[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, FLA., ALA., MINN., UTAH, ARIZ., USA

[Rick Halperin]

March 23



TEXAS:

Supreme Court won't hear appeal of Texas inmate who has been on death row for 
30 years



The Supreme Court said Monday it would not hear an appeal from an inmate who 
has been on death row in Texas for three decades. This decision lifts a stay 
that has been in place since last month and opens the door for Texas to 
schedule and try to carry out an execution of one of its longest-serving death 
row inmates.

Lester Bower, 67, was convicted of shooting and killing 4 men in an aircraft 
hangar in 1983. He shot 1 man while trying to steal an ultralight plane this 
man was trying to sell, then shot the other 3 when they unexpectedly arrived, 
according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

Bower's long tenure on death row was among the reasons his attorneys argued he 
should be eligible for a stay. They say that his execution has been scheduled 6 
times since he arrived on death row, and he has come within hours of heading to 
the death chamber before.

"Executing Mr. Bower after he has served on death row for more than 30 years 
under these circumstances serves no penological purpose and constitutes cruel 
and unusual punishment," his attorneys wrote in a filing to the Supreme Court.

Last month, 5 days before Bower's scheduled lethal injection in Texas, the full 
Supreme Court granted his request for a stay while it considered whether to 
hear his case. No explanation was offered, but the court's order said that if 
the justices decided not to hear the case, the stay would be lifted.

The court's decision Monday not to hear the case comes weeks before the 
justices are scheduled to consider a different case involving capital 
punishment. The justices are going to hear a case focusing on Oklahoma's 
lethal-injection procedure, which relies upon a controversial drug that has 
been involved in problematic executions. Executions in Oklahoma, Florida and 
Alabama have been delayed until after the court rules in that case.

After the court said it would not hear the case after all, Justice Stephen 
Breyer argued in a dissent that the court should hear it because of an issue 
involving Bower's sentencing. When Bower was convicted, the jury helping decide 
his sentence did not consider potentially mitigating evidence, something the 
Supreme Court later said was unconstitutional. As a result, Beyer says this 
should allow for a new sentencing hearing for Bower.

"I recognize that we do not often intervene only to correct a case-specific 
legal error," Breyer wrote in the dissent, which was joined by Ruth Bader 
Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor. "But the error here is glaring, and its 
consequence may well be death."

If Bower had been executed last month as scheduled, he would have been the 
oldest inmate executed in Texas history, according to the state's Department of 
Criminal Justice. As it is, he has already spent 3 times as many years on death 
row as the average inmate in the state. The average death-row inmate nationwide 
has spent about 14 years under a death sentence, Justice Department figures 
show.

A federal judge in California last year called that state's death penalty 
system unconstitutional and "completely dysfunctional," decrying a system he 
said was plagued by delays. U.S. District Judge Cormac J. Carney wrote this in 
an order vacating the death sentence of an inmate who was facing an execution 
nearly 2 decades after being sentenced, which Carney said violated the Eighth 
Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Texas state officials argued against granting Bower a reprieve, saying that 
because Bower has been fighting his looming execution in the courts for so 
long, his lengthy tenure on row "is purely of his own making."

"Bower's claims are nothing more than a meritless attempt to postpone his 
execution," the office of Ken Paxton, attorney general of Texas, said in a 
filing to the Supreme Court opposing a stay. "The families of the victims of 
Bower's quadruple murder have been waiting to see Bower's sentence carried out 
for over 30 years now.'

However, it is unclear when Bower may face the death chamber. Texas has half a 
dozen executions scheduled over the next three months and only one dose of its 
lethal injection drug left. As a result, if the state carries out its scheduled 
execution of Kent Sprouse on April 9, it will have no execution drugs left and 
5 other executions on the calendar. States around the country are facing a 
shortage of lethal injection drugs, which has fragmented the way executions are 
carried out nationwide.

(source: Washington Post)








FLORIDA:

Legislature should require unanimous jury vote in death penalty cases



On March 16, the Senate Criminal Justice Committee voted 5-0 to pass SB664 to 
require unanimous jury votes in capital case penalty phase proceedings, rather 
than by simple majority, to recommend a death sentence

Sen. Thad Altman, R-Cape Canaveral, sponsored this bill and similar versions 
during previous sessions.

