[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----MO., CALIF., USA

[Rick Halperin]

March 16



MISSOURI:

Missouri Supreme Court upholds death penalty for 3 murders


The Missouri Supreme Court has upheld the death sentence of a Kansas man 
convicted of killing 3 relatives in Missouri. The court on Tuesday rejected 
appeals for Robert Blurton, who sought to have his convictions and sentence 
overturned. Blurton, of Garnett, Kansas, was sentenced to death in June 2013 
for the deaths of his aunt and uncle, Donnie and Sharon Luetjen and the 
couple's 15-year-old granddaughter, Taron Luetjen. Prosecutors said Blurton 
killed his victims in June 2009 at the couple's Cole Camp home during a 
robbery.

Blurton's attorneys argued the trial judge made errors in allowing certain 
testimony and evidence, not instructing the jury on a possible 2nd-degree 
murder conviction and not declaring a mistrial because some crime scene 
photographs were inadvertently displayed before the verdict.

(source: Associated Press)

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

Man convicted of 1977 murder of Brentwood teen dies in Missouri prison


A man once sentenced to death for the 1977 murder of a Brentwood teenager has 
died in prison.

Gregory Bowman was convicted of kidnapping, raping, and killing 16-year-old 
Velda Joy Rumfelt. His death sentence was set aside in 2011 after the state 
Supreme Court ruled jurors improperly heard information about 2 Illinois 
murders Bowman had been sentenced to life for. He was set free in those cases 
after a court threw out his confession.

Prosecutors as recently as last year were pursuing a new penalty phase against 
Bowman, intending to again seek the death penalty. DNA evidence linked him to 
Rumfelt's murder.

Bowman, 64, was reported last year to be terminally ill. The Department of 
Corrections says his death appears to be due to natural causes.

(source: missourinet.com)






CALIFORNIA:

32-year-old man faces death for killing 4 at Valley Village gathering


A man who fired 50 rounds at a memorial gathering at a Valley Village 
restaurant, killing 4 people and wounding 2 others, was convicted Tuesday of 
1st-degree murder and other counts and faces a possible death sentence.

Jurors deliberated for about 3 1/2 days before convicting Nerses Galstyan, 32, 
of 2 counts of 1st-degree murder for the shooting deaths of Vardan Tofalyan, 
31, and Harut Baburyan, 28, along with 1 count of 2nd- degree murder for the 
killing of Hayk Yegnanyan, 25, and 1 count of voluntary manslaughter in the 
death of Sarkis Karadjian, 26.

The 9-man, 3-woman jury found true the special circumstance allegation of 
multiple murders, along with gun allegations, and also found Galstyan guilty of 
2 counts of attempted voluntary manslaughter and 1 count of mayhem.

The jurors will return to court March 28 for the start of the trial's penalty 
phase, in which they will be asked to recommend whether Galstyan should be 
sentenced to death or life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Deputy District Attorney Thomas Trainor said Galstyan carried out the April 3, 
2010, ambush "on an unsuspecting group of friends mourning the loss of a loved 
one."

It was undisputed during the trial that Galstyan shot and killed Yegnanyan, 
Karadjian, Baburyan and Tofalyan, who was described as the defendant's best 
friend, at the Hot Spot restaurant.

Defense attorney Alex Kessel argued, however, that the shooting was carried out 
in self-defense. He told jurors that Yegnanyan pulled a knife on Galstyan's 
brother, Sam, outside the restaurant prior to the shooting.

Kessel said his client tried to defuse the situation by picking up Yegnanyan, 
hoisting him over his shoulder and turning in circles before putting him down. 
Yegnanyan then called Karadjian and Baburyan, who came armed to the memorial 
gathering, according to Kessel.

"My client, Nerses Galstyan, was the one targeted that day," Kessel said, 
telling the jury that Galstyan only fired when Karadjian pulled a gun on him.

Galstyan and his brother testified that Yegnanyan had been pressing Sam 
Galstyan to run drugs through his motorcycle club, leading to escalating 
tension between the 3 men.

