[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, CONN., PENN., DEL., OHIO

[Rick Halperin]

June 16



TEXAS----impending execution

Death Watch: Shaken Science----Appeal rests on new research into Shaken Baby 
Syndrome


To have his federal habeas attorneys tell it, Robert Roberson is "dim-witted" 
and "mentally ill." The 49-year-old, sentenced to death in 2003 for the 2002 
death of his 2-year-old daughter Nikki Curtis, was a "drug abusing petty 
criminal with a long family history of serious mental health issues," attorneys 
James Volberding and John Wright have said. But did that make him a ruthless 
killer? No, Volberding and Wright argued in a Sept. 2010 application for habeas 
relief made to the U.S. District Court of the Eastern District of Texas. Their 
client "probably did contribute" to the death of his daughter: "Just not 
knowingly or intentionally. Roberson is not the worst of the worst. Not even 
close." The 2 attorneys suggested a modified conviction of manslaughter, and a 
sentence of 20 years.

Much of the old argument hinged on the manner in which Nikki is believed to 
have died, and the way Anderson County District Attorney Doug Lowe manipulated 
the trial process to elevate the jury's belief in the ruthlessness of the 
crime. According to Roberson, Nikki died during a night when he was left alone 
with her and was high on drugs. Prosecutors said he shook her, hard, when he 
was angry with her - hard enough that she slipped into a coma. When that 
happened, they said, he put her in bed, and left her there for hours. Nikki was 
only taken to a hospital after being checked on 5 hours later, at which point 
it was discovered she was not breathing.

Roberson has maintained his innocence since the day he was arrested, saying 
that Nikki died after landing on her head during a fall from her bed. Medical 
professionals who testified at his trial quickly dismissed his claims as 
unlikely.

An examination of Nikki's body by a nurse upon her arrival at the Palestine 
Regional Medical Center revealed a "superficial tear to Nikki's anal cavity" 
and a rate of dilation to the anal canal that was considered faster than usual, 
suggesting what Roberson's attorneys described as "theoretical sexual 
penetration." Dallas pediatrician Dr. Janet Squires found no evidence of any 
sexual abuse, however - no deformities to her anal cavity, bruises, or markings 
on her vagina. Squires testified at trial that she found no semen or traces of 
sexually transmitted bacteria. She noted that the anal cavity usually dilates 
in the comatose state due to the nervous system shutting down.

The notion that Roberson sexually abused his daughter that night ultimately 
became irrelevant during trial. Lowe ultimately even attempted to have that 
charge dismissed. (Capital murder indictments can be secured in cases in which 
a murder occurs during a felony, is premeditated, or involves a victim who is 
younger than 6, making Roberson a candidate under 2 circumstances.) In appeals, 
Volberding and Wright argued that the notion of sexual abuse was only important 
to Lowe at the beginning of the trial: By securing an indictment of sexual 
assault from the grand jury, Lowe would have an easier time turning the jury 
against Roberson, thus making a death sentence - a more appropriate penalty, he 
considered, for the high-profile death of a small girl in a small town - a more 
likely outcome. Roberson's trial attorneys John Vanmeter and Steve Evans used a 
strategy that pointed to Roberson's longstanding mental illness, though they 
never actually argued that their client was insane, which would have raised 
questions of cruel and unusual punishment.

Since a final judgment was rendered in federal court in Sept. 2014, Roberson's 
effort has shifted away from the mental illness angle and instead toward the 
argument that "Shaken Baby Syndrome" (aka "Abusive Head Trauma") is a 
phenomenon rooted in junk science. Much of that shift has been Roberson's 
doing. In 2014, after learning of a Houston case involving a newfound 
understanding of SBS, Roberson wrote a letter to the 5th Circuit Court of 
Appeals asking that he be granted new counsel. That request eventually led to 
the Texas Defender Service taking his case to the U.S. Supreme Court, where it 
ultimately failed.

On June 8, 2 weeks before his pending execution, Gretchen Sween, an attorney 
with the Office of Capital Writs, filed 2 applications for relief (1 in 
Roberson's trial court and another with the Court of Criminal Appeals) as well 
as a motion with the trial court for a stay of execution. In each application, 
Sween argues that new forensic science could rebuke previous theorems of SBS, 
and corroborate Roberson's claims that Nikki - who had a temperature of 104.5 
degrees only 2 days before her death - did fall from her bed. Among the claims, 
Sween has argued that Nikki's lack of any serious neck injuries indicates that 
she was not in fact shaken, and that the science surrounding SBS has evolved 
enough to change the course of Roberson's case.

