respect the USA's right to bring those convicted of a crime to justice, the UK 
is deeply opposed to the use of the death penalty in all circumstances.

"In Linda Carty's case, we have additional, deep concerns about how this case 
was handled. We were not notified of her detention until after she had been 
convicted and sentenced to death. We also strongly believe her defense was very 
weak.

"We will continue to support Linda's case and remain in close contact with her 
legal team."

According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, seven women are 
currently on death row, including Carty. Its website boasts that "Texas leads 
the nation in the number of executions since the death penalty was reinstated 
in 1976."

(source: vice.com)

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

Death penalty violates human rights, fails to serve purpose



The death penalty in the United States has failed as a form of punishment in 
the criminal justice system.

If a country is going to use the death penalty, it should be reserved for those 
who commit an act of terror against the state, not for person on person or 
property crimes.

Texas is a prime example of how the death penalty has failed.

11 years ago, former Gov. Rick Perry sentenced Cameron Willingham to the death 
penalty. Willingham was convicted of setting his home on fire, killing his 
daughters.

When new evidence had come up indicating that Willingham was not responsible 
for the murders, there was a petition for a stay of execution, which Perry 
refused to grant.

Willingham was executed. Since his execution, evidence has been confirmed 
clearing Willingham for causing the fire.

Wrongful convictions are not rare; having incarceration as the primary method 
of punishment, however, makes it easier to amend a wrongful conviction.

You cannot undo the death penalty.

The death penalty, if used, should be used as a last resort, which is currently 
not the case.

There should be a lot more scrutiny on the injections being administered to 
convicts receiving the death penalty. Currently, the cocktail in use is a 
3-drug method, which could be switched out for a single drug method that would 
help eliminate risks associated with the current cocktail.

Risks associated with the cocktail include reports that, following 
administration, convicts often writhe or make sounds that indicate pain.

It also takes a considerable amount of time for this 3-drug method cocktail to 
kill the convict; some cocktails have taken up to 2 hours.

Take for example Robert Ladd, a convicted murderer who was considered 
intellectually disabled, executed on Jan. 29. He died 27 minutes after the 
administration of the pentobarbital.

Manufacturers of the cocktail are primarily based in Europe and are closing 
down because they do not agree that the drugs are not being used in accordance 
with medical indications.

Some manufacturers also do not want their drugs being used in departments of 
corrections in the United States.

As more and more manufacturers of the cocktail are closing down, it would 
behoove states to look at the financial cost of these lethal injections versus 
incarceration.

There have been recent discussions in Europe about reinstating the death 
penalty. I believe this is a reactionary response to the Charlie Hebdo attacks.

It would be unfair to presume that the use of the death penalty would fail in 
Europe just because it has failed in the United States, but I still do not 
envision the death penalty being successful in Europe.

The European Union (EU) has acknowledged the death penalty as being a violation 
of human rights for a very long time, and this ethical and moral foundation is 
very ingrained in the various legal systems there.

There are also several treaties made in France that would be broken if they 
adopted any form of death penalty.

The world believes the death penalty is wrong. Our government should too.

It is unlikely that Texas will do away with the death penalty. However, there 
has to be substantial revisions made to the administration of this capital 
punishment across the board. These revisions include decreasing the amount of 
wrongful convictions, as well as finding a better method by which we ascertain 
the lethal injection.

The death penalty is ineffective and becoming increasingly more inhumane due to 
a lack of transparency in the process.

The discourse surrounding the death penalty needs to work on a transition into 
other methods of punishment, or perhaps disbanding lethal injection as a whole.

(source: Bryanna Esdtrada, hilltopviewsonline.com)








PENNSYLVANIA:

Hugo Selenski's lawyers, citing moratorium, say no death penalty



Lawyers for Hugo Selenski, the man convicted of strangling 2 people during a 
2002 robbery, asked a judge on Tuesday to bar jurors from considering the death 
penalty in his trial because Pennsylvania's governor has declared a moratorium.

Selenski's defense team filed its motion just before the penalty phase of his 
capital murder trial was scheduled to open and 4 days after Gov. Tom Wolf 
declared a moratorium on the death penalty in Pennsylvania.

Wolf, who took office last month, called the current system of capital 
punishment "error prone, expensive and anything but infallible" and said the 
moratorium will remain in effect at least until he receives a report from a 
legislative commission that has been studying the topic for several years. 
Selenski's motion asked Luzerne County Common Pleas Judge Fred Pierantoni III 
to remove the death penalty as a sentencing option or, alternatively, to delay 
the penalty phase indefinitely.