But Trainor insisted that Galstyan "walked in ready to fire, bullet already in 
the chamber, no safety on." The prosecutor said Galstyan "began firing as he 
walked in ... round after round after round after round ... pausing to reload 
... stopping only when he ran out of bullets."

Karadjian was "never able to chamber a round," according to the prosecutor.

After the shooting, the Galstyan brothers fled to a Seattle, Washington suburb, 
where they were later arrested, because they were "2 scared guys looking for 
"safety, not for sanctuary," Kessel said.

Sam Galstyan was not charged in connection with the shooting.

(source: mynewsla.com)

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

D.A. to seek death penalty against man in serial killer case


Prosecutors will seek the death penalty against both registered sex offenders 
accused of raping and killing four women in a case that drew scrutiny over the 
GPS monitoring of sex offenders.

The Orange County District Attorney's Office on Tuesday said it will seek the 
death penalty against Franc Cano, 29, of Anaheim, who is facing 
special-circumstances murder and forcible-rape charges in connection to the 
slayings of 4 Santa Ana and Anaheim women believed to have ties to 
prostitution.

In December, prosecutors announced they would seek the death penalty for Cano's 
co-defendant, Steven Dean Gordon, 47, who is facing the same charges.

The pair were indicted by a grand jury in 2014 for the killings of Kianna 
Jackson, 20; Josephine Vargas, 34; Martha Anaya, 28; and Jarrae Estepp, 21, 
whose body was found on a conveyer belt at an Anaheim recycling facility. The 
other 3 women's bodies were never recovered.

Both men were under the supervision of federal probation and state parole 
officials when the women were killed. Investigators believe the pair twice cut 
off their monitoring bracelets to travel out of state.

Authorities said the 2 men picked up the women at well-known prostitution hubs 
in Orange County and left their bodies in trash dumpsters. Police say they 
suspect the pair might have killed a 5th women, who hasn't been identified or 
found.

Using the men's GPS units, detectives could track the suspects to where the 
killings were believed to have occurred and linked them to each woman's 
cellphone, according to grand jury transcripts.

District Attorney Tony Rauckauckas decided to seek the death penalty after 
conferring with a committee of top prosecutors with experience in capital 
murder cases.

(source: Orange County Register)






USA:

It's Time to Make the Presidential Candidates Answer for Their Support of the 
Death Penalty


A man who had been wrongfully convicted and sentenced to die challenged Clinton 
on the death penalty. We need more of these moments.

In 1975, Ricky Jackson, then just 18 years old, was wrongfully convicted of 
murder and sentenced to die in Ohio's electric chair. He languished in prison 
for more than 39 years until, in 2014, he was exonerated and set free, earning 
the dubious honor of serving more time in prison than any other exoneree in US 
history.

At a town hall event in Columbus on Sunday night, Jackson had the chance to 
share his story with Hillary Clinton - and ask for an answer. "I came 
perilously close to my own execution," he told Clinton, pausing to choke back 
tears. "In light of what I just shared with you, and in light of the fact that 
there are documented cases of innocent people who have been executed in our 
country, I would like to know how you can still take your stance on the death 
penalty in light of what you know right now?"

There has been almost no meaningful political conversation this election about 
the United States' unique predilection for state-sponsored killings.

For an election season that has been punctuated by the newest bipartisan buzz 
phrase - "criminal justice reform" - yet has featured almost no discussion of 
the death penalty, this moment was both electric and long overdue. "The 
audience was quiet and could hear pin drop, they were mesmerized," Mark Godsey, 
director of the Ohio Innocence Project, told Cleveland's Plain Dealer. When 
Clinton responded to Jackson by repeating her support for the death penalty, 
albeit a "very limited use of it," the exchange crystallized into something 
more than interesting or noteworthy. It became iconic: one of those rare 
election moments that endures long after the last votes have been counted. 
Tweets poured in, followed by articles, and for an all-too-brief moment, the 
fact that the United States continues to engage in state-sponsored killings - 
and that hundreds of innocent Americans have been sentenced to die - was the 
subject of serious campaign conversation.

