[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, ARK., NEB., CALIF.

[Rick Halperin]

Oct. 31



TEXAS:

Activists march against the death penalty


Although she grew up in a pro-death penalty Republican family, Terrie Been 
chose to speak out in front of a crowd on Saturday for her brother Jeff Wood, a 
Texas death-row prisoner whose execution was halted in August.

While Wood didn't shoot the victim, he was sentenced to the death penalty under 
Texas' Law of Parties for his involvement in a 1996 murder case. The ruling has 
since been appealed by Wood's lawyers and will be sent to the original trial 
court for re-evaluation.

"I want the world to know that my brother, Jeff Wood, is not a monster," Been 
said. "I want the world to know that he is not the worst of the worst. Jeff is 
a human being, he does not deserve to be referred to as number 999256."

A crowd of more than 30 people consisting of activists, student organizations, 
UT students and families of death row inmates gathered at the south side of the 
Texas State Capitol for the 17th annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty. 
However, Been wished her voice could be heard by a larger audience.

"It's breaking my heart." Been said. "Every year there are less and less 
people."

Linguistics senior Elizabeth Dean, a member of the International Socialist 
Organization, said the death penalty is a cruel and undeserved punishment for 
people who don't get proper representation.

"The rich committing crimes can buy their way out of it, and the poor, 
innocent, are subject to far worse penalties." Dean said. "Especially, black 
and brown people are targeted by the police."

After an open-mic speech at the Capitol, the crowd walked up to the governor's 
mansion while shouting chants like, "Texas death row, we say hell no," and "Law 
of Parties, shut 'em down."

As the 2nd-most populous state, Texas has accounted for more than 1/3 of the 
nation's total executions since 1976, but the number is declining, according to 
the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

"There are increasingly signs that conservatives, as well as liberals, are 
concerned about problems with the administration of the death penalty," said 
Raoul Schonemann, clinical professor and co-director of the Capital Punishment 
Clinic. "The repeal by the Nebraska legislature in 2015 may signal abolition by 
other 'red states' in the future. So while I don't think Texas will abolish the 
death penalty soon, I also don't think it's inconceivable that it will happen 
eventually."

(source: The (Univ. Texas) Daily Texan)






ARKANSAS:

Jury picking starts in trial of Bella Vistan accused of killing son


Jury selection will begin Tuesday for a Bella Vista man accused of killing his 
son last year.

Mauricio Alejandro Torres, 46, and his wife, Cathy Lynn Torres, 45, are charged 
with capital murder and 1st-degree battery. They will be tried separately. 
Prosecutors opted to try Mauricio Torres 1st. Cathy Torres' trial is scheduled 
to begin May 5.

Prosecutors will seek the death penalty against both. Mauricio and Cathy Torres 
are being held in the Benton County Jail without bail.

The couple are accused of killing Maurice Isaiah Torres, 6.

Nathan Smith, Benton County prosecuting attorney, declined to comment on the 
case. Deputy prosecutors Stuart Cearley and Carly Marshall will assist Smith.

Jeff Rosenzweig, Bill James and George Morledge will represent Mauricio Torres. 
Rosenzweig declined to comment on the trial. He said the defense will reserve 
its comments for the courtroom.

A witness list filed by prosecutors includes more than 90 witnesses who may be 
called. A witness list from the defense team was not included in Torres' case 
file. The trial is expected to last 3 to 4 weeks.

75 prospective jurors are scheduled to report at 9 a.m. Tuesday for jury 
selection.

The 1st stage of jury selection will take place in Circuit Judge Robin Green's 
courtroom. Circuit Judge Brad Karren will preside over the case and the trial 
will be in his courtroom.

The boy was pronounced dead at an area hospital on March 29, 2015. A medical 
examiner determined he suffered chronic child abuse and his death was from 
internal injuries caused by rape, according to court documents.

The autopsy also found there were multiple healing and healed wounds and blunt 
force trauma to the child's head and other parts of his body, according to the 
probable cause affidavit.

The Torreses could be sentenced to life imprisonment without parole or the 
death penalty if convicted of capital murder. They face from 5 to 20 years if 
convicted of 1st-degree battery.