"The prior medical understanding was that a specific set of symptoms could be 
viewed together as categorical proof of SBS/AHT," Sween wrote. "More 
specifically, in 2002-2003, when Robert was tried, the medical community 
invited doctors to infer conclusively that a child had been violently shaken 
from the presence of 3 symptoms: retinal hemorrhaging, subdural 
hematoma/hemorrhaging, and edema or brain swelling."

Roberson is scheduled to be executed on Tuesday, June 21. As we go to press, 
he's still awaiting a response from the trial court and CCA. Should his latest 
efforts be denied, Roberson will be the 7th Texan executed this year and the 
538th since Texas reinstated the death penalty in 1976.

(source: Austin Chronicle)

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

Texas is scheduled to execute this man in 6 days - but 4 experts say he was 
convicted based on junk science


The scientific evidence was conclusive, doctors told a Texas jury in 2003: 
capital murder defendant Robert Roberson had violently shaken his 2 
1/2-year-old daughter to death.

13 years later - and just days before Roberson is scheduled to be executed - 4 
medical experts are now claiming that the scientific theory used to convict him 
has been thoroughly debunked.

Roberson, 49, is the next death row inmate in America scheduled to be executed, 
and will go to the death chamber June 21. He was sentenced to death in 2003 for 
the murder of his daughter, Nikki Curtis.

Last week, he filed an application for a writ of habeas corpus - essentially an 
appeal to stay his execution and be given a new hearing - to the Texas Court of 
Criminal Appeals, the highest criminal court in the state. A decision is 
expected within days.

At the time of Roberson???s trial, doctors believed that certain symptoms in a 
child could conclusively prove they were violently shaken or abused, based on a 
theory known as Shaken Baby Syndrome. But in the last decade, the 4 experts who 
submitted affidavits as part of his appeal say, there's been a sea change in 
the scientific understanding of the issue.

Now his best last hope to postpone an execution and get a new hearing is Texas' 
junk science law, which guarantees defendants a new trial if they can prove 
they were convicted based on scientific evidence that has since been 
discredited. It's seen as one of the most progressive laws in the country of 
its kind.

Roberson, whose lawyers say suffers from "severe limitations in intellectual 
functioning," was Nikki's biological father but essentially shared custody with 
the parents of Nikki's mother, whom she had lived with for the 1st 2 years of 
her life. He brought her home from her grandparents house in Palestine, Texas, 
on the evening of January 30, 2002, and put her to bed. Early the next morning, 
he was woken up by her crying, and found that she had fallen on the floor. She 
seemed OK, he told investigators, so he put her back in her bed and went to 
sleep. When he woke up again a few hours later, she was blue and barely 
breathing. Roberson rushed her to the hospital, and she was declared dead the 
next day.

Prosecutors dismissed Roberson's account, his lawyers say, and instead charged 
him with murdering his daughter by shaking or beating her. At the time, most 
doctors believed that they could determine that a child could be diagnosed with 
Shaken Baby Syndrome based on 3 symptoms: retinal hemorrhaging, subdural 
hematoma/hemorrhaging, and edema, or brain swelling. Roberson's jury was told 
that because Nikki had signs of all 3, she must have been abused.

The defense didn't contest that explanation or call any medical experts. On 
February 14, 2003, the jury convicted Roberson and sentenced him to death.

Now, however, a growing group of scientists disagree with this method of 
diagnosing Shaken Baby Syndrome. Research has shown that the same symptoms can 
be caused by other natural or accidental causes, the four experts who reviewed 
Roberson's case write. They present a range of possible causes for Nikki's 
death that were not explored during the trial: meningitis due to an ear 
infection; an injury before Roberson arrived; a short fall like the one he 
described or a congenital condition.

"The medical personnel in this case seemed to adopt the presumption that child 
abuse was the root cause from the outset, a presumption that appears to have 
imposed a cognitive bias that prevented them from investigating all reasonable 
possible causes of death either before or after her death," wrote Dr. Harry 
Bonnell, a forensic pathologist.

