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

[Rick Halperin]

August 18




MISSOURI:

Secret sedative: How Missouri uses pentobarbital in executions



Missouri will use 2 of its 34 vials of the sedative pentobarbital on Tuesday 
when it executes Marcellus Williams, who was convicted in the 1998 killing of 
Felicia Gayle, former St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter.

The state has enough pentobarbital for 17 executions, Williams' included, 
according to a document obtained by St. Louis Public Radio. No one except the 
state of Missouri knows where the stockpile comes from, despite lawsuits from 
inmates and media outlets.

But there is 1 sure thing, according to 2 people who've witnessed executions in 
Missouri and Georgia: Pentobarbital is a potent means of death.

The FDA-approved manufacturer of the drug will not sell directly to any state 
for use in an execution and has made it clear it doesn't want 3rd-party 
distributors to do so. Any compounding pharmacy that makes small, 
quick-to-expire batches is shielded from public knowledge, too.

St. Louis Public Radio's Erica Hunzinger explains how pentobarbital works and 
why Missouri's source is still a secret 4 years after the state began using it 
in executions.

Experts argue that such secrecy makes it difficult to know whether Missouri's 
capital punishment process is constitutional.

"With a policy that is as important as the death penalty, and that has results 
that are so final and irreversible, it's important that the policy be carried 
out in the light of day," said Rob Dunham, the executive director of the 
nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center.

What is pentobarbital?

Simply, pentobarbital is "a drug that slows down the electrical activity of the 
brain and nerve cells," according to Dr. Aarti Sarwal, a neurologist and the 
medical director of the critical care unit at Wake Forest Baptist Medical 
Center in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

Pentobarbital is used in humans and animals. In a veterinary setting, it's 
mostly for euthanasia, Dr. John Dodam, a professor at the University of 
Missouri-Columbia's veterinary school, said. He noted the pentobarbital used in 
that situation is for animals only and has species-specific versions of the 
drug.

For humans, it's mostly used in operating rooms and intensive care units to 
treat uncontrolled seizures and brain swelling. When injected, the drug goes to 
the heart and is pumped throughout the body.

Sarwal noted: "It's unique in a manner that it reaches the brain tissue very 
efficiently."

She described how pentobarbital affects a body when used in operating rooms and 
ICUs to treat uncontrolled seizures and brain swelling. What follows does not 
address executions.

"It slows down the activity in the brain - it essentially puts you to sleep - 
and, as the doses go higher, into almost a state of coma to the point of 
completely shutting down. (The) rest of the body is controlled by nerve cells, 
so similar effects happen there ... the nerves that affect your heart muscles 
... get slowed down, so the heart muscles will start beating slower and slower, 
essentially to the point of lowering your blood pressure. ...

"Same happens for breathing: The brain centers that regulate your breathing, as 
well as the nerve cells that help the breathing muscles work, get slowed down. 
... It also has several other effects, like slowing down your stomach activity 
and pretty much any other activity in the body that's controlled by nerve 
cells," she said.

And it isn't a drug that just any doctor can prescribe, Sarwal cautioned.

"Pentobarbital is a drug that has to be given by qualified providers who are 
specifically trained to monitor the dosing and side effects ... So, this is not 
part of typical medical school training. (Doctors) do get trained in 
understanding the side effects but it does require special training, and the 
use of pentobarbital is restricted to specific professions," she said.

Why executions?

Ohio was the 1st state to use a single-drug pentobarbital protocol in 
executions in 2011 (it changed to a two-drug protocol a couple of years later 
when pentobarbital became tougher to purchase). Texas followed in 2012, with 
Georgia and Missouri joining in 2013 and Tennessee in 2015.

Other drugs, mostly used in 2- or 3-drug protocols, have led to botched 
executions, such as the sedative midazolam in Oklahoma and Ohio. That's not the 
case with pentobarbital, though that's not to say there haven't been problems.

In both Georgia and Texas, placing IVs in the arms of inmates who had been 
heavy drug users caused some difficulty. Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporter 
Rhonda Cook said in the case of one execution, the team "couldn't get a vein, 
and what they had to do is what they call a 'cut down' where they inserted the 
IV at the base of his neck."

