[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, MD., N.C., FLA., KY., OKLA., USA

[Rick Halperin]

Jan. 28



TEXAS----impending execution

Texas Set to Kill Intellectually Disabled Man on Thursday



Barring any last minute action by the United States Supreme Court, Robert Ladd 
will be executed Thursday night by the state of Texas. Ladd, convicted for the 
1996 murder of Vicki Ann Garner, will be the 2nd inmate on Texas' death row 
killed in 2015.

Texas' highest criminal court, the Court of Criminal Appeals, denied Ladd's 
final request for a stay of execution Tuesday, despite his long-documented 
history of intellectual disability. In a 2005 U.S. District Court hearing held 
to determine whether Ladd met Texas' statutory definition of "mentally 
retarded," a defense expert testified that Ladd's IQ was 67 and that Ladd had 
significant functional deficits in areas like work, money, social and 
communication skills. The state's expert at the hearing agreed with the defense 
about Ladd's functional problems, but blamed them on an anti-social personality 
disorder rather than an intellectual disability.

The district court judge found that Ladd had "significantly subaverage 
intellectual functioning," but refused to find that Ladd's functional deficits 
were "significant," a requirement for Texas to classify someone as "mentally 
retarded" for the purposes of whether or not it is OK to kill that person.

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that executing the intellectually disabled is 
unconstitutional, but left each state to determine what standard of disability 
each would use. Texas' standard is, partly, based on John Steinbeck's character 
Lennie, from the novel Of Mice and Men.

"Texas citizens might agree that Steinbeck's Lennie should, by virtue of his 
lack of reasoning ability and adaptive skills, be exempt. But, does a consensus 
of Texas citizens agree that all persons who might legitimately qualify for 
assistance under the social services definition of mental retardation be exempt 
from an otherwise constitutional penalty?" the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals 
wrote in its 2004 opinion on the appeal of Jose Garcia Briseno.

Ladd was classified as "fairly obviously retarded" by the Texas Youth 
Commission when he was 13. At 36, he qualified for services from the Andrews 
Center in Tyler, which helps the intellectually disabled and mentally ill.

(source Dallas Observer)








MARYLAND:

Keep the death penalty abolished



I find it amazing that Del. Pat McDonough feels that reinstating the death 
penalty demands his time and resources as a priority in our state despite the 
numerous more pressing issues ("Del. McDonough seeks to restore death penalty 
in some cases," Jan. 26). He references 2 recent police killings in New York 
City as a reason to reinstate the death penalty for cop killers. He doesn't 
mention that the shooter quickly shot and killed himself after shooting the 
police officers. I expect that most people crazy enough to kill a uniformed 
police officer would lack the will to live, and stiffer penalties are not going 
to deter such a person from committing such a crime.

We need to keep the death penalty abolished in Maryland and not offer the 
luxury of death as opposed to life in prison to those who commit the most 
heinous crimes. And Delegate McDonough needs to refocus his attention on issues 
that improve our state instead of trying to retract the progress we've made in 
the past years.

Vinnie Bevivino, Baltimore

(source: Letter to the Editor, Baltimore Sun)








NORTH CAROLINA:

It's time to kill costly, ineffective death penalty



Robeson County's district attorney says he favors the use of the death penalty 
as a deterrent, but his infrequent pursuit of that ultimate punishment is a 
slave to practicality.

Pursuing a capital case takes up at lot of courtroom time and is costly, says 
Johnson Britt, and the likelihood of success is low because of juries reluctant 
to dish out the death penalty.

Britt points out, that in a county as violent as ours, the number of pending 
trials for murder cases is apt to grow during a 2-to-3 week capital trial, and 
doesn't shorten. Here are some staggering numbers: According to Britt, there 
are more than 100 pending murder cases in the county and he has just 12 
prosecutors and himself to handle that load. That is a reality that forces 
unappetizing plea deals.

For comparison's sake, the state's largest county, Mecklenburg, has about 80 
assistant district attorney; in Mecklenburg County during 2014, lawmen 
investigated 42 homicides, just a handful more than in Robeson County.

There is another reason why pursuing the death penalty is a waste of time, 
money and other resources: There has been a moratorium on putting anyone to 
death in North Carolina since 2006 because of litigation over lethal injection 
and claims that the death penalty process is racially tainted. Britt isn't 
alone in his reluctance to seek the death penalty, something he hasn't done 
since December 2011, when a jury convicted but said no to lethal injection. 
During 2014, North Carolina juries only 3 times sentenced the convicted to die.

The death penalty, assuming it ever had such utility, long ago exhausted any 
usefulness as a deterrent. We doubt anyone ever decided not to kill because of 
the worry that as an old man or old woman, he or she would be put to death.