The impetus is State vs. Steele, a Florida Supreme Court opinion urging the 
Legislature to address a significant anomaly in the law.

Steele characterizes Florida as the only state to allow penalty phase juries to 
recommend death sentences and find the presence of aggravating circumstances (a 
legal threshold for imposing death sentences) by simple majority, 7-5.

By contrast, Florida law requires a unanimous vote to convict a defendant at 
trial, and while judges are the final sentencing authorities, judges must place 
great weight upon juries??? penalty phase sentencing recommendations (either 
death or life in prison without the possibility of parole).

Some detractors claim serial killers like Ted Bundy would have avoided death 
sentences given less-than-unanimous penalty phase votes.

Not necessarily. Research by Scott Sundby from the University of Miami School 
of Law indicates unanimity would prompt more rigorous analysis, changing the 
nature of jury deliberations - conceivably achieving unanimity, especially when 
nine or more jurors favor death (the situation involving Bundy).

The Senate's analysis notes the U.S. Supreme Court recently agreed to review 
Hurst vs. Florida, involving a 7-5 penalty phase recommendation of death.

The court will consider "whether Florida's death sentencing scheme violates the 
Sixth or Eighth amendments in light of [its] decision in Ring vs. Arizona, 536 
U.S. 584 (2002)," which essentially requires juries to make crucial factual 
determinations that would subject a convicted murderer to death.

The Florida Supreme Court hasn't applied Ring to Florida's sentencing scheme.

The Florida Bar recently renewed its support for a comprehensive review of 
Florida's entire death-penalty process by all branches of government, a 
position it originally adopted in 2013 that we sought since 2011.

In 2006, an American Bar Association Death Penalty Assessment Team released a 
report identifying a range of serious concerns regarding the fairness, accuracy 
and impartiality of Florida's death penalty process.

Irrespective of whether one supports or opposes capital punishment, a 
comprehensive review by state officials arguably is long overdue.

(source: Raoul Cantero, a former state Supreme Court justice appointed by Gov. 
Jeb Bush, practices law in Miami; Mark Schlakman is with Florida State 
University's Center for the Advancement of Human Rights----Florida Times-Union)








ALABAMA:

Girl's Mother Calls for Death Sentence in Run-to-Death Case



The mother of an Alabama girl testified through tears Monday that the child's 
grandmother doesn't deserve to live after being convicted of running the 
youngster to death.

Heather Walker took the stand in support of prosecutors who want the death 
penalty for her former mother-in-law, Joyce Hardin Garrard.

Walker said the 49-year-old Garrard "shouldn't be spared" after being convicted 
of capital murder in the death of 9-year-old Savannah Hardin.

"I personally feel like I see no remorse and she took away my baby's life," 
Walker said of Garrard.

Seated just a few feet away at the defense table, Garrard showed no emotion. 
Meanwhile, much of Walker's testimony was hard to understand because she was 
sobbing uncontrollably.

Walker, who is divorced from Garrard's son Robert and has since remarried, said 
she wasn't allowed to see Savannah during the last two years of the girl's 
life.

Jurors convicted Garrard on Friday and now must decide whether to recommend 
death or life without parole, the only options under Alabama law. The final 
decision is up to the judge.

The defense will begin presenting its case for a life sentence on Wednesday.

Prosecutors said Garrard - with 8 surviving grandchildren and a ninth-grade 
education - should be put to death for making the child run around her yard and 
carry wood for hours as punishment for a lie about candy in February 2012.

Under cross-examination by defense attorney Richard Rhea, Walker said she 
didn't believe Garrard "woke up that morning" planning to kill Savannah. 
Rather, she said, the situation seemed to get out of hand.

"I think there was a point where she knew what she was doing," Walker said. 
Another witness, Samuel Hudgins, testified he saw the girl running laps around 
the house that day as Garrard stood by.

Savannah collapsed from a seizure and died three days later in a hospital in 
Birmingham after doctors determined there was no brain activity and removed her 
from life support. An autopsy blamed her death on seizures cause by low sodium 
following extreme physical exertion.

