[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, DEL., FLA., LA., UTAH, CALIF.

[Rick Halperin]

June 15



TEXAS:

Appeal in 1997 Texarkana capital murder to be reviewed


The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals says a 37-year-old man on Texas death row 
for a robbery and fatal shooting in Texarkana nearly 19 years ago will get a 
review of an appeal in his case.

Attorneys for convicted killer Julius Murphy argue Bowie County prosecutors at 
his 1998 trial improperly withheld evidence that 2 key witnesses were pressured 
into testifying against Murphy and that one of the witnesses gave false 
testimony.

The state's highest criminal court Wednesday sent the appeal to Murphy's trial 
court to be resolved. It also rejected an argument that evolving standards of 
decency show the death penalty is now unconstitutional.

Murphy was condemned for the slaying of 26-year-old Jason Erie, who was 
attacked after his car broke down near his father's house in Texarkana.

(source: Associated Press)

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

Court Changes Texas Death Row Inmate's Sentence to Life


A man who fatally stabbed a 68-year-old woman and her 4-year-old granddaughter 
during a 1995 burglary in Hidalgo County will no longer face execution after he 
has been determined to be intellectually disabled.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state's highest criminal court, 
changed Jose Noey Martinez's sentence Wednesday to life in prison. The court 
agreed with a lower court's ruling that Martinez, now 40, "is a person with 
intellectual disability" and "is constitutionally ineligible for a death 
sentence." Martinez had been on death row almost 20 years.

Martinez broke into the home of Esperanza Palomo to steal a TV and stereo, 
according to court documents. Palomo was babysitting her blind granddaughter, 
Amanda. Shortly after breaking in, Palomo confronted Martinez with a baseball 
bat. He stabbed the grandmother, who fell to the ground immediately, and raped 
her.

After killing the woman, Martinez told law enforcement, he heard the 
granddaughter crying in another room, court documents show. He told officers 
that he stabbed her to death.

A Hidalgo County jury found Martinez guilty of capital murder in 1996 and 
sentenced him to death. On appeal, Martinez's attorneys had claimed that he is 
mentally retarded and argued that executing him would violate the Eighth 
Amendment's prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment.

(source: Texas Tribune)






DELAWARE:

Delaware court considers constitutionality of death penalty


A silent vigil was held outside the Delaware Supreme Court as the court weighs 
the constitutionality of capital punishment in Delaware.

The ongoing debate over Delaware's death penalty has made its way to the 
state's highest court.

For nearly a year, the discourse has drawn protests and emotional pleas at 
Legislative Hall, but the issue, now sitting squarely before the Delaware 
Supreme Court, drew a much more pensive tone in a Dover courtroom on Wednesday, 
as the court heard arguments over whether the way people are sentenced to death 
in Delaware is constitutional.

The quandary before the court arose after the U.S. Supreme Court found in 
January that Florida's death penalty law was unconstitutional because it gave 
judges - not juries - the final say to impose a death sentence. Delaware and 
Alabama are the only other states that allow judges to override a jury's 
recommendation of life. Delaware judges, however, have not been using that 
power.

Confusion over the rulings implication in Delaware led the state's Supreme 
Court to agree to hear arguments and weigh in.

In front of a packed courtroom Wednesday, a prosecutor argued to the Supreme 
Court that the state's death penalty process avoids the pitfalls that made 
Florida's statute infirm, especially since juries make the initial decision 
about whether a defendant is eligible for the death penalty in Delaware. A 
public defender countered that the state violates the Sixth Amendment when 
juries are routinely told that their sentencing decision is merely a 
recommendation.

"The most basic tenant of the [Florida] decision is that fact finding 
subjecting the defendant to the death penalty must be made by the jury," said 
Assistant Public Defender Santino Ceccotti "That does not occur in this state."

Delaware is 1 of 32 states with capital punishment. The last execution in the 
state was in 2012, when Shannon Johnson, 28, was killed by lethal injection.

All pending capital murder trials and executions for the 14 men on death row 
are currently on hold while the state considers the constitutionality issue.

The process for sentencing someone to death in Delaware requires multiple 
steps. Once a person is found guilty of 1st-degree murder, the jury must 
unanimously agree that the evidence shows beyond a reasonable doubt that a 
least once of 22 statutory aggravating factors exists.

?Then, each juror has to decide whether the aggravating factors outweigh the 
mitigating factors. That decision does not need to be unanimous, and the judge 
is not bound by those findings. The judge then has the final authority in 
sentencing someone to death.

On Wednesday, Deputy Attorney General Sean Lugg argued that Florida's death 
penalty process looks similar to an older version of Delaware's statute that 
existed before the General Assembly in 2002 changed it in response to another 
court ruling. The more recent ruling was a way to get Florida in line with the 
prior decision, Lugg said.

Ceccotti countered that legislative change is still needed for Delaware's law 
to pass constitutional muster. Delaware Supreme Court Chief Justice Leo E. 
Strine Jr. repeatedly questioned how, if the court were to find the statute 
unconstitutional, would the legislature write a new statute with a judge still 
involved in any aspect of the sentencing.

Ceccotti responded, saying that to be in line with the Florida decision, the 
fact finding can not be in the hands of judges.

Florida and Alabama are also still grappling with the U.S. Supreme Court 
decision.

Last week, the Florida Supreme Court heard arguments over whether the death 
penalty statute lawmakers in Florida hurriedly passed after the January 
decision is now acceptable. Like Delaware, Florida's new law requires juries to 
unanimously determine at least one aggravating factor before defendants are 
sentenced to death. Alabama has been far less willing to act, but the U.S. 
Supreme Court has told the Alabama appeals court multiple times recently to 
reconsider its statute.