Notably, the experts - who also include 2 other doctors and a professor of 
mechanical engineering - agreed that "it is impossible to shake a toddler to 
death without causing serious neck injuries - and Nikki had none," the appeal 
states.

Across the country, there are several hundred people in prison for murder 
convictions based on Shaken Baby Syndrome, L.A. Weekly reported, even though 
the latest scientific findings would undermine their cases. The American 
Academy of Pediatrics now doesn't even use the term "shaken baby syndrome," 
based on an understanding that its effects are not only caused by shaking. (A 
smaller contingent of doctors, however, still believe the kind of evidence used 
to convict Roberson is conclusive.)

The prosecution in Roberson's case also originally charged him with sexually 
assaulting Nikki, and several witnesses talked about that theory in front of 
the jury. But no evidence was presented that any sexual assault took place, and 
the prosecution dropped the charge at the last minute. Roberson's lawyers argue 
that was highly prejudicial. "The State used this rank speculation to drive 
home its view that Robert was not just a poor, mentally impaired father 
struggling with sobriety, but a deviant - capable of raping and brutally 
shaking his own daughter to death," they write.

Gretchen Swenn, Roberson's attorney, declined to comment while the case is 
being considered by the court.

Last year, Roberson asked the U.S. Supreme Court to remove his previous 
lawyers, James Volberding and Seth Kretzer, alleging that they had failed to 
adequately represent him in his appeals. The justices declined to hear his 
case.

That means that this appeal is most likely Roberson's last chance at a stay of 
execution. He has an application for clemency pending at the Texas Board of 
Pardons and Paroles, but clemency for Texas death row inmates is exceedingly 
rare.

The state has not yet filed a response to Roberson's appeal. The Court of 
Criminal Appeals is expected to rule on his case in the next few days.

"When the trial record is viewed through the lens of current science and 
evidence-based medicine, it is clear that he is innocent of capital murder," 
Roberson's appeal states.

(source: fusion.net)

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

Executions under Greg Abbott, Jan. 21, 2015-present----19

Executions in Texas: Dec. 7, 1982----present-----537

Abbott#--------scheduled execution date-----name------------Tx. #

20---------June 21------------------Robert Roberson-------538

21---------July 14------------------Perry Williams--------539

22---------August 19----------------Ramiro Gonzales-------540

23---------August 23----------------Robert Pruett---------541

24---------August 31----------------Rolando Ruiz----------542

25---------September 14-------------Robert Jennings-------543

26---------October 19---------------Terry Edwards---------544

(sources: TDCJ & Rick Halperin)

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

Texas Man Escapes Death Sentence in Police Chief's Murder


The killer of a small-town Texas police chief escaped the death penalty on 
Wednesday after a jury could not reach agreement on his punishment.

David Risner, a 59-year-old former police officer, will automatically be 
sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. He was convicted last 
Monday in the 2014 shooting death of Little River-Academy Police Chief Lee 
Dixon.

After hearing testimony for 5 days in the sentencing phase of Risner's trial, a 
Bell County jury deliberated for more than four hours before announcing it 
could not agree to sentence Risner to death.

"He's going to die in prison; we're going to take that home," Bell County 
Assistant District Attorney Nelson Barnes said after the sentencing. "We only 
hope he doesn't hurt someone in prison."

Almost 2 years ago, on June 19, 2014, Dixon arrived at Risner's house a little 
after 5 p.m. to investigate a complaint. The 2 talked for a few minutes, but 
when Dixon went to cite Risner for a class C misdemeanor, things escalated.

In a dashcam video played during the trial's closing arguments, the courtroom 
heard Dixon call out to Risner in an increasingly frantic voice as Risner 
brought a shotgun to the screen door: "David, show me your hands! Show me 
them!"

A gunshot sounded, and the shouting ceased. Another shot rang out a few seconds 
later.

Risner called 911 himself, and a sheriff's deputy arrived to find Dixon dead on 
the front porch, according to an arrest affidavit. In court, prosecutors showed 
an autopsy photo of Dixon, missing almost half of his face.

"What you did because you had a bad day was horrible, horrible," Lee Dixon's 
wife, Mary, said through tears to Risner after the sentencing. "I'm sorry, I 
just cannot forgive you."

In the 1990s and early 2000s, Risner served as a law enforcement officer in 
several departments east of Dallas. He was active in his church and described 
as a generous man.

Later, he took a contract job in Baghdad during wartime.