Walker described the mournful scene in the hospital room as a physician turned 
off a breathing machine as a test to see whether Savannah, who was unconscious, 
would breathe on her own.

"During this time Joyce was just screaming at Savannah saying, 'Savannah, you 
need to breathe,'" Walker said.

Within moments it was obvious Savannah wouldn't survive, she said.

"I held her hand until her body stiffened up," said Walker, sobbing and barely 
understandable.

But Garrard seemed more worried about herself than her granddaughter, Walker 
said.

Later at the hospital, Walker said, Garrard grabbed the shoulders of the 
child's pregnant stepmother, Jessica Mae Hardin.

Even though Hardin was in labor at the time and would later give birth, Garrard 
seemed intent on getting the other woman's attention, Walker said.

"She said, 'Jessica, there's a lot on the line. You need to pull it together,'" 
Walker said.

Walker said already had suspicions about what had happened to her daughter, and 
she became "more uneasy" after hearing Garrard's remarks to Hardin.

Garrard and Hardin were both at the house the afternoon the girl ran, evidence 
showed.

Walker said her ex-husband later told her of the arrests of Garrard and Hardin, 
who is charged with murder for allegedly sitting by as Garrard ran the girl to 
death.

Savannah loved cheerleading and horses and wanted to be a veterinarian when she 
grew up, Walker said. "She was full of life. She was the sweetest little girl," 
said Walker.

(source: Associated Press)








MINNESOTA:

Minnesota's 1st execution still a tantalizing tale



Editor's note: This story was originally published in the Pioneer Press on 
March 23, 2000. Jim Ragsdale was a Pioneer Press reporter from 1984 through 
2011. He died in November 2014 after a year-long battle with pancreatic cancer; 
he was 64.

On the morning of March 23, 1860, a convicted murderer mounted a scaffold in 
downtown St. Paul, said a few last prayers as the noose was fastened, and 
stepped onto the drop.

When the sheriff released the platform, the sad, spectacular story of Ann 
Bilansky passed into Minnesota history. Her body was allowed to hang for about 
20 minutes, long enough for 1,500 to 2,000 people who blocked Wabasha Street 
with their carriages and hay wagons to get a glimpse of the swaying woman at 
the end of the rope.

"I die a sacrifice to the law,'' the newspaper, the St. Paul Pioneer & 
Democrat, quoted Bilansky as saying seconds before she stepped into eternity.

In an age of O.J. and court-TV crime entertainments, her words still have an 
eerie reverberation.

Bilansky was convicted of killing her husband, Stanislaus Bilansky, by mixing 
arsenic in his food and drink in their rat-infested cabin. She did it, 
prosecutors said, so she could take up with a fair-haired, blue-eyed carpenter 
named John Walker.

Her lawyers said Stanislaus, habitually drunk and in poor health, could have 
died of any of a number of ailments. They said John Walker was not her lover, 
but her nephew, who summoned her to St. Paul so she could care for him during 
an illness.

Between her arrest in March 1859 and the hanging a year later, Bilansky's case 
sorely tried the limits of 19th-century forensic science; became one of the new 
state Supreme Court's first appeals; triggered an eight-day "woman-hunt'' when 
Bilansky escaped from a basement window of the city jail and headed west with 
John Walker; became a cause celebre for St. Paul society figures, who flocked 
to her jail cell; triggered a showdown between the pro-Ann Legislature and Gov. 
Alexander Ramsey; became the first execution under statehood, and the only time 
Minnesota ever executed a woman; and, finally, was one of our state's first 
sensational newspaper stories.

"Bad enough to be a harlot, and bold enough to be a murderer,'' the Pioneer & 
Democrat said in a story about Bilansky's last day. It was headlined 
"EXECUTION! - Her Dying Words.''

I am not an innocent bystander in the story. For several years now, I have been 
involved in (and have been paid for) a project with the Great American History 
Theatre. The result is "A Piece of the Rope,'' a play that brings all the 
actors in that dark March drama back to life.