The Torreses also were arrested in connection with rape, a Class Y felony, but 
Benton County prosecutors did not file rape charges. Smith previously said the 
suspected rape occurred in Missouri, not in Benton County.

Zachary Holly's murder case was the last death penalty case tried in Benton 
County.

Holly, 30, of Bentonville was sentenced in May 2015 to die by lethal injection 
for killing 6-year-old Jersey Bridgeman in 2012. A jury found Holly guilty of 
capital murder, rape, kidnapping and residential burglary. Holly is being held 
on death row at Varner Supermax Unit.

(source: arkansasonline.com)






NEBRASKA:

Juror calls Anthony Garcia trial 'its own little world,' death of 11-year-old 
cemented in mind----'It was so much blood. It soaked through the floor 
underneath her. I can't imagine Dr. Hunter walking into that house and seeing 
her and his son. I just can't imagine'


Jurors found Anthony Garcia guilty on 4 counts of 1st-degree murder Wednesday.

Prosecutors charged Garcia with the 2008 murders of 11-year-old Thomas Hunter 
and the family's housekeeper Shirlee Sherman, and the 2013 murders of Dr. Roger 
Brumback and his wife Mary.

They were revenge killings, prosecutors claimed, after Dr. William Hunter -- 
Thomas' father -- and Brumback fired Garcia from the Creighton pathology 
department in 2001.

One of the 12 jury members was Drew Lyons of Omaha. Lyons says it was a trial 
by fire in "its own little world." It would also be Lyons' 1st time serving on 
a jury.

'DO YOU RECOGNIZE ME?'

During the voir dire phase of jury selection, Lyons says prosecutors and 
defense attorneys were passionate about finding people who didn't know much 
about the well-known case.

According to Lyons, during the questioning of potential jurors, the defense 
attorneys were surprised that anyone couldn't be familiar with the case. Lyons 
says he has his reasons for not knowing much detail.

"A case hits the news, you see it, and you hear it," said Lyons. "You say it's 
terrible, but unless you're either a hound for those things, or have a personal 
connection, it doesn't register in long-term memory and I speak for myself."

Lyons says one of the questions asked by the defense attorneys during voir dire 
was from Bob Motta Jr. Lyons says he asked, "Do you recognize me?" Lyons 
replied "No? Should I?"

Lyons says Motta Jr. had been reported on by several news outlets prior to the 
start of the trial, but he claims "it wasn't important in my world."

'GOING HOME EXHAUSTED.'

Lyons says each day of the trial came with exhaustion.

"At the end of the day, you're glad that day is over," said Lyons. "It was far 
from a slam dunk."

Lyons says when it came for deliberations, it took hours upon hours as they 
comb through hundreds of pieces of evidence and hundreds of documents including 
"all types of reports on the phone extraction and DNA evidence."

"We spent a lot of time deciding which witnesses were credible, and which were 
not," said Lyons. "We spent a lot of time working on timelines because it was 
mostly circumstantial evidence and very little hard evidence."

Lyons says one thing they had to do was to make sure it was "absolutely certain 
that Garcia could have been in Omaha" at the time of the slayings. He adds it 
was easier on the Brumback's case because Garcia used credit cards. The 
Sherman-Hunter case didn't include any paper trail.

Still, Lyons adds, "Based on eyewitness testimony and eyewitness circumstance, 
we were confident."

'SO MUCH BLOOD. IT SOAKED THROUGH THE FLOOR.'

Lyons says one of the moments he'll never forget, during the course of serving 
as a juror, is seeing the photo of 11-year-old Thomas Hunter.

Hunter was photographed deceased with a knife in his neck.

"They were all horrific and horrible crimes," said Lyons. "(We were told to) 
think about what went through Tommy's mind in the last minute or two of his 
life."

Lyons has a 9-year-old grandson and when he saw the photo displayed by 
prosecutors in court, he instantly began thinking about his grandson.

"It didn't influence my decision, but it sort of cemented that in my mind," 
said Lyons.

Lyons talked about the photograph of Shirlee Sherman, who was also photographed 
deceased with a knife in her neck.

"It was so much blood," said Lyons. "It soaked through the floor underneath 
her. I can't imagine Dr. Hunter walking into that house and seeing her and his 
son. I just can't imagine."

'I FOUND IT ALL VERY ATTRACTIVE.'