"As the sole elected official responsible for signing execution warrants, the 
Governor's words and actions are compelling and reinforce the various 
imperfections of Pennsylvania's capital sentencing system under both state and 
federal constitutional principles," the motion said.

The death penalty remains on the books in Pennsylvania, and it wasn't 
immediately clear whether the judge has the ability to preclude jurors from 
considering it. Prosecutors and defense lawyers were still meeting in the 
judge's chambers Tuesday hours after the penalty phase of Selenski's trial was 
supposed to begin.

Pennsylvania has executed only 3 people since the U.S. Supreme Court restored 
the death penalty in 1976. All 3 had voluntarily given up their appeals. The 
last execution took place in 1999.

Law enforcement groups are considering a legal challenge to Wolf's moratorium.

Selenski was convicted last week on 2 counts of 1st-degree murder in the deaths 
of pharmacist Michael Kerkowski and his girlfriend, Tammy Fassett. Prosecutors 
said Selenski and another man killed the couple in a plot to rob the pharmacist 
of tens of thousands of dollars from an illegal prescription drug ring.

Police found the victims' bodies, along with 3 other sets of human remains, on 
Selenski's property north of Wilkes-Barre in 2003.

(source: The Morning Call)

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

Death penalty already dying



When Gov. Tom Wolf imposed a moratorium on the death penalty last week, he 
merely formalized reality. Fact is, there hasn't been an execution in 
Pennsylvania in 15 years.

Since 1978, when the death penalty was reinstated by the Supreme Court, only 3 
prisoners have been executed in this state out of 412 death sentences. And the 
3 prisoners who were executed all waived at least part of their appeals and 
asked to be put to death.

Here's more reality: 60 % of all death sentences in Pennsylvania - 250 at last 
count - have been overturned by state or federal courts. And if the pool of 
death sentences is restricted to those who completed ordinary appeals, the 
reversal rate is more than 90 %.

So, the fact of the matter is that the death penalty in Pennsylvania exists on 
paper only. In imposing a moratorium, Wolf cited more realities, calling the 
current system of capital punishment "error prone, expensive and anything but 
infallible."

He's right.

That so many sentences have been overturned by higher courts speaks to a system 
riddled with errors and, in its application, injustice. Numerous studies 
clearly indicate that racial minorities and the poor receive death sentences at 
a significantly higher rate than others convicted of capital crimes. And those 
sentences, as the appeals courts have found, often are related to inadequate 
legal representation at trial.

What's more, unimpeachable DNA evidence has provided a clear and troubling 
picture of just how flawed the system is, as scores of wrongly convicted people 
have been released from prisons across the nation - excluding those who, 
hauntingly, were put to death.

Making the situation all the more nightmarish is the cost of the death penalty.

Using data from a Maryland study, which concluded that death penalty cases cost 
$1.9 million more than cases involving life sentences, the Reading Eagle 
newspaper estimated in a 2014 series that the 185 people then on death row cost 
Pennsylvania taxpayers an additional $351.5 million. And that's a conservative 
estimate, because the figure didn't include overturned cases.

Finally, the prestigious National Research Council, based on a review of more 
than three decades of research, concluded the death penalty hasn't had a 
deterrent effect on murder rates despite other studies to the contrary. And so 
the council urges that such studies, which it determined to be flawed, not be 
used to guide public policy about capital punishment.

What emerges as the new public policy in Pennsylvania will, in part, be 
determined by a report from a legislative commission that has been studying the 
issue for about 4 years. That and Wolf's reasoned declaration that if the state 
"is going take the irrevocable step of executing a human being, its capital 
sentencing system must be infallible."

Nothing less should be acceptable.

(source: Editorial, Bucks County Courier Times)

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

Governor Calls for Halt on Death Penalty in Frein Case



Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf's call for a halt on the death penalty won't 
keep the Pike County district attorney from seeking the punishment against 
accused cop killer Eric Frein.

Frein is accused of the ambush shooting last September which killed 1 
Pennsylvania State Trooper and injured another.

Pike County DA Raymond Tonkin released a statement saying if Frein is found 
guilty he will still ask the jury to weigh the aggravating circumstances.

Tonkin had filed notice to seek the death penalty in January.

Wolf's moratorium will stay in effect until a state Senate committee's study on 
the punishment is finished.

(source: WICZ News)

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

Goal isn't vengeance



The Old Testament's recommendation of an "eye for an eye" to compensate an 
injured party has been cited over the ages by proponents of capital punishment. 
Meanwhile, death penalty opponents note the New Testament's directive to set 
aside the desire for retribution and "turn the other cheek" when slapped.