Mary Ann Evards Wright arrived in St. Paul in the spring of 1858. She was in 
her late 30s or early 40s and said she was originally from North Carolina, 
where her parents still lived and where her 1st husband died in a railroad 
accident. She said she had never borne children and came here to care for her 
nephew, John Walker, during an illness.

A police handbill issued during her escape described Ann as "tall in stature 
... sharp-visaged, teeth a little projected ... very talkative, uses good 
language ... grey eyes, light hair, Roman nose.'' Walker had "light curly hair, 
blue eyes, light complexion'' and had been here for several years before Ann 
arrived.

Perhaps through Walker, Ann soon met Stanislaus Bilansky, a "Polander'' in his 
early 50s who had come to St. Paul in 1842 and had run a bar and grocery in his 
lowertown cabin. Stanislaus went through several wives before he married Ann 
and was described as a short, heavy-set man with brown hair and a 
less-than-winning personality - "melancholy, abusive, unlovable,'' and also 
frequently ill, convinced he would die in March.

It was only a few months after their wedding that Stan took to bed with a 
violent abdominal illness. He died at 3:30 a.m. Friday, March 11, after 
drinking a tumbler of liquor brought by his son. The next day, at an inquest in 
the cabin, his was ruled a death from natural causes, and the body was freed 
for burial Saturday evening.

A neighbor and friend of the Bilanskys, Lucinda Kilpatrick, then made the 
report that turned the old pioneer's death into a murder case: She went to the 
police chief and said she and Ann had purchased arsenic a few weeks before the 
death. She said Ann Bilansky called her aside during the first inquest and 
asked that Lucinda not tell the coroner about that trip. With that new 
information, Stan Bilansky's body was exhumed and a second inquest a few days 
later ruled that he died by arsenic poisoning "administered by Mrs. Bilansky.''

Kilpatrick became a key witness against Bilansky in her trial in late May and 
early June. (One of the jurors was Justus Ramsey, whose brother, Alexander 
Ramsey, would be elected governor later that year and would have Bilansky's 
life in his hands.) Kilpatrick and Rosa Scharf, the Bilanskys' maid, brought 
out suspicious remarks and behavior by Ann, painting her as a woman who wanted 
Stanislaus out of the way so she could flee with John Walker, who (prosecutors 
alleged) was her lover, not her nephew. Local scientists offered an array of 
tests to suggest there was arsenic in Stanislaus' stomach.

Ann Bilansky did not testify. John Walker did, said Ann was his aunt, and 
denied there were any improper relations. Others said Stanislaus was depressed 
and worried about debts, suggesting a motive for suicide. Kilpatrick, the 
neighbor whose testimony sent Ann to jail, was asked about her own relationship 
with John Walker, and about letters, a breast pin and a ring that she allegedly 
gave to Walker. She refused to give an answer - an answer that could have cast 
a new light on her accusation - and the trial judge did not force her to.

The jury deliberated for 5 hours on June 3, 1859, before finding Bilansky 
guilty of 1st-degree murder. On July 21, the state's new Supreme Court upheld 
the conviction. 2 days after this last legal appeal was exhausted, Bilansky was 
visited in jail by Walker, and later that evening, she escaped through an open 
window and disappeared into the countryside.

"In a very short time, every policeman in the city was made aware of the 
escape,'' the Pioneer & Democrat reported. "Watchmen were placed on all the 
thoroughfares leading out of town, and every vehicle inspected. A general 
search was also made throughout the city, but without success.''

For most of the next 8 days, John Walker and Ann Bilansky hid out near Lake 
Como and made preparations to escape. (They holed up for a time at the farm of 
a fellow jail inmate, George Lumsden, who had befriended her. 4 years later, 
Lumsden would be pardoned on the condition that he enlist in the Union army. He 
did, and was promptly killed at the Battle of Nashville.) Bilansky, wearing 
men's clothes, and Walker were finally captured on their way to St. Anthony, 
walking west.

A month later, Walker appeared in court on a charge of aiding in her escape. 
According to the Pioneer & Democrat, there was insufficient evidence to convict 
him, and he was released. He disappeared forever from the city and the story. 
Bilansky was sentenced to death by hanging on Dec. 2. She "sobbed audibly while 
the judge was addressing her, and on receiving her sentence, she burst into 
tears,'' the Pioneer & Democrat reported.