"David came back from Iraq a different man, a broken man," said Donna Risner, 
his wife. "It was hard for him to concentrate. It was hard for him to sit 
still. I heard him tell a doctor once it was like there were fire ants in his 
brain."

Both prosecutors and defense attorneys agreed that Risner suffered from 
post-traumatic stress disorder and a traumatic brain injury. Multiple 
explosions rocked the compound where he worked as a security supervisor in 
Iraq, at least once blowing out the windows of his room.

The defense argued those disorders were the cause of the shooting, and because 
of that, Risner shouldn't receive the death penalty.

"He didn't choose to have these conditions," said Russ Hunt, Jr., Risner's 
attorney. "These conditions are a result of him serving his community."

Prosecutors said Risner couldn't use PTSD or a brain injury as an excuse 
because millions of people are affected by these conditions.

"A shotgun to the face is not the result of PTSD, and it is not the result of a 
brain injury" Assistant District Attorney Shelley Strimple said. "There's no 
excuse for blowing a man's face off."

Even with the lesser sentence, Risner will still die in prison, Hunt said. He 
only asked that his client be spared from execution.

"We're not asking for a pass," he said. "David Risner needs to be punished for 
what he's done."

Throughout the day Wednesday, David Risner smiled broadly at his wife and son 
in the courtroom and wiped tears from his eyes during discussion of his friends 
and family. When talk focused on Dixon, his face became still and unreadable.

Mary Dixon cried quietly and often. Several times, she left the room in tears.

In a plea to the jury to give her husband a life sentence over death, Donna 
Risner said, "I want David any way I can have him."

"How bad do you think Mary Dixon wants Lee?" Barnes asked on cross-examination. 
In his closing argument, he held Mary's hand as she sobbed and turned the jury.

"She would walk [Risner] out of this courtroom for just 5 minutes with Lee," he 
said.

In a death penalty sentencing, jurors must unanimously agree that the defendant 
will pose a future danger to society and that nothing in the defendant's 
background or character warrants the lesser sentence.

The defense pointed to a doctor's evaluation of Risner that said he was 
low-risk for future danger. Prosecutors said his multiple altercations with 
Bell County jail staff show that isn't the case.

Since his arrest almost 2 years ago, Risner has been in altercations with jail 
staff over his medication and his laundry, defense attorney Jeff Parker said. 
He said jail staff was able to handle it easily both times, indicating the 
prison system would be able to control Risner.

The prosecutors have also pointed to Risner's several run-ins with law 
enforcement before Dixon's death but after Iraq as evidence that he should 
receive the harshest punishment.

He fired a shot above an officer's head in 1 incident and told a dispatcher he 
would kill the officer if he ever returned to his home. Years later, he became 
argumentative with an officer after a traffic stop, and officers found a rifle 
in his trunk.

"He's no different today than when he killed Lee Dixon," Barnes said. "He's 
still going to hate cops, and he's still going to hate authority."

Hunt argued that Risner is only a danger when he has guns: "Is he going to have 
any guns in prison? No."

The defense focused on Risner's behavior before Iraq to justify a life 
sentence. Hunt pointed to several examples where Risner gave money or even the 
title to his truck to strangers in need, and the Risners created a Sunday 
school program at their community church. In 1992, he was named officer of the 
year for the Van Zandt County Sheriff's Department.

"Underneath the David Risner that [killed Dixon] ... there is a good cop," 
Parker said. "You need to judge his whole life, not just the worst part of his 
life."

The last death penalty trial in Bell County was in 2007, when Richard Tabler 
was sent to death row, Barnes said. There have been 3 death sentences in Texas 
this year.

(source: Texas Tribune)

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

Judge on Top Texas Court Questions Death Penalty's Fairness


Texas' highest criminal court should consider whether the death penalty is 
being fairly applied and should still be constitutional, one of the nine judges 
on the all-Republican court wrote in a dissenting opinion issued Wednesday.

Judge Elsa Alcala, who was appointed to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in 
2011 by then-Gov. Rick Perry, agreed with the court's decision to order a lower 
court to consider overturning the conviction of Julius Murphy, who was 
sentenced to death for the 1997 killing of 26-year-old Jason Erie. However, in 
a dissenting opinion she challenged the court's decision to reject, without 
elaboration, Murphy's lawyers' contention that "evolving standards of decency" 
show the death penalty should be deemed unconstitutional.