While this county's district attorney in the 1970s and 1980s was tabbed the 
"world's deadliest DA," the facts belie that moniker. Joe Freeman Britt did 
indeed send about 50 people to death row, but only 2 were executed - mass 
murderer Velma Barfield in 1984, and Henry Lee Hunt, who was convicted of 
killing 2 but suspected of other murders, in 2003.

The death penalty might provide a bit of satisfaction to the surviving victims 
in a capital case, but the negatives far outweigh the positives, including this 
elephant in the middle of the room: Last year, 2 men from this county who had 
been convicted as boys and sentenced to death, walked out of prison free in the 
fall of their lives. It was the work of the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry 
Commission that showed with DNA evidence that Henry Lee McCollom and Leon Brown 
had not raped and then killed an 11-year-old in September 2003.

The commission, a dispassionate panel that follows evidence and is unencumbered 
by politics, has now exonerated 8 people, the latest being 70-year-old Joseph 
Sledge, a Bladen County man who spent parts of 5 decades in prison for 2 
murders he didn't commit. He was freed last week.

In fewer words, the death penalty, when carried out, doesn't allow for a 
suitable correction.

North Carolina would do well to become the 19th state to ban the death penalty. 
That seems unlikely in an eye-for-an-eye state, but comfort can be found in 
knowing very little about the process makes actual executions likely going 
forward.

(source: Editorial, The Robesonian)








FLORIDA:

Jury recommends death for Largo man who killed 2-year-old



A jury has recommended that a Largo man be executed for killing his 
girlfriend's 2-year-old daughter.

Although the jury voted 10-2 in favor of the death penalty for Joel Adrian 
Cruz, it is Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Joseph Bulone who will decide whether 
to impose the sentence. That's a process that often takes a few months.

If Bulone does not choose the death penalty, Cruz would be given life in prison 
without the possibility of parole.

Cruz repeatedly beat the girl, Ananhie Fernandez in Largo in May 2013. 
Afterward, Cruz balked at taking her to the hospital, but finally did so after 
the girl's mother pleaded with him. But on the drive to All Children's 
Hospital, he asked the mother if she was going to "snitch" on him, she said 
during the trial.

(source: Tampa Bay Times)








KENTUCKY:

2 KY Lawmakers Want Prosecutors to Put a Price on Death Penalty Cases



Kentucky has the death penalty - but no firm price tag on what it costs to send 
a convicted felon to death row. Sen. Gerald Neal, D-Louisville, and Rep. David 
Floyd, R-Bardstown, who both oppose the death penalty, have filed companion 
resolutions - SCR 11 and HCR 30 - to determine the costs of administering the 
law.

While public defenders have provided cost estimates, the lawmakers say, 
prosecutors have been unwilling to cooperate.

"It's irresponsible to not at least know what those costs are," Neal said, "and 
how they effect the bottom line of the Commonwealth." Neal and Floyd also have 
filed bills to make life without parole the maximum sentence in Kentucky. Floyd 
said putting a price tag on the death penalty would help appeal to the 
"conservative side" on the issue by focusing on the "waste" spent on what he 
called "a very broken system."

"I believe that it's in the hundreds of millions," Floyd said. "I think we can 
solidly just guesstimate $100 million since 1976 that has been essentially been 
wasted if you consider that only one person in all that time has been 
involuntarily executed."

Meanwhile, Floyd said, 52 people sentenced to death in Kentucky have had their 
sentences reduced or exonerated.

When the idea of a cost study was first brought up 6 years ago, state Attorney 
General Jack Conway rejected the idea, saying there is no easy way to quantify 
the costs. Again this week, Conway said through his spokesperson that nothing 
has changed.

Yet, other states have managed to put a price tag on the death penalty, 
something Floyd said Kentuckians deserve. "I think it's important for the 
people of Kentucky to know this," Floyd said, "to have that information, so 
that they can understand how much of our resources are being wasted on this."

The latest state to put a price on its death row cases was Washington, where 
earlier this month a Seattle University study found that each case cost more 
than $3 million, $1 million more than similar cases where the death penalty was 
not sought.

(source: publicnewsservice.org)


OKLAHOMA---3 stays of impending executions

Justices block 3 Oklahoma executions over drug used


The Supreme Court on Wednesday blocked the next 3 executions scheduled in 
Oklahoma pending its review of the state's controversial 3-drug cocktail for 
lethal injections.

The ruling was expected, since both lawyers for the convicted murderers and the 
state itself had urged the justices to block the executions. But Oklahoma also 
wanted the court to allow executions to resume if it could find a replacement 
drug, and the court left open that possibility.