Between the sentencing and the execution, legislators and other prominent 
citizens paid their respects in Bilansky's cell. Cynics viewed her comments on 
her trial as wholly untrustworthy; they used the phrase, `You have been to see 
Mrs. Bilansky,' when someone was suspected of stretching the truth.

On Jan. 5, 1860, Rosa Scharf, the maid whose testimony helped seal Bilansky's 
fate, was found dead in her bed. The night before, she had visited Lucinda 
Kilpatrick and was worried about what was happening to Bilansky. A coroner's 
jury ruled that Rosa took an overdose of laudanum, suggesting suicide; the 
physician said she died of apoplexy.

Pressure began to build on the new governor, Alexander Ramsey, to commute Ann 
Bilansky's sentence. Ramsey signed the death warrant in late January, setting 
March 23, 1860, as the date of the execution. The Legislature passed a bill 
commuting the sentence to life. Ramsey vetoed the measure.

In his message, he colorfully expanded on the evidence of the trial, 
suggesting, as no one at the trial did, that someone had actually seen Bilansky 
administer poison.

"She sat by the bedside of her husband, not to foster, but to slay,'' Ramsey 
wrote. "She watched without emotion the tortures she had caused, and, by and 
by, administered no healing medicine, no cooling draught, but ever, under a 
guise of love and tender care, renewed the cup of death.''

In the days before her death, petitioners urging that Ramsey commute her 
sentence included the prosecutor, Isaac Heard, who said he had "grave and 
serious doubts'' about whether Bilansky had a fair trial, and Supreme Court 
Justice Charles E. Flandreau, who participated in the opinion denying her a new 
trial. Flandreau wrote that while he supported the death penalty, "it rather 
shocks my private sense of humanity to commence by inflicting the extreme 
penalty on a woman.''

In an excellent article on the case in Minnesota History magazine, author 
Matthew Cecil noted that Gov. Ramsey must have heard arguments for Bilansky's 
guilt from his brother, Justus, who had been on the jury and who was in 
business with the governor. Cecil also notes that commuting the sentence would 
be "likely to anger a public skittish about criminal justice.''

On the day of the execution, the town was clogged with gawkers, including an 
unusually large number of women, many carrying children. As soon as the body 
was cut down, the newspaper reported, "We noticed an individual making 
strenuous efforts to secure a portion of the rope, and succeeded, and there 
were many present who endeavored to get a piece of it as mementos, or as a 
remedy for disease.''

(source: twincities.com)








UTAH:

Utah death penalty trial: Prison volunteer calls Lovell a 'very positive' 
person



In an effort to convince a jury that Douglas Anderson Lovell should not be put 
to death for killing a woman in 1985, defense attorneys started their penalty 
phase case by calling a former religious volunteer at the prison who said he 
admires Lovell "for what he has been able to do with his life, given the 
circumstances he finds himself in."

John Newton testified Monday that he started talking to Lovell ??? who used to 
be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints - about "fairly 
basic level" church teachings, and that Lovell asked questions about the Bible 
and Book of Mormon.

"I think he's always been very positive and looking ahead," Newton told a 2nd 
District Court jury.

Newton said that while he never discussed the murder case with Lovell, the 
inmate was "very remorseful. He just felt bad for the victim's family. Who 
would not?"

Newton said Lovell turned down an offer to have the case publicized "because he 
felt bad about the family and what he'd done to them already."

Newton said he had volunteered in the prison from 2006-2009, and that he still 
talks on the phone monthly with Lovell.

Last week, the 12-member jury found Lovell, 57, guilty of aggravated murder for 
kidnapping and strangling 39-year-old Joyce Yost in 1985 to keep her from 
testifying against him in a rape case.

Jurors now must decide whether Lovell should be executed for the crime.

Lovell's defense attorneys did not contest the guilt-phase evidence that Lovell 
murdered Yost, saying they would instead focus on mitigating factors, including 
that Lovell's suffered head injuries as a child, as well as his family history, 
his model behavior as a prisoner and the low risk that he will re-offend.