Only 9 nations continue to execute their citizens on a regular basis. We in the 
United States find ourselves in a sorry club - aligned with the likes of North 
Korea, Iran, China, and Sudan. Bernie Sanders - the only current candidate on 
either side who is opposed to capital punishment - likes to regularly call 
attention to our embarrassing singularities, such as our unique refusal to 
provide paid childcare leave or our idiosyncratic healthcare costs. But almost 
no meaningful political conversation in the election thus far has been 
dedicated to the United States' other unique predilection: state-sponsored 
killings.

In 2014, the United States executed 35 people. Perhaps this relatively small 
number is the reason that capital punishment has been a mere footnote in this 
election season. Does it begin to feel more significant when you realize that 
this statistic sandwiches us between Iraq and Sudan for the most confirmed 
state executions in 2014? What about the fact that 34.6 % of executed Americans 
are black, despite representing only 13.2 % of the general US population? Does 
it begin to make more sense when you learn that 94.5 % of prosecutors in death 
penalty states are white? Does it worry you that, since the death penalty was 
reinstated in the United States in 1976, for every 10 people executed one has 
been found innocent and set free? If you knew that a plane you were boarding 
had a 1 in 10 chance of spontaneously combusting midflight, you probably 
wouldn't get on.

So why have American voters been content to allow another election season to 
pass by without meaningfully addressing the broken death penalty system that 
inexplicably persists in our country in the year 2016? Why do we talk about 
criminal justice reform without talking about the fact that we continue to 
sanction government killings? This is especially perplexing given the drastic 
reduction in public support for the death penalty, which stands at a 40-year 
low. In 1996, 78 % of Americans supported the death penalty. In 2015, only 56 % 
were in favor. Among Democrats, that number is even lower - 40 % in 2015.

When Ricky Jackson challenged Clinton on her support of the death penalty, it 
was one of only a handful of times she had been asked to respond to the issue 
this campaign season, and she answered much the same as on those occasions. 
"What I have said and what I continue to believe is that the states have proven 
themselves incapable of carrying out fair trials...," Clinton explained. "And I 
have said I would breathe a sigh of relief if either the Supreme Court or the 
states, themselves, began to eliminate the death penalty."

The trouble with this stance is the assumption that the problems that plague 
state death-penalty sentencing procedures would somehow be eradicated on a 
federal level. Overzealous prosecutors who commit misconduct in order to secure 
convictions are undoubtedly not just a state problem. Eyewitness 
identifications will be just as fallible in a federal court. Coerced 
confessions happen everywhere. Minorities make up a majority of death-penalty 
sentences federally as well as at the state level.

In her response to Jackson, Clinton acknowledged "struggling" with the issue 
but said she ultimately believes the death penalty should be reserved for 
extreme cases such as "horrific" mass killings. "[M]aybe it's a distinction 
that's hard to support, but at this point, given the challenges we face from 
terrorist activities primarily in our country that end up under federal 
jurisdiction for very limited purposes," she said, "I think that it can still 
be held in reserve for those."

Clinton was right: Many thoughtful people do find this distinction hard to 
support - including the parents of Martin Richard, the youngest victim of 
Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who wrote a letter to The Boston 
Globe stating that they hoped Tsarnaev would receive a life sentence, not a 
death sentence. (Despite their plea, Tsarnaev is currently awaiting execution 
on federal death row.)

Why are voters content to allow another election season to pass by without 
addressing this country's broken death penalty system?

Nonetheless, it's true that Clinton's present position does represent an 
evolution from her past, when her support for capital punishment was such that 
she lobbied for a federal bill that expanded the number of crimes eligible for 
the death penalty. She has since reversed her support for the bill - which is 
both welcome and acceptable. What is not reversible are the hundreds of 
executions which have been carried out since then.