Lyons says some of the most fascinating testimony came from Omaha police 
Detective Nick Herfordt as he describe his process in cellphone extraction.

"I found it all very attractive," said Lyons. "They tried to discredit some of 
his process, but he did just fine."

Lyons says the exotic dancer, Cecilia Hoffman, gave key testimony on the 
circumstantial side saying she "was quite credible and his confession to her, 
we felt was real and valid.'

"We found her to be very credible," said Lyons. "She was shook up. Her life was 
pretty much ruined by this, but she stuck to her guns even when Mr. Motta was 
inappropriate and made her cry."

Lyons also credited testimony from neighbors in the Sherman-Hunter case saying 
they "all had such similar stories and such similar timeliness."

'HE DID HIS JOB'

Lyons says Garcia's defense attorneys ultimately did their jobs. He references 
Motta during his reflection.

"His job as a defense attorney is to try and create reasonable doubt and that's 
what he was doing," said Lyons. "He did his job."

Lyons continues saying, at times, Motta Jr. was a bit much.

"I will say that I was rather surprised at the level of disrespect for the 
court," said Lyons. "(He has to) distract you from the facts."

Lyons also remembers other distractions in the courtroom including Garcia 
sleeping and distracting himself from the trial. Lyons says he had to see it 
and then unsee it.

"We could not consider that in any way, nor could we consider Mr. Garcia's 
reactions," said Lyons. "You can't take any of that into account when deciding 
the case."

'HIS SHIP WAS SUNK.'

Lyons says he looked at Garcia during the trial. Some jurors chose not to. 
Lyons says he didn't allow himself to use Garcia's actions in the court when 
deciding the verdict.

"I did look at him, and he slept a lot," said Lyons. "I found that to be 
unusual."

Lyons says Garcia knew his ship was sunk.

"He's de-compensating over time," said Lyons. "I'm not sure he was done and I 
would classify him as a sociopath."

Lyons says he thinks Garcia would've killed again if he was let go.

"Obviously, this man can hold a grudge for a long time. We're talking years. I 
think he's a person that would go after anyone who had felt had wronged him," 
said Lyons. "Each time he wouldn't get a job or a license, it would reopen old 
wounds."

'WE WERE VERY METHODICAL.'

It was time for the jury to deliberate and reach a verdict.

"During the trial, it was important to keep an open mind the entire time until 
we received the case," said Lyons. "As we went through the deliberation 
process, it became clear, with no doubt in my mind, that he was guilty."

Lyons says the jurors went through each piece of evidence and each piece of 
paper before voting on each charge.

"As you go along and say 'yes, yes, yes, yes' and you finally get to the point 
where we pass around a secret ballot to vote on the actual guilt, it became 
clear that there was no doubt," said Lyons.

Lyons says the jurors acted very orderly.

"We were very methodical. The very first thing we did was laid out each witness 
one-by-one, and we decided which ones were credible and which ones were not. We 
developed these very detailed timelines and we considered each piece of 
evidence," said Lyons. "We look at the gun. We looked at the forensic 
extraction. We looked at it all."

'HE ENDED 4 LIVES ABRUPTLY.'

Lyons says he thinks the death penalty is appropriate in this case. He said it 
was a "no brainer" deciding if this case was appropriate for capital 
punishment.

"I personally am voting to repeal Nebraska's current law to reinstate the death 
penalty," said Lyons. "I think it's an appropriate form of punishment and I 
think he deserves it. He ended 4 lives abruptly."

Lyons added, "The particularly heinous aspect of it was, again, not really hard 
to determine, gruesome and it wasn't just murder."

Lyons says having this case be his 1st time serving on a jury was quite a load 
to bear, but he's confident in the decision made by the jurors and himself: "I 
am 100 % certain in my own mind, conscience, and soul. He's guilty and we did 
the right thing."

(source: KETV news)

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

Death penalty in Nebraska: 3 death row inmates claim innocence, muddying the 
waters ---- Voters will consider a historic ballot measure on Nov. 8 to restore 
Nebraska's death penalty after the Legislature repealed it in 2015. The 
World-Herald is exploring several aspects of capital punishment; this is the 
final installment. Today: Innocence claims by death row inmates

* * * * *

The 2 sides in Nebraska's highly charged death penalty debate say they agree on 
at least 1 point: No one wants to see an innocent person executed.