Last week, Yost's son, Greg Roberts, 51, testified that it was "tragic" that 
his mother died so young.

"Joyce has missed all of these things with my kids," Roberts said. "She would 
have only been 69 years old. A young grandma. She could have taught them so 
much more."

On Aug. 10, 1985, Lovell kidnapped Yost from her South Ogden apartment and took 
her to the mountains above Ogden, where he strangled her and hid her body.

He later pleaded guilty to the murder in 1993 as part of a plea deal, where 
prosecutors agreed not to seek his execution if Lovell could lead authorities 
to where Yost was buried. But despite a search that year near the Snowbasin Ski 
Resort, her body was never found and Lovell was sentenced to death.

But the Utah Supreme Court ruled in 2010 that Lovell could withdraw his guilty 
plea because he should have been better informed of his rights during court 
hearings.

Though Yost was missing when Lovell's rape case went to trial later in 1985, a 
transcript of her preliminary hearing testimony helped to convict him.

Prosecutors say that on the April night in 1985 when Lovell raped Yost, he had 
followed her home from a Clearfield restaurant and asked her out. When she 
declined to join the stranger for a drink, they say, he kidnapped her and 
sexually assaulted her.

For the rape, Lovell is serving a 15-years-to-life sentence in the Utah State 
Prison.

Lovell was not charged with the slaying until 1992, after his ex-wife recorded 
him confessing during a prison visit.

(source: Salt Lake Tribune)








ARIZONA:

Woman who spent 22 years on death row has murder case tossed



An Arizona woman who spent more than 2 decades on death row in her 4-year-old 
son's killing was exonerated Monday, bringing an end to a controversial case 
that relied almost entirely on the work of a detective with a long history of 
misconduct.

Debra Milke hugged her supporters and sobbed as she left the courtroom, where a 
judge formally dismissed the case less than a week after prosecutors lost their 
final appeal. In a brief hearing, Judge Rosa Mroz also allowed Milke, who has 
been free on bond since 2013, to have her electronic-monitoring ankle bracelet 
removed.

Milke emerged from a conference room a short time later without the device.

"It feels good," Milke said, pulling up one pant leg to show her unencumbered 
ankle.

Milke was convicted of murder in 1990 in the death of her son, Christopher. 
Authorities say Milke dressed him in his favorite outfit and told him he was 
going to see Santa Claus at a mall in December 1989. He was then taken into the 
desert near Phoenix by 2 men and shot in the back of the head.

Authorities say Milke's motive was that she didn't want the child anymore and 
didn't want him to live with his father. Milke has maintained her innocence and 
denied that she confessed to the killing. The 2 men who led her child to his 
death were convicted of murder but refused to testify against Milke.

An appeals court overturned Milke's conviction in 2013, ruling that prosecutors 
failed to disclose a detective's history of misconduct. Her conviction was 
based entirely on a confession Milke gave to the now-discredited detective, 
Armando Saldate.

Multiple court rulings in other cases said the now-retired officer either lied 
under oath or violated suspects' rights during interrogations.

In a scathing 2013 opinion, a federal appeals court leveled harsh criticism 
over the case.

"No civilized system of justice should have to depend on such flimsy evidence," 
the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said.

Michael Kimerer, one of Milke's attorneys, said Monday that he was still in 
disbelief that "a long, long journey with so many ups and downs" ended with his 
client's freedom.

"She was innocent. It was all based upon a police officer that just totally 
lied," Kimerer said outside court. "To see her free today and totally free and 
exonerated, it's an unbelievable feeling - just unbelievable."

Saldate has said he would not testify at any retrial, citing fears of potential 
federal charges based on the 9th Circuit's accusations of misconduct. Both 
county and federal authorities have said they don't intend to seek charges 
against the detective based on any accusations leveled by the federal appeals 
court.

Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery last week called the decision not to 
let the case be retried "a dark day for Arizona's criminal justice system."

Milke filed a lawsuit earlier this month against the city of Phoenix, Maricopa 
County and numerous individuals. She alleges authorities violated her civil 
rights. She also contends she was denied a fair trial and was a victim of 
malicious prosecution.