Sanders's stance is much more straightforward than Clinton's, which is why it's 
a shame that he was not asked to give his thoughts on Jackson's question. "In a 
world of so much violence and killing, I just don't believe that government 
itself should be part of the killing," he said during an earlier debate. He has 
also cited the probability of executing an innocent person, as well as the 
racial inequities of death penalty sentencing. These have been long-held 
beliefs of his, yet it is not a subject he often expounds upon without 
prompting. (He did, notably, call for an end to the death penalty during an 
October 2015 speech on the Senate floor.)

One candidate who has made headlines expounding on the death penalty is - no 
surprise - Donald Trump. In December, he caused a stir after telling a union of 
New England police and correctional officers in December that "one of the first 
things I'd do in terms of executive order if I win will be to sign a strong, 
strong statement that will go out to the country, out to the world, that 
anybody killing a policeman, policewoman, police officer, anybody killing a 
police officer: death penalty."

The typically Trumpian legalities of this statement aside - death penalty 
administration is handled by the states, and mandating the death penalty via 
executive order would be uncharted territory - Trump's rhetoric on capital 
punishment hardly seems shocking when stacked against the rest of the 
outlandish statements that constitute his would-be policies. But it is a 
mistake to dismiss his words as mere attention-seeking bluster.

In the spring of 1989, as he was undergoing a messy, tabloid divorce, Trump 
found the time to call for the execution of 5 innocent teenagers. "Bring Back 
the Death Penalty," read the headline of the full-page ad Trump purchased in 
New York City's 4 major daily newspapers. "Yes, Mayor Koch," it continued, 
"...I recently watched a newscast trying to explain 'the anger in these young 
men.' I no longer want to understand their anger. I want them to understand our 
anger. I want them to be afraid." The teenagers whose deaths Trump was calling 
for - Anton McCray, Kevin Richardson, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana, and Kharey 
Wise, all between the ages of 14 and 16 - had just weeks prior been arrested 
and charged with the brutal attack of Trisha Meili while she was jogging in 
Central Park.

As we now know, the "confessions" given by the boys were shaky, inconsistent, 
and false: coerced by police under great duress with no physical evidence or 
independent corroboration. The Central Park 5, as they are now known, were all 
wrongfully convicted and sent to prison; their innocence was not uncovered 
until the real perpetrator crossed paths with Kharey Wise in prison and, more 
than a decade after the convictions, unburdened his conscience with a 
confession of guilt, which was confirmed by DNA testing. That however has not 
induced Trump to reconsider his position. He has refused to apologize for 
calling for the deaths of innocent juveniles, and was furious at the 
multimillion-dollar settlement that the City of New York ultimately approved 
for the Central Park 5, calling it "a disgrace."

As the election continues, we have the opportunity to push politicians toward 
the right side of history. In the midst of the 2008 election season, CNN 
compiled a list of key campaign issues, including the economy, abortion, LGBT 
issues, immigration, and guns. Criminal justice reform wasn't even on the 
table. In 2016, mass incarceration, police violence toward communities of 
color, the failed war on drugs, and even shifting attitudes toward ex-offenders 
have permeated the rhetoric of both the Republican and Democratic candidates. 
The progress we've made - spurred in large parts by social movements like Black 
Lives Matter - is incredibly encouraging. But if voters care about the systemic 
racism and ineffectual, biased policies that plague our criminal justice 
system, we need to talk about the death penalty more.

"No serious Democratic candidate should be able to support the death penalty."

In an article penned the day after he confronted Clinton on her support of the 
death penalty, Ricky Jackson wrote of his hopes that candidates might someday 
catch up to a changing society. "Not too many years ago, a Democratic candidate 
could not publicly support same-sex marriage and stand a chance of getting 
elected in a general election. Now, a Democratic candidate could not be taken 
seriously if he or she didn't support same-sex marriage," he wrote. "Likewise, 
no serious Democratic candidate should be able to support the death penalty." 
The same goes for Republicans, he wrote.