In a recent opinion column, Gov. Pete Ricketts called the question of possible 
death row innocence an "important conversation to have." But then he sought to 
address what he described as "misinformation" spread by out-of-state advocates 
regarding a possible wrongful execution.

"Nobody is claiming that any of Nebraska's 10 death row inmates are innocent," 
the governor said.

He's not the only one to make such a pronouncement. While debating the 
Legislature's 2015 death penalty repeal, Sen. Beau McCoy of Omaha said much the 
same.

But, in fact, 1 death row inmate, Arthur Lee Gales, has a formal innocence 
claim pending before Nebraska courts. A 2nd inmate, Marco Torres Jr., says his 
current appeal supports his innocence claims. And a 3rd, John Lotter, continues 
to maintain his innocence, even though his claims have been repeatedly rejected 
by the courts.

County attorneys and lawyers with the Attorney General's Office dispute the 
claims and are defending the convictions.

In the context of the Nov. 8 referendum that will decide the fate of Nebraska's 
death penalty, the issue of guilt and innocence represents a major fault line.

Death penalty supporters say redundant safeguards in the system protect the 
innocent, but opponents say repealing capital punishment removes the 
irreversible consequences of a capital mistake.

As one death penalty critic put it, "You can???t undo dead."

Public awareness of the fallibility of the criminal justice system may be at an 
all-time high with the popular "Making a Murderer" television series. And proof 
that wrongful convictions can happen in Nebraska was recently underscored by a 
$28 million federal court judgment for 6 people imprisoned for a 1985 Beatrice 
slaying they did not commit.

Nationally, 156 of nearly 7,900 death row inmates have been exonerated since 
1973, according to a database maintained by the Death Penalty Information 
Center. A total of 1,439 executions have been carried out since 1977.

A 2014 analysis published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of 
Sciences estimated the rate of false conviction could be 4.1 percent, which is 
higher than the exoneration rate. That would equate to 119 of the 2,900 inmates 
currently on death rows across the country who could potentially be innocent.

Kent Scheidegger, legal director of the pro-death penalty Criminal Justice 
Legal Foundation in Sacramento, California, argued there's a difference between 
an inmate who is "factually innocent" and one who wins a reversal because of a 
procedural error. He said true innocence on death row is rare.

"A claim of innocence has to be looked at," he said. "If there are any with 
substance to them, they have to be looked at in detail. But those with 
substance are not very common."

Robert Dunham, director of the Death Penalty Information Center, defended the 
list maintained by his organization. To be included, a former inmate must have 
been acquitted on retrial, fully pardoned or had his conviction vacated by a 
judge or dismissed by a prosecutor.

"Everybody who was on that list was wrongly convicted, wrongly sentenced to 
death and was legally exonerated," he said.

When asked last week about the innocence claims on Nebraska's death row, the 
governor said he is confident the courts provide thorough reviews and adequate 
opportunity for criminal defendants to make their cases.

"The Nebraska Supreme Court has repeatedly found Nebraska's death row inmates 
to be guilty," he said.

Among those who watched the public television broadcasts of the Legislature's 
death penalty debate were the men on death row, which is at the Tecumseh State 
Prison. When Marco Torres heard lawmakers discount the possibility of innocence 
on death row, he said in an interview with The World-Herald, he felt compelled 
to make it clear that's not the case.

"I'm hoping that if I can show there is an innocent man on death row, hopefully 
that would ... show the system is flawed," said Torres, who was the last person 
sentenced to death in Nebraska.

A Hall County jury convicted Torres of the March 2007 shootings of Ed Hall and 
Tim Donohue of Grand Island.

In addition to being shot in the head 3 times at close range, Hall, 60, had 
been bound with an extension cord and gagged with a cloth bathrobe belt. 
Donohue, 48, who had been staying at Hall's residence, was shot 3 times in the 
head and chest.

Among the evidence presented against Torres was bank surveillance video that 
showed him using Hall's ATM card and the discovery of Hall's burned-out Ford 
station wagon in Texas, where Torres had driven it.