(source: Associated Press)








USA:

Most Boston Residents Prefer Life Term Over Death Penalty in Marathon Case, 
Poll Shows



Despite this city's immersion in a trial that is replaying the horrific details 
of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, the vast majority of Bostonians say in a 
new poll that if Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the admitted bomber, is found guilty, he 
should be sent to prison for life and not condemned to death.

Given the choice of sentencing Mr. Tsarnaev to death or to prison for the rest 
of his life without the possibility of parole, 62 % of Bostonians chose life in 
prison, while 27 % said he should be put to death, according to a poll released 
Monday by WBUR, Boston's NPR news station.

Previous polls have shown Bostonians opposing the death penalty for Mr. 
Tsarnaev. A Boston Globe survey conducted in September 2013, 5 months after the 
bombings, found that 57 % favored life in prison while 33 % wanted him put to 
death.

Boston Police special operations officers patrolled outside the Moakley Federal 
Courthouse as the trial began in the Boston Marathon bombing.

But the WBUR poll is the 1st to be conducted since Mr. Tsarnaev's lawyers 
admitted this month that he had participated in the crimes. And it was 
conducted in the midst of his trial, which has included survivors recounting 
the graphic details of their limbs being blown off, and of loved ones being 
killed.

The poll clearly shows that Boston voters have nonetheless not changed their 
minds about his potential punishment, pointing to the enduring depth of 
sentiment here against the death penalty.

Steve Koczela, president of the MassINC Polling Group, which conducted the 
survey for WBUR, said he initially expected support for the death penalty to 
intensify, given the grim testimony emanating from court.

But, he said, the poll's results reflect the fundamental liberalism of the 
region and its longtime opposition to capital punishment.

"It's largely driven by the city's liberal political makeup," Mr. Koczela said. 
"It seems voters stuck to their core values even in the face of this attack," 
the worst on American soil since Sept. 11, 2001.

New England was in the forefront of the movement to abolish capital punishment 
in the mid-1800s. Massachusetts did not do so until 1984. But the state has not 
carried out an execution since 1947. And the state legislature has withstood 
attempts to revive the death penalty, even in the immediate aftermath of the 
marathon bombings.

Mr. Tsarnaev is facing death now because he has been charged under federal law, 
not state law. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., who personally opposes the 
death penalty, nonetheless authorized it for Mr. Tsarnaev more than a year ago, 
saying that "the nature of the conduct at issue and the resultant harm compel 
this decision." The Justice Department is determined to get a death sentence 
and has refused overtures from Mr. Tsarnaev to plead guilty in exchange for a 
life sentence.

Opinion here stands in sharp contrast to that of the nation as a whole. The 
most recent Gallup survey, from October, says that 63 % of Americans support 
the death penalty for convicted murderers. Gallup has not polled nationally on 
whether Mr. Tsarnaev specifically should be put to death.

Support nationwide for the death penalty has been stable over the last several 
years, Gallup says, although it has dropped significantly among Democrats. It 
has dropped among Republicans and independents too, but not by as much.

The WBUR poll found that opposition toward the death penalty was not as great 
in the Boston metropolitan region as it was in the city itself, but those in 
the metro area still preferred a sentence of life in prison over death: 49 % 
favored sending Mr. Tsarnaev to prison for life, while 38 % opted for death.

This might hearten the defense, but the poll does not necessarily reflect the 
views of the jurors who will decide the case. The jury was selected from all of 
eastern Massachusetts, beyond the Boston metro region, where support for the 
death penalty is greater.

In seeking to move the trial out of state, the defense team has complained that 
the jury is stacked with people who believe Mr. Tsarnaev is guilty and want to 
sentence him to death.

In terms of overall interest, the WBUR poll found that about 1/4 of the people 
in Boston and the region were following the trial "very closely," and that 
about half were following it "somewhat closely."

The poll interviewed a total of 504 registered voters from March 16 to 18 and 
has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 5 % points. It interviewed 229 
voters in the city of Boston; that portion of the poll has a margin of sampling 
error of plus or minus 7 % points.

(source: New York Times)