"It is hereby ordered that petitioners' executions using midazolam are stayed 
pending final disposition of this case," the court said in an unsigned order.

The court's order is the latest in a series of actions it has taken on issues 
relating to the death penalty.

On Tuesday, it allowed Georgia to execute double-murderer Warren Lee Hill with 
a different form of lethal injection, despite his lawyers' claims that he was 
intellectually disabled.

Earlier this month, the justices also refused to block the execution of Charles 
Warner in Oklahoma, despite the use of a 3-drug protocol including midazolam, 
which has caused several botched executions in the past. But 4 liberal justices 
objected, and last Friday the court agreed to hear the broader case over the 
use of that drug cocktail.

It takes only 4 votes to place a case on the calendar, 5 to win it. So the more 
liberal justices who would have spared Warner, convicted of murdering and 
raping an infant, probably were the ones who demanded that the court look into 
the use of midazolam, a sedative lacking the same knockout punch as 
barbiturates, which are in short supply.

"I am deeply troubled by this evidence suggesting that midazolam cannot 
constitutionally be used as the 1st drug in a 3-drug lethal injection 
protocol," Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in an 8-page dissent signed by 
Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan.

"The questions before us are especially important now, given states' increasing 
reliance on new and scientifically untested methods of execution," Sotomayor 
wrote. "Petitioners have committed horrific crimes and should be punished. But 
the Eighth Amendment guarantees that no one should be subjected to an execution 
that causes searing, unnecessary pain before death."

The case will be heard on April 29, the last day of oral arguments in the 
court's 2014 term, and decided by late June. In the meantime, the executions of 
Richard Glossip, John Grant and Benjamin Cole will be put on hold.

Their lawyers claim that midazolam, the 1st drug used in the 3-drug protocol, 
is being used in state executions virtually on an experimental basis. They say 
Inmates may not be rendered unconscious, as they are with stronger 
barbiturates, and could suffer painfully as the other drugs in the protocol are 
administered.

That, they claim, was a factor in Oklahoma's botched execution last April of 
Clayton Lockett, who struggled, groaned and writhed in pain for 43 minutes 
before dying. A state investigation later blamed Lockett's ordeal on a failure 
by prison staff to realize that drugs had not been administered directly into 
his veins. The state has since changed its procedures and increased the dose of 
midazolam used.

Warner's execution was the 1st in Oklahoma since Lockett's. The execution 
lasted 18 minutes, during which Warner, 47, convicted in the murder and rape of 
an 11-month-old girl in 1997, said the injection "feels like acid" and "my body 
is on fire." Witnesses said they saw only slight twitching in Warner's neck for 
about 7 minutes before he stopped breathing.

The prisoners' lawyers also blame the drug protocol for 2 other gruesome deaths 
-- the execution a year ago of Ohio's Dennis McGuire, who made snorting noises 
for 20 minutes before dying, and July's execution of Arizona's Joseph Wood, who 
appeared to gasp hundreds of times during a death that took nearly 2 hours.

However, Florida has had fewer issues with the same drug protocol. On the day 
Warner was executed, it used the same 3-drug combination to execute Johnny 
Shane Kormondy, 42, who killed a man during a 1993 home invasion.

Lawyers for Oklahoma responded that there was no real evidence midazolam would 
not work as a general anesthetic. They noted that it had been used successfully 
in at least 10 previous executions.

"It is undisputed that Oklahoma's protocol, which is identical to Florida's 
protocol, has been used 10 times in executions without serious incident," the 
state argued in its brief. "Petitioners can only cite to executions that took 
place using different drug combinations, or the Oklahoma execution of offender 
Lockett, in which IV access was subsequently found to be insufficient and 
flawed."

(source: USA Today)

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

Supreme Court Halts Oklahoma Execution of Richard Glossip, 3 Others



The U.S. Supreme Court issued stays of execution Wednesday for 3 Oklahoma 
death-row inmates whose challenge to the state's lethal-injection formula will 
be heard in the spring. The prisoners include Richard Glossip, who had been 
scheduled to die Thursday night and whose cause has been championed by 
prominent capital-punishment opponent Sister Helen Prejean.

For the 1st time since 2008, the high court has agreed to hear a challenge to 
the legality of lethal injection. The Oklahoma case centers on the 1st of 3 
drugs administered to a condemned inmate - the sedative midazolam, which 
opponents say isn't strong enough to protect a prisoner from the other 2 
chemicals used. Midazolam has featured in at least 3 executions that did not 
unfold as planned.

Glossip, 51, was convicted twice in the murder-for-hire of his boss. Prejean, 
who was portrayed in the 1995 movie "Dead Man Walking," is his spiritual 
adviser and plans to accompany him to the execution chamber if he loses his 
appeals. At a press conference in Oklahoma on Tuesday, the nun called for 
repeal of the death penalty in the state.