Also, Torres could not be excluded as a contributor of the DNA recovered from 
the extension cord, the robe sash and cigarette butts found in Donohue's 
upstairs room.

Prosecutors told jurors that Torres needed money and transportation to get to 
Texas, where he wanted to carry out a drug deal.

Torres says he was framed.

In court documents, he said his trial lawyers failed miserably to bring out 
evidence that he believes would have raised reasonable doubt in the minds of 
jurors.

Hall's house was used by Donohue and others to manufacture methamphetamine, 
Torres said. Another man involved in the drug operation was the killer, Torres 
said.

Torres explained the ATM card by saying Hall had given it to him. And he said 
he was staying in a Grand Island motel when someone brought him Hall's car to 
make the trip to Texas. He panicked upon learning that authorities were looking 
for it in a murder investigation and set it on fire.

Records indicate that Torres had been to Hall's house a few days before the 
slayings, which Torres said could explain how his DNA turned up on the robe 
belt and extension cord. He alleged 2 possible ways his DNA could have been 
transferred to the items: the investigators did not change out exam gloves when 
processing the crime scene, nor did they ensure that the belt and cord did not 
contact other surfaces in the room where Hall was found.

Finally, Torres said authorities released the home back to Hall's extended 
relatives after only 2 weeks, which he said prevented his lawyers from 
conducting an independent investigation of the crime scene. The house was later 
burned down for a firefighter training exercise.

Gail VerMaas, one of the deputy Hall County attorneys who prosecuted the case, 
said Torres has raised his claims both at trial and in appeals.

"I don't believe his arguments are viable," she said. "I think we disproved 
each one of his points of contention. (His guilt) was proved in the trial, and 
12 people found him guilty."

Arthur Lee Gales is on death row for the 2000 murders of a 13-year-old Omaha 
girl and her 7-year-old brother. Among the evidence used to convict Gales was 
his DNA recovered in the apartment where the children were found, including on 
the girl, who had also been raped.

The Nebraska Supreme Court affirmed his conviction on direct appeal.

In seeking to have his conviction overturned, much of Gales' claim involves 
allegations that his trial lawyers were so ineffective that his constitutional 
rights were violated. Gales argues in court documents that they didn???t do 
enough to challenge the DNA evidence that incriminated him.

Gales said the DNA got in the apartment because he had engaged in consensual 
sex with the mother of the children and left behind a used condom. He alleges 
that his DNA was planted on the girl.

Gales also pointed to the fact that former Douglas County crime lab director 
David Kofoed had a role in processing the crime scene in his case. Kofoed was 
later criminally convicted of evidence tampering in a different case.

Gales raises many additional claims to support his innocence, including an 
alibi defense, challenges of incriminating statements from the mother of the 
children that Gales said should not have been heard by the jury, and theories 
about others who could have targeted the children.

John Lotter, the 2nd-longest-serving inmate on Nebraska's death row, has always 
maintained he was innocent of the 1993 slayings of 3 people at a Humboldt 
farmhouse. The killings inspired the 1999 film "Boys Don't Cry."

His co-defendant testified that Lotter pulled the trigger on all 3 victims. But 
in 2007, the co-defendant recanted.

Nonetheless, state and federal judges who have reviewed the case concluded that 
any doubts about the co-defendant's testimony did not overcome other evidence 
that pointed to Lotter's guilt. That evidence included testimony that he stole 
the handgun and knife used in the slayings and told his girlfriend to lie to 
authorities about when he got back home the night of the murders.

James Smith, one of the top lawyers with the Nebraska Attorney General's 
Office, said the state's judicial system provides 5 avenues of appeal and 
post-conviction review for death penalty cases. And nearly all death row 
inmates also seek a federal court review of their cases.

In his opinion, none of the 10 on death row have a legitimate claim of 
innocence.

"The idea of an innocent person in Nebraska actually being executed, I don't 
see how that would be possible," Smith said.

Many people find it hard to accept that sometimes the criminal justice system 
gets it wrong, said Nina Morrison, senior staff attorney with the Innocence 
Project in New York, a legal clinic that helps inmates obtain post-conviction 
DNA testing. She was part of the team that just last week helped overturn the 
sentence of a Florida man convicted of killing 2 women.