"In my view, the Texas scheme has some serious deficiencies that have, in the 
past, caused me great concern about this form of punishment as it exists in 
Texas today," Alcala wrote.

She wrote that the court has been ignoring similar claims from other inmates as 
a matter of routine without regard for "more current events," and said Murphy's 
appeal "has presented arguments that are worthy of this court's substantive 
review."

The court historically has shown little sympathy for condemned inmates, 
although Alcala has been critical of some past rulings. It is the last state 
judicial stop for condemned prisoners in Texas, which executes more prisoners 
than any other state - 537 since 1982.

In Murphy's case, the appeals court ordered the trial court to resolve Murphy's 
appeal and deliver its findings on challenges alleging that prosecutors 
improperly withheld evidence showing that two key witnesses were pressured into 
testifying against him and that one of the witnesses gave false testimony.

Murphy's attorneys argued that the U.S. executes fewer people than it used to, 
that more states have decided to abolish or to not use the death penalty, and 
that delays in carrying out death sentences mean prisoners are kept in solitary 
confinement for excessive lengths of time, which amounts to cruel and unusual 
punishment.

They also questioned whether race has resulted in a disproportionate number of 
minority inmates on death row.

Murphy is black, like 44 percent of the 246 Texas death row inmates. As of Jan. 
1, 1,227 of the country's 2,943 condemned prisoners were black, or 42 percent 
of them. Hispanics, meanwhile, make up 27 percent of Texas' death row inmates 
and 13 percent of the nation's.

"Given both state and federal case law and the history of racial discrimination 
in this country, I have no doubt that race has been an improper consideration 
in particular death-penalty cases, and it is therefore proper to permit 
(Murphy) the opportunity to present evidence at a hearing about the specifics 
in his case," Alcala wrote.

Murphy, 37, was convicted of killing Erie, who was attacked in September 1997 
after his car broke down near his father's house in Texarkana. Murphy was 
scheduled to die last November but the appeals court gave him a reprieve. The 
same court stepped in to halt his scheduled lethal injection in 2006.

Alcala was elected to a full 6-year term on the criminal appeals court in 2012.

(source: Associated Press)






CONNECTICUT:

Convicted Killer Is 1st Death-Row Inmate Resentenced to Life


1 of 2 men sentenced to death for the slayings of a mother and her 2 daughters 
during a 2007 home invasion in Connecticut has been resentenced to life in 
prison.

Steven Hayes is the 1st of 11 death-row inmates to be resentenced since the 
Connecticut Supreme Court ruled in August that their sentences violated the 
state constitution's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment.

State lawmakers abolished Connecticut's death penalty in 2012, except for those 
already sentenced to death.

A judge on Wednesday imposed six consecutive life sentences on Hayes for the 
murders of Jennifer Hawke-Petit and her daughters, 17-year-old Haley and 
11-year-old Michaela, in Cheshire. Hawke-Petit's husband and the girls' father, 
Dr. William Petit, was badly beaten but survived.

He didn't immediately respond to a message seeking comment Wednesday.

(source: Associated Press)






PENNSYLVANIA:

Johnstown judge allows death penalty option in retrial of 2004 Hollidaysburg 
slaying


A federal judge in Johnstown has upheld a ruling allowing prosecutors to seek 
the death penalty against a man accused killing a woman more than a decade ago.

U.S. District Judge Kim R. Gibson rejected a defense attorney's argument last 
week that a lower court had wrongly ruled against Paul Aaron Ross, according to 
an Altoona Mirror report. The judge also denied any further hearings at the 
District Court level.

Ross is charged in the 2004 death of 26-year-old Tina Miller, whose body was 
found partially submerged and bound with duct tape at Canoe Creek State Park in 
Hollidaysburg.

Ross won a retrial after an appeals court ruled his attorney didn't have enough 
time to fully prepare a defense.

Ross' death penalty attorney, Thomas Hooper, wasn't immediately available for 
comment.

(source: Associated Press)

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

Killer avoids death penalty for Craigslist car deal shooting


A Reading man avoided the possibility of being sentenced to death after he 
admitted Wednesday to the fatal shooting of an Allentown businessman during a 
Craigslist car deal.

Tyrell Young pleaded guilty to 3rd-degree murder, a person not to possess a 
firearm and receiving stolen property in connection with the April 2014 killing 
of 41-year-old Eric Ervin in East Allentown.