Capital punishment in the United States represents a flagrant human-rights 
violation, inflicting cruel and unusual punishment on our most disenfranchised 
citizens in an arbitrary and unjust manner. It is an ineffective deterrent to 
crime. It is racist, it is classist, and it is incredibly expensive. It is a 
human system, and therefore fallible. And the fact that it continues to exist 
in this country, in 2016, matters. Voters need to make that clear.

(source: The Nation)

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

Death penalty repeal efforts flaming out in red states


When Nebraska last year became the 1st red state in 40 years to abolish the 
death penalty, it offered a glimmer of hope for repeal supporters that the 
national momentum against capital punishment was taking hold in Republican-led 
states.

But the repeal in the Cornhusker State has yet to be duplicated elsewhere 
despite similar efforts in several conservative states this year. Of repeal 
legislation proposed in nine states, at least six already have sputtered out.

In Utah last week, lawmakers were unable to garner enough votes to enact a 
capital punishment repeal bill before the end of the regular legislative 
session.

"Given the pressure of the last night, the votes I needed to swing, I didn't 
see them swinging," Utah state Sen. Steve Urquhart, the bill's sponsor, told 
The Salt Lake Tribune.

Legislative efforts to ban the death penalty also have failed this year in 
Wyoming, Kentucky, South Dakota, New Hampshire and Delaware. Even the repeal 
success in Nebraska, the seventh state to abolish capital punishment since 
2007, could be short-lived. The state is set to vote on a referendum that could 
reinstate the death penalty in November.

But those who have lobbied against capital punishment said this year has been 
full of small but symbolic victories.

"In Kentucky, it was the 1st time an abolition bill has gotten a hearing since 
the death penalty was reinstated in 1976," said the Rev. Patrick Delahanty, 
chairman of the Kentucky Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. "It's major 
progress. There are more people interested in the state than I've ever seen 
before."

The U.S. Supreme Court effectively banned capital punishment in 1972 and 
reinstated it in 1976.

Kentucky's repeal bill was sponsored by a Republican lawmaker, as were efforts 
in Missouri and Kansas, where legislation has not been rejected this year but 
seems unlikely to pass.

Repeal efforts in states that have garnered bipartisan support seem best poised 
to gain the most ground, said Richard Dieter, senior program director at the 
Death Penalty Information Center.

"A recent convert joining the force seems to be the missing ingredient," Mr. 
Dieter said. "Otherwise, it can just be in limbo. No executions, but no getting 
rid of it either."

Marc Hyden, the national advocacy coordinator for Conservatives Concerned About 
the Death Penalty, said a record number of conservatives have been sponsoring 
legislation to abolish capital punishment in recent years.

"There is a strong conservative case against the death penalty," Mr. Hyden 
said. "In these other states, I think they are starting to be more critical of 
the death penalty because they are looking at what it is supposed to do in 
theory and what it does in practice."

Use of the death penalty has fallen precipitously in recent years.

19 states and the District of Columbia have banned executions. In 2015, 6 
states carried out a total of 28 executions, the lowest number since 1991, 
according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

Use of capital punishment has declined as views on it have changed. Politicians 
have been more willing to reconsider abolishment of the death penalty as 
controversy has arisen over potential executions of the wrongly convicted as 
well as the drugs used in lethal injections.

"There used to be the belief that if you voted against the death penalty, you 
were voting against yourself," Mr. Dieter said. "You were going to lose the 
elections."

But as executions have become more rare, voters aren't as concerned with an 
elected leader's stance on the issue, he said.

In additional to concern over how executions are carried out, conservatives 
also have responded to considerations about the cost of death sentence appeals 
and the toll on victims' family members, who remain involved throughout the 
lengthy process, Mr. Delahanty said.

Despite the enthusiasm that small victories have inspired, Mr. Dieter said, 
repeal efforts often stretch for years before attaining success.

"It is proceeding slowly, but it hasn't reached that snowball effect," he said 
of the recent repeal effort. "It's going to take a number of years in each 
state."

(source: Washington Times)