An Innocence Project analysis of 250 exoneration cases found that 10 % of the 
time, judges reviewing the cases on appeal had previously declared the evidence 
of guilt "overwhelming," Morrison said.

"The system is only as perfect as the human beings who run it, and nobody is 
perfect," she said.

(source: omaha.com)

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

The men on Nebraska's death row


10 inmates are currently on death row in Nebraska, even though the Legislature 
eliminated the death penalty last session.

The last execution in Nebraska was on Dec. 2, 1997, when the state executed 
Robert E. Williams, who committed a rape and double murder in Lincoln in 1978. 
The state also executed Harold "Wili" Otey and John Joubert in the mid-1990s, 
but has not executed anyone since.

Nebraskans will vote on Election Day whether to uphold the Legislature's 2015 
decision to replace the death penalty with life without parole or whether to 
reinstate capital punishment.

Under Nebraska law, the only crime that carries the death penalty is 1st-degree 
murder, and the death penalty can only be used when the crime was committed 
with "aggravating circumstances."

The state has 9 different criteria that qualify as "aggravating circumstances."

Those circumstances usually apply when multiple murders are committed at once, 
or if a murder was exceptionally brutal. All 10 of the current prisoners either 
have multiple 1st-degree murder convictions, or killed a child.

Moore

The longest serving prisoner on death row is Carey Dean Moore, who murdered 2 
cab drivers in Omaha in 1979. Moore has appealed his sentence multiple times 
since being sentenced in 1980, but has claimed responsibility for the killings.

Lotter

The next longest serving inmate is John L. Lotter, who committed a triple 
murder near Falls City in 1993. Among the victims was a transgender man born 
Teena Brandon, who went by the name Brandon Teena at the time of his death. The 
murders were the subject of the 1999 film "Boys Don't Cry."

Lotter has appealed all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, but the court 
denied hearing his case in 2012.

Mata

Raymond Mata was sentenced to death in 2000 for the 1999 murder and 
dismemberment of a 3-year-old child in Scottsbluff.

Mata's death sentence was originally vacated in 2003 due to a Supreme Court 
ruling in Ring v. Arizona that said only juries, not judges, could sentence 
someone to death. Mata was re-sentenced to death in 2005.

Gales

Arthur Gales severely beat and raped a woman, raped and murdered the woman's 
13-year-old daughter and murdered the woman's 7-year-old child in Omaha in 
2000. Gales also had to be re-sentenced in 2003 after the Ring v. Arizona 
ruling.

Galindo, Vela and Sandoval

3 men were convicted and sentenced to death for 5 murders that took place in 
Norfolk, during a botched bank robbery on Sept. 26, 2002.

Jorge Galindo, Eric Vela and Jose Sandoval walked into a U.S. Bank and killed 5 
people within 1 minute, according to police. They carjacked a nearby car and 
police tracked them using the car's navigation system. The 3 men were found 3 
later in O'Neill. A 4th accomplice served as a getaway driver and is serving 5 
life sentences.

Hessler

Jeffrey Hessler was convicted of raping and murdering a 15-year-old girl in 
Scottsbluff in 2003. Hessler filed a motion in 2012 saying he was mentally ill 
and was not fit to stand trial when he was convicted and that he was given 
ineffective counsel. The motion was denied, and Hessler remains on death row.

Ellis

Roy L. Ellis was convicted and sentenced to death for the abduction and murder 
of 12-year-old Amber Harris of Omaha, a missing person case that generated 
national attention. Harris disappeared in 2005 without a trace, but her 
belongings and remains were found 6 months later. When Ellis was sentenced in 
2008, after the electric chair was declared unconstitutional but before lethal 
injection was made the legal method of execution.

Torres

The most recent death sentence in Nebraska was given to Texas native Marco 
Torres, Jr. for a double murder in Grand Island in 2007. He was sentenced in 
2010.

Rescinded

The number of inmates on death row has fluctuated since the state's last 
execution in 1997. Several inmates have died in prison after being sentenced to 
death, such as David Dunster in 2011 and Michael Ryan in 2015. Several people 
sentenced to death in Nebraska have since been given lesser sentences or been 
freed altogether, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

Jeremy Sheets was sentenced to death in 1997, but was freed in 2001 after the 
Nebraska Supreme Court overturned his conviction due to lack of evidence.