Prosecutors had said they would seek the death penalty against Young if he were 
convicted of 1st-degree murder.

Under the deal, Young was instead sentenced to 30 to 60 years in state prison. 
Young was on parole at the time of the murder for a Northampton County 
carjacking, and will also have to serve the remaining nine years in that case.

Judge James Anthony recommended Young not be paroled at all, and serve the 
entire 60 years in prison.

The sentence came after a handful of Ervin's family members, most carrying 
photographs, tearfully described the gentle giant taken so suddenly from their 
lives.

Richard Ervin has been counting the days since Eric, his first-born son, was 
killed -- 657 days as of Wednesday. When the elder Ervin woke up on Wednesday, 
he thanked God he wouldn't have to count anymore since Young would be pleading 
guilty.

"Then I realized, I'll have to count till I'm gone," he sobbed. "I miss him so 
much. I don't know how to go on."

Ervin's mother, Linda, wore a T-shirt from her son's business to court. She 
spoke through sobs as she described the earlier death of her daughter, Crystal, 
and then the stunning blow of Eric's murder.

Linda Ervin said she was able to say good-bye to her daughter, but never had 
the chance with Eric.

"Why didn't you let my son go?" Linda Ervin asked Young. "Why you had to do 
this, I don't understand. ... I hope you rot. ... You have devastated us. We're 
destroyed."

Young apologized to the family, and said there was a confrontation before the 
shooting but that he wasn't using that as an excuse.

Defense attorney Earl Supplee said Young suffers from paranoia, and brought a 
gun to the car deal after Ervin insisted on Young paying cash.

Young "lost it" in the trailer and shot Ervin, Supplee said.

Prosecutors said Young shot Ervin the night of April 8, 2014, during a deal to 
purchase Ervin's BMW. Ervin's body was found early the next morning at Aces 
High Auto Detailing, his business in the 600 block of Nelson Street in 
Allentown.

The Lehigh County Coroner's Office said Ervin died of a gunshot wound that 
entered his shoulder and exited his neck, ruling his death a homicide.

Ervin's girlfriend reported him missing at 1 a.m. April 9, 2014; his body was 
found in a trailer at his business and a shell casing was recovered at the 
scene.

After Ervin's body was discovered, police put out an alert for a silver BMW. 
The car was stopped in Reading and Young was driving, police said.

Young's defense attorneys said at trial they would have introduced evidence of 
Young's mental health diagnosis: schizoid personality disorder, paranoia, 
depressive personality traits.

Supplee said the plea deal was the appropriate resolution in the case.

(source: lehighvalley.com)






DELAWARE:

Judicial Override in Law Grad's Death-Penalty Appeal Eyed by High Court


During oral arguments Wednesday, Delaware's chief justice pressed a public 
defender on his argument that the state's death-penalty statute is 
unconstitutional because it allows judges to override juries' findings of fact 
in the sentencing phase.

The statute, Section 4209 of the Delaware Code, had come under scrutiny after 
the U.S. Supreme Court's January decision in Hurst v. Florida struck down a 
capital-sentencing scheme in Florida, which gave judges the final say in 
whether to impose a sentence of death.

In an 8-1 decision, the nation's high court ruled in Hurst that the "Sixth 
Amendment requires a jury, not a judge, to find each fact necessary to impose a 
sentence of death."

On Wednesday, Santino Ceccotti, an assistant public defender in the appellate 
unit, told the state Supreme Court en banc in Dover that Delaware's statute 
suffered from the same constitutional infirmities as the Florida law because it 
allows a judge to independently weigh aggravating and mitigating factors after 
the jury makes its own sentencing recommendation based the same findings.

The arguments came in a test case involving Benjamin Rauf, a Temple 
University's Beasley School of Law graduate.

The Delaware case is captioned Rauf v. State.

Rauf, who graduated from law school in 2015, was charged in the Aug. 23, 2015, 
killing of a classmate, Shazim Uppal, that took place in a parking lot in 
Hockessin. Law enforcement officials have said the murder was the result of a 
drug deal gone bad.

Prosecution of his case has been delayed under an order of Superior Court 
President Judge Jan R. Jurden, who stayed all capital case trials in the First 
State in the wake of the Hurst decision. Rauf is being held without bail, a 
Department of Justice spokesman said.