"There is no humane way to kill a conscious, imaginative human being," she 
said. "We the citizens have our name on that gurney."

Polls have show a majority of Americans still support capital punishment, even 
after the high-profile botching of Clayton Lockett's execution in Oklahoma in 
April, which prompted a federal review of lethal-injection protocols.

In addition to granting Glossip a reprieve, the Supreme Court also issued stays 
for 2 other death-row killers - Benajmin Cole and John Grant - who were 
scheduled for execution in February and March.

(source: NBC news)

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

Supreme Court Issues Stay For Richard Glossip, Two Other Inmates' Scheduled 
Executions In Oklahoma



The Supreme Court has ordered Oklahoma to postpone lethal injections executions 
using a controversial sedative until the court rules in a challenge involving 
the drug.

The court's order Wednesday came as little surprise after both the state and 
the lawyers for three inmates who faced execution between now and March 
requested the temporary halt. The justices agreed on Friday to take up the 
challenge to the use of the sedative midazolam, which has been used in 
problematic executions in Arizona, Ohio and Oklahoma.

The case will be argued in April and decided by late June.

Left open by the court's order is whether Oklahoma can carry out an execution 
that does not involve midazolam.

(source: Associated Press)








USA:

The Execution of Our Consciences



When the time comes to consecrate communion, most celebrants approach the altar 
and read from a prepared liturgy. In the moment when Jesus is supposed to be 
closest to us, I have always felt like the consecration of communion is a time 
to explain what the incarnation means. Based on Jesus' promise to inhabit the 
least of these amongst us, I feel like the incarnation changes and transforms 
constantly with the changes and transformations that go on in the world around 
us.

Consequentially, I approached the altar last Sunday and declared, "I know some 
people are not comfortable with body and blood language when it comes to 
communion. Some find it ancient and repulsive. This week, the people of Georgia 
are prepared to execute Warren Hill. Warren has an IQ of 70 and is 
intellectually disabled according to every doctor who has ever examined him. I 
believe that Jesus is closest to those that we marginalize and oppress. On this 
day, Jesus is with Warren. When you take communion this week, I want you to 
remember Warren. If we want to stop using body and blood language in communion, 
then we need to stop killing those that Jesus inhabits. We execute Jesus and 
our own consciences every time we shed someone's body and blood. Jesus was 
executed in a state-sponsored execution and will be executed again if we 
execute Warren Hill."

In the midst of person after person coming to receive the body and blood of a 
Jesus that we keep on killing, I realized that these executions have become 
most effective at executing our consciences. The performed and scheduled 
executions this week give us a moment to push back and reflect.

Though I expect more from our whole society, I am saddened and outraged that 
most of the executions in our country are carried out by states that are 
predominately Christian. In Georgia, people who claim to follow Jesus are 
largely responsible for executing Warren Hill. At every step of the way, 
Christians could have stepped in and stopped the killing of an intellectually 
disabled man. Like the disciples before them, few people said anything. In 
their race to execute their own consciences and pretend that this execution was 
justified, the followers of Jesus forgot that Jesus said that he would be with 
the least of these. It wasn't just Warren Hill that was executed.

Richard Glossip was convicted of murder based on the testimony of 1 person. 
Though Justin Sneed is the one who actually committed the crime, he testified 
that Glossip hired him to do it and got a life sentence. Recently, Sneed's 
daughter sent a letter to the Oklahoma Clemency Board that said her father lied 
in his testimony and was afraid to formally recant for fear of getting the 
death penalty. Our execution system encourages the execution of the conscience 
in order to save your own skin. In a case of possible actual innocence, we 
can't know the truth because we have already decided what we want to happen and 
created a system that will make it happen. The execution of Jesus was similar.

The authorities are ready for another execution in Texas. Robert Ladd has a 
measured IQ of 67 and has qualified for special needs most of his life. Texas 
is still determined to kill him. People don't care about who Robert is. We 
simply declare that he is a murderer. In our othering of Robert, we other Jesus 
and execute our consciences. Robert is a child of God who deserves our help not 
our violent retributive hate.

Who are the killers and who are the victims in these processes of execution? If 
we can somehow develop a tiny sliver of conscience, we will understand that 
this process makes us all killers and victims. I thought our existence was 
about giving life and not taking it. There is an antidote to our vengeance and 
hate. Love can awaken the consciences that we have executed and set us free 
from this madness. Would you open your heart for the revival of your soul?

Amen.

(source: Rev. Jeff Hood----Baptist Pastor, Theologian and Activist)