No biblical debate is required, however, to determine the value of capital 
punishment. There is more than enough empirical evidence to show that the 
practice is neither fair nor cost-effective and that it fails to deter violent 
crime.

No wonder most countries no longer sentence prisoners to death. It's a shame 
that the United States not only still executes prisoners, but is listed among 
the rogues' gallery of the 5 countries with the most executions since 2010, 
which also includes China, Iran, North Korea, and Yemen.

That unsavory distinction could go away if more states abolish the death 
penalty. New Jersey did in 2007, and Pennsylvania took a giant step in that 
direction last week, when Gov. Wolf suspended all executions pending the 
release of a state task force's report on capital punishment.

Wolf made it clear that he wasn't motivated by sympathy for death-row inmates, 
including Terrance Williams, who was scheduled for execution on March 4 for a 
1984 murder. "I take this action because the capital punishment system has 
significant and widely recognized defects," Wolf said.

Perhaps the biggest defect is the death penalty's fallibility. Evidence 
revealed after conviction has led to the exoneration of some 150 people 
sentenced to die in this country since 1973. No one knows how many of the 1,200 
people executed during that period were also innocent.

Racial bias is a factor in imposition of the death penalty. A 2007 Yale study 
showed that black defendants were 3 times more likely to be sentenced to death 
than whites when victims were white. An American Bar Association study that 
year concluded that 1/3 of Philadelphia death-row inmates would have been 
sentenced to life in prison instead if they were white.

Of course, a death sentence rarely means death. Pennsylvania has executed only 
3 people since the penalty was reinstated 40 years ago, and all had voluntarily 
abandoned further appeals. 2 of the 186 people still on the state's death row 
have been there more than 30 years, and one has been scheduled for execution 6 
times. Shouldn't that qualify as "cruel and unusual" punishment?

But it's not just cruel to prisoners spending year after year in mortal limbo; 
it's cruel to the families of victims. The certainty of a life sentence might 
not be as satisfying for those who seek vengeance for their pain, but it would 
keep them from having to relive their tragedies each time a defendant is due 
for appeal.

States without the death penalty have lower murder rates, and after reducing 
lengthy appeals and cutting incarceration costs, they also have more money for 
education and other budget needs. Those facts are expected to be corroborated 
by the task force report, giving Pennsylvania all the evidence it needs to end 
capital punishment.

(source: Editorial, Philadelphia Inquirer)








SOUTH CAROLINA:

WIS Investigates: Is the death penalty on hold in South Carolina?



It was September 1991. A crowd cheered as the body of the most notorious serial 
killer in modern South Carolina history, Donald "Pee Wee" Gaskins, was taken 
from Columbia's Broad River Correctional Institution. On that day, Gaskins 
became the fourth death row inmate to be executed since the reauthorization of 
capital punishment in the Palmetto State.

During the next 2 decades, 39 more men would follow Gaskins sometimes in rapid 
succession. There were 19 over 4 years beginning in 1996, but scenes like this 
are now rare.

In the last nearly 6 years, just 1 inmate has entered the death chamber at 
Broad River Correctional Institution. S.C. Department of Corrections Director 
Bryan Stirling is not expecting that number to change anytime soon.

"There are no current orders for execution," Stirling said. "Everything is 
under appeal at this time."

Experts say it's not that prosecutors here or elsewhere have become reluctant 
to seek death sentences.

"We have found that generally on average the state across the country seeks 
death in approximately 17 cases a year," said Emily Paavola, of the S.C. Death 
Penalty Resource and Defense Center. "And we have not found that to decline in 
recent years."

Even opponents of capital punishment say they don't see that public opinion has 
turned against it in this state.

"I think our state is still predominantly in favor of capital punishment," said 
Charles Grose, of the S.C. Death Penalty Resource and Defense Center.

But several factors have combined to virtually shut down the death house.

Among them are advances in DNA technology, legal rulings protecting inmates 
with severe mental disorders, and most recently, the inability of states 
executing by lethal injection to get one or more of the drugs they use. That is 
a problem in South Carolina.

"Right now, what we're doing is we are looking and reaching out to pharmacies 
and suppliers et cetera to try to find pentobarbital," Stirling said. "We have 
thus far not been successful at that."

Pentobarbital is an anesthetic - the 1st component of a 3-drug series that also 
includes a paralyzer, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride, which stops 
the heart. South Carolina had been using a different anesthetic, such as sodium 
thiopental, until the Drug Enforcement Administration cracked down on the use 
of that foreign-made ingredient in 2011.