2 prisoners, Jerry Simpson and Clarence Victor, were taken off death row in 
1999 due to intellectual disabilities. Later, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 
2002 that it is unconstitutional to execute people with mental disabilities.

Randy Reeves was taken off death row in 2000 due to "improper procedure of the 
court" at his trial. He is now serving 2 life sentences for a double murder in 
Lincoln in 1980.

Peter Hochstein and Michael Anderson were taken off death row in 2001 and now 
serve life sentences for a contract killing of an Omaha man in 1975.

(source: North Platte Bulletin)






CALIFORNIA:

Forgive evil: No on the death penalty


As a budding newspaper reporter back in 1981, I was sent to Michigan City, 
Ind., to cover an execution. The state was about to kill Steven Judy, who had 
driven alongside a mother traveling on the highway, and falsely indicated that 
something was wrong with her car. She had 3 small children in the back. She 
pulled over. Pretending to try to fix her car, he disabled it. When it wouldn't 
start, she agreed to a ride to her destination, but she didn't get there. He 
pulled over into a remote area, drowned her children in a creek, then raped and 
killed her.

Indiana used the electric chair back then, before switching to lethal 
injection. When I and my fellow reporters arrived, we saw a thick electric 
cable strewn across the parking lot. When we asked why, the warden said that 
when the switch was thrown, the lights in the prison might blink because of the 
electrical surge, and prisoners would know that the execution had just 
happened. So they laid an extra cable to bypass the system and keep things calm 
inside.

Waiting for midnight, the macabre hour of death, protesters against the death 
penalty rallied for the TV cameras in the parking lot against the groups 
rallying for it. Those of us in the press interviewed people on both sides, 
trying to figure out what angle, what story, to tell. I had already written 
about what I thought to be a bizarre story: that the electric chair itself was 
constructed from wooden boards taken from the old hangman's gallows.

Seats for witnesses to watch Steven Judy die were few. Our society had moved 
beyond the era of mass public executions at the hangman's gallows. The 
families' next of kin got seats first, but there were a certain number of seats 
reserved for the press. Because of the large number of reporters, prison 
officials held a lottery to determine who would be allowed to take one of the 
precious few witness seats. We took our numbers, continued reporting and 
waited.

I won.

I couldn't believe it. I didn't want to believe it. Stunned, I looked at the 
correctional officer handing me the pass to the death chamber and stuttered. I 
asked, "Could I give this pass to someone else from my newspaper?" He shook his 
head. If I didn't take it, he said, my number would go back into the kitty and 
be drawn again in the larger pool. I didn't know what to do - I felt torn; 
should I do my reportorial duty and go and watch?

During my interviews in the parking lot I had talked to a woman on the 
pro-death penalty side. She had been the victim of a mass shooting. Her sons 
had been involved in drugs, and one day some of their enemies had come to their 
home, made everyone lay face down and then shot each in the back of the head. 
The woman I interviewed had been wearing a wig, and when the bullet skimmed her 
head, it knocked off the wig. The killer thought it was her skull, and left her 
for dead. Amid her dead sons, she played dead. She lived to testify against the 
gunmen. She wanted the death penalty for Steven Judy, too.

In Michigan City, I looked at the officer handing me the pass to watch Judy's 
electrocution. I couldn't accept it. I did not want to watch an execution. My 
pass went back into the pool and was taken by another reporter, from another 
newspaper.

My fellow reporters were furious. Later my editor told me I would be better off 
to quit journalism, that I wasn't cut out for it. She might have been right, 
but I don't think so. I didn't want an execution haunting me for the rest of my 
life. I wanted to tell the truth, to report what I saw, but I didn't have to be 
part of the actual act.

Firing squads do a queer but smart thing: They give one or a couple of guys 
blanks to shoot so no one ever knows if they were the ones who shot the fatal 
bullets.

We're all on that firing squad, right now, in California.

Next week our state will either pass or turn down Proposition 62, which 
abolishes the death penalty.

We have to be better than our previous generations.

I want to be the guy with the blanks, which is why I'm voting yes, to stop the 
death penalty.

(source: Opinion; Chris Lavin is a freelance writer in the East Bay----San 
Francisco Chronicle)