The state court's future decision will be significant for Delaware. A bill to 
abolish the death penalty failed in the state House of Representatives earlier 
this year, but instead of filing a motion for reconsideration of the bill, the 
bill's sponsors said in March they would suspend legislative action until the 
Delaware Supreme Court rules.

Abraham J. Bonowitz, Delaware's death penalty abolition coordinator for Amnesty 
International, said at a silent vigil with about 15 people outside the Supreme 
Court building Wednesday that the court's decision could help toward the goal 
of abolishing the death penalty.

"All of us here are praying that the Delaware Supreme Court finds ... that the 
death penalty is unconstitutional," he said. "And then it will be on the 
legislature to fix it, rather than end it. We should be able to stop a fix as 
it's always easier to stop bad legislation than to pass progressive 
legislation."

(source: delawareonline.com)






FLORIDA:

Napolitano: Orlando Terrorist's Wife Could Face The Death Penalty


Fox News's senior judicial analyst Andrew Napolitano says that the Orlando 
terrorist attacker's wife could face the death penalty as a result of her role 
in the terrorist attack.

Appearing on "America's Newsroom" Wednesday, Napolitano said, "There's a long 
list of charges that she could face, from providing assistance, to agreeing to 
participate."

Noor Zahi Salman, Omar Mateen's wife, knew of Mateen's plans but did not stop 
him, reports Fox News. Moreover, Salman said that she was present when Mateen 
bought ammunition and a holster. Last Sunday, Mateen killed 49 people at a gay 
nightclub in Orlando, Florida.

"The highest and greatest charge, the reason I mention this is because the 
federal government likes to charge you with the highest and greatest charge 
supported by the evidence, would be conspiracy to commit mass murder," 
Napolitano said. "A conspiracy is an agreement by 2 or more people to commit a 
crime. Once the crime is committed and the person actually commits it is dead, 
the remaining conspirators in this case one person we believe, is as liable as 
the person who pulled the trigger."

As a result of her role, Napolitano said, Salman could face "the death 
penalty."

"Now, I don't know if the federal government wants to pursue that with her, 
they probably will because by charging her with the highest and greatest crime 
they would expect her to plead guilty to something less which would incarcerate 
her for the rest of her life, get a dangerous person off the street, send a 
message to other bad guys and other confederates 'We will come after everybody 
that we can.'"

Referring to the guidance of "see something, say something," Napolitano says 
that Salman might have had a "legal" obligation to tell authorities about 
Mateen's plans.

(source: dailycaller.com)






LOUISIANA:

Will the Supreme Court Crack Down on Louisiana???s Rogue Prosecutors?


In a Louisiana case now pending before the U.S. Supreme Court, lawyers for a 
death row inmate named David Brown are asking the justices to put a stop to 
what the outspoken jurist and author Alex Kozinski has called an "epidemic" of 
prosecutorial misconduct. One of the most common forms of such misconduct is 
the withholding of evidence that might exonerate or mitigate the guilt of a 
defendant. Failure to turn it over, according to the court's seminal 1963 
decision Brady v. Maryland, is a violation of due process. Brown's lawyers 
argue that nothing less is at stake in their client's case than the future of 
Brady and the right to due process in criminal proceedings.

Although prosecutors have bristled at Kozinski's charge, there is certainly 
plenty of evidence to back up his claim. According to the National Registry of 
Exonerations, a project at the University of Michigan Law School, 933 of the 
nearly 1,800 exonerations to date involve official misconduct by prosecutors, 
police, or other government officials. 35 of those exonerations come from the 
state of Louisiana alone, where prosecutors have a dismal record of complying 
with their legal obligations. According to Pace University School of Law 
professor Bennett Gershman, a leading expert on prosecutorial misconduct, many 
of Louisiana's prosecutors "have an incomplete and even warped understanding of 
the Brady rule, and their enforcement of their Brady duty is deficient." In 
Kozinski's estimation, it is the duty of the courts to solve the misconduct 
problem. "Only judges can put a stop to it."

(source: theintercept.com)






UTAH:

Report: Each death row inmate costs Utah $1.66 million


A new state report finds that each death row inmate in Utah costs $1.66 million 
more in taxpayer money than one sentenced to life in prison without parole.

State lawmakers weighed the costs of capital punishment Wednesday at a hearing 
that came after the legislature both brought back the firing squad and 
seriously considered eliminating death sentences altogether.

Some lawmakers sharply questioned whether the state could really save that much 
money if they did away with capital punishment, pointing to costs like care for 
elderly inmates.

Republican Rep. Paul Ray of Clearfield sponsored the proposal that brought back 
the firing squad as a backup execution method, and now wants to streamline the 
death-penalty appeals process from about 30 years to 15 or less. Critics say 
that could give defendants short shrift.

(source: Associated Press)






CALIFORNIA:

Money for executing mentally ill inmates would be better spent helping them


To the editor: The poor, the mentally ill and the disabled - those are the 
people who are sentenced to die in this state. ("A sane approach to dealing 
with mentally ill death row inmates," editorial, June 11)

The death penalty is expensive. Sentencing someone to die costs taxpayers 
considerably more than sentencing someone to spend the rest of his or her life 
in prison. Money spent on the death penalty could be spent on education, law 
enforcement, victim assistance and mental health treatment.

Attempting to speed up executions will cost even more money and will increase 
the likelihood that an innocent person will be executed. Attempting to speed up 
the death penalty will impose a tremendous strain on the already overburdened 
courts.

The only question that remains is why the lawmakers in this state are unwilling 
to publicly state what they all know - that the death penalty is irreparably 
broken and should be abolished?

Jennifer Friedman, Los Angeles

The writer is a Los Angeles County public defender.

(source: Letter to the Editor, Los Angeles Times)