Delaware's death-penalty law, Ceccotti argued, allows a judge to make factual 
determinations that can enhance a sentence in capital cases and relegates the 
jury's involvement to the kind of "advisory" role that was found to be 
unconstitutional in Hurst.

"The most basic tenet of the Hurst decision is that fact-finding subjecting a 
defendant to the death penalty must be made by a jury," he said. "That does not 
occur in this state."

But Chief Justice Leo E. Strine Jr. led a barrage of questioning from the bench 
challenging the idea that Delaware juries are deprived of the ability to make 
the initial factual finding that makes a defendant death-eligible.

"Isn't the question ... who, constitutionally, has to make that judgment in the 
1st instance," Strine asked, referring to the jury's weighing of aggravating 
and mitigating factors.

The discussion sparked a follow-up from Justice Randy J. Holland, who indicated 
that the jury's initial finding of at least 1 statutory aggravator constituted 
the factual finding necessary for the court to proceed with a death sentence.

"As I understood your argument on Hurst, it was relying on anything that's 
necessary prior to the imposition of death, and in Delaware, prior to the 
imposition of a death sentence, you have to find the aggravators outweigh the 
mitigators," the justice said.

Holland's statement aligned with the position of state prosecutors seeking to 
uphold the statute, who in their briefs tried to differentiate Delaware's law 
from Florida's sentencing scheme.

Deputy Attorney General Sean P. Lugg said Delaware's law is consistent with 
Supreme Court precedent laying out the elements required to impose a death 
sentence. The requisite "overt balancing and weighing process," he said, is not 
required to be done solely by a jury.

"The element here that elevates the availability - and that's important - the 
availability of the death penalty to a sentencing judge is the finding, 
unanimously and beyond a reasonable doubt, of the existence of that statutory 
aggravator," Lugg said.

"Thereafter, there is a legislative determination that a judge needs to be 
involved."

A final ruling from the court is expected sometime within the next month to a 
case that has sparked national interest since the state Supreme Court in late 
January agreed to hear the case at the request of the Superior Court in the 
wake of the Hurst decision.

Three amici groups have filed briefs in the case, all arguing that Delaware's 
statute is unconstitutional. Meanwhile, all capital cases have been stayed, and 
Delaware lawmakers have suspended an effort to repeal the death penalty, both 
pending a decision from the high court.

(source: delawarelawweekly.com)






OHIO:

Prosecutors look into cellphone of Cleveland quintuple homicide suspect facing 
death penalty


Forensic scientists will review cellphone data of the man facing a death 
sentence in a 2014 quintuple homicide on Cleveland's East Side.

James Sparks-Henderson, 20, appeared in court Wednesday as attorneys settled 
confusion over how his cellphone data would be preserved and copied.

Defense attorney Fernando Mack filed a motion to preserve the accused shooter's 
cellphone as evidence. In order to extract the data necessary to study 
Sparks-Henderson's activity leading up to the shooting incident, however, 
forensic scientists will have to dismantle the phone.

After hearing testimony from JoAnn Gibb, a forensics expert with the Ohio 
Bureau of Criminal Investigation, Mack agreed that a copy of the phone's data 
chip would be sufficient, even though the phone itself may not be salvageable.

Prosecuting attorney Blaise Thomas told Cuyahoga Common Pleas Judge John P 
O'Donnell that the state's forensics experts could deliver Sparks-Henderson's 
defense team a copy of the cellphone data as soon as it is extracted.

Defense attorneys have retained their own forensic cellphone expert to review 
the state's work.

Sparks-Henderson, of Shaker Heights, was indicted on capital murder charges in 
April. He is accused of firing into a home on East 93rd Street on Nov. 21, 
2014. The gunfire took the lives of four people inside, prosecutors say, along 
with an unborn child.

The shooting led to the deaths of Lemon Bryant, 60, Shaylona Williams, 17, 
Ja'rio Taylor, 18, and Sherita Johnson, 41. Johnson's unborn son, Juwan, was 
also killed.

After a plea deal fails to materialize, Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy 
McGinty is now seeking the death penalty against a man accused of a quintuple 
homicide in May 2014.

O'Donnell did not set a date for trial, although a September starting date was 
discussed during the hearing. Another pretrial hearing was scheduled for June 
23 at 11 a.m.

(source: cleveland.com)