"The opponents of the death penalty have been very good at stopping states from 
obtaining the necessary drugs to carry out an execution," Stirling said.

But it's not a drug shortage that's kept Tommy Sease and his family frustrated 
for more than 30 years.

"We think about how she suffered. And we just don't feel like the justice 
system has worked here," Sease said.

Sease is the nephew of Newberry County schoolteacher Elizabeth Sease Lominack, 
who was robbed, raped, and murdered in her Pomaria home in 1982. Her killer is 
Fred Singleton, who went to death row a year later. He is still there, and his 
sentence blocked by a 1991 court ruling that determined Singleton was mentally 
incapacitated.

"We feel like -- I mean our family's been violated," Sease said.

Sease said his family and many in the Newberry area believe capital punishment 
is a deterrent to others who would commit serious crimes, if it is carried out 
after appeals are exhausted within a reasonable amount of time.

While Singleton is the longest serving death row inmate, there are others among 
the 42 residents with sentences dating back to the 80's. They include Jamie 
Wilson, who shocked the nation in 1988 by gunning down 11 people, killing 2 in 
a Greenwood elementary school. He pleaded guilty, but mentally ill - the 1st in 
South Carolina to be sentenced under that statute.

"The way we do capital punishment is absurd," said Bob McAlister, opponent of 
the death penalty.

McAlister said seemingly endless delays in the capital punishment system are 
troubling. He says that from the perspective of a counselor, who opposes the 
death penalty and has dealt closely with inmates, like spree killer Ronald 
"Rusty" Woomer.

Woomer was executed in the electric chair in 1990, with the former chief of 
staff to Gov. Carroll Campbell as a witness.

"If a society decides that's the right thing to do, then there should be a 
mechanism whereby the case can be vetted through the court system in something 
less than 20 or 30 years," McAlister said.

Paavola agrees.

"It should not take 30 years before you have some sort of closure in a criminal 
case, and I think that is the product of a system, which is broken," she 
explained. "And I think it's broken beyond repair. We cannot fix it in a way 
that will address those needs of quick closure and also provide for the kind of 
reliability that is necessary when we take another person's life."

South Carolina law allowed the condemned inmate a choice on whether they die by 
lethal injection or electrocution, if the inmate makes that choice in writing 
at least 14 days prior to the execution date.

(source: WIS news)








GEORGIA----impending female execution

Georgia Set To Execute 5th Person In A Year



Georgia is set to execute a woman on death row next week. This would be the 5th 
inmate put to death in the state within the past year.

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, Georgia is among the top in 
the nation for carrying out its death sentences. The scheduled execution of 
Kelly Gissendaner would be the third since January.

"It's a little unusual given that Georgia's only sentencing 1 or 2 people a 
year to death," Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty 
Information Center, said.

Dieter said in the 1990s, juries handed out more death sentences than they do 
now.

"In a given year, you sometimes have older cases that were delayed for other 
reasons now occurring," Dieter said.

According to the Georgia Department of Corrections website, Georgia currently 
has 81 inmates on death row.

But Dieter said it's not the number that determines when executions happen. For 
example, North Carolina has more death row inmates than Georgia, but hasn't 
executed anyone in about 8 years. Dieter said it's about political consensus in 
a state.

"If the courts are hesitant, if the governor is hesitant, if the legislature is 
hesitant - any one of those can really slow down a process," he said.

In Georgia, the process slowed down for about a year starting in the summer of 
2013 because of a lawsuit challenging the state's lethal injection secrecy law 
that keeps providers of the drug anonymous. The Georgia Supreme Court then 
upheld the law in May 2014 and executions resumed.

The Georgia Department of Corrections said it would not comment on executions. 
A clemency hearing has been set for Gissendaner on Feb. 24.

(source: WABE news)








FLORIDA:

State Attorney Jeff Ashton to seek death penalty in 2002 murder 
case----Demorris Andy Hunter charged with 1st-degree murder



A Central Florida state attorney has filed notice that his office will seek the 
death penalty in a 13-year-old murder case.

Ninth District State Attorney Jeff Ashton's office filed a notice of intent on 
Friday in the case of Demorris Andy Hunter.

Hunter was charged with 1st-degree murder in the death of Teresa Ann Green.

Green was reported missed from her Orlando home on May 27, 2002, and found dead 
that evening in the trunk of her car.

Hunter is currently serving a life sentence in a March 2002 death of an 
Oakland, California woman.

He was extradited from a California prison last week to Orange County.

No future court date has been set.

(source: WESH news)