And in 2015, Georgia had to cancel a scheduled execution because the 
pentobarbital was stored at too cold of a temperature.

"And what happened was the solids that are combined with the liquid to create 
pentobarbital separated. So there were clumps in the containers that had the 
pentobarbital," Cook said.

Missouri's protocol calls for inmates to be injected with 5 grams of 
pentobarbital. That makes for a quick, lethal dose. Witnesses say it looks like 
little more than someone falling asleep.

"There is seldom anything for us to really talk about except to say the person 
was executed, might have gasped a couple of times and then became silent and 
was pronounced dead a few minutes later. ... There's nothing especially 
dramatic about it. It's very clinical," according to Bob Priddy, the former 
news director of the statewide radio network Missourinet.

He's witnessed 22 executions in Missouri, including 2 pentobarbital-only ones, 
and said, "I've never seen any discomfort. In fact ... the media witnesses get 
a call from the attorney general's office usually the day or so after the 
execution asking if we had seen any signs of discomfort or any signs of pain or 
any struggles or anything like that. And the answer that I've always given is 
'No. The person just went to sleep.'"

Missourinet's Bob Priddy describes state's execution chamber, what witnesses 
can see and the chain of events when an inmate is put to death.

Missouri's protocol calls for the medical personnel on the execution team to 
check whether a prisoner is dead after "a sufficient amount of time." When 
asked for an estimate of how long that is, Department of Corrections spokesman 
David Owen said it's about 5 minutes, which Priddy corroborated.

Cook has seen 26 executions in Georgia, many of them with the pentobarbital 
protocol. She said that witnesses can see inmates' faces.

"You can watch his breathing. Every once in a while you can hear a sound like 
they might blow, exhale tremendously," she said. "But mostly you can't hear 
what's going on in the execution chamber."

She continued to describe what happens as the execution begins: "What I've seen 
on occasion is the inmate will look at one of the arms, like he felt the drugs 
moving through. ... You can tell it's happening because they will struggle to 
keep their eyes open. The last one that I saw, he insisted on smiling as much 
as he could. He would smile and then the smile would drift away and he would, 
like, shake himself awake and smile again.

"But what happens is you just see them go to sleep. And you can see their chest 
moving, and then after a while you no longer see their chest moving. ... It's 
very respectful, as much as it can be. But it's very quiet," she said.

Rhonda Cook, a reporter at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, talks about 
Georgia's execution process and what a witness sees during the capital 
punishment process.

Sourcing pentobarbital

There's a lot at stake with a pentobarbital-only protocol, according to Megan 
McCracken, an attorney with the Death Penalty Clinic at the University of 
California-Berkeley law school. She???s worked on capital punishment cases 
since 2003.

One factor, she said, is whether the execution will be free of cruel and 
unusual punishment as the U.S. Constitution requires. She argued that the 
public needs to know because it's a "simple question of good government and 
whether or not the state is disclosing relevant information about its 
executions or concealing that information."

Pentobarbital is made by 1 of 2 sources: A compounding pharmacy or an 
FDA-approved manufacturer.

Akorn is the only manufactured-pentobarbital supplier in the U.S. and has said 
it will not sell to states that use the drug in their executions, and it has 
asked 3rd-party suppliers to follow suit. A Buzzfeed report in January by 
former St. Louis Public Radio reporter Chris McDaniel showed that, at some 
point, Missouri purchased manufactured pentobarbital, but the timing and the 
amount weren't clear in the now-sealed court documents.

Compounding pharmacies, according to Dunham with the Death Penalty Information 
Center, are "state regulated and their quality - while they serve an important 
purpose - their quality varies greatly."

Georgia and Texas are both transparent about obtaining their pentobarbital from 
compounding pharmacies, although the names of those pharmacies are state 
secrets. Dunham said that's because the pharmacies don't want people to know 
they make the drugs so they don't lose business.

The pentobarbital made at compounding pharmacies is "typically produced in 
anticipation of a pending execution," because it's shelf life is "weeks or 
months. You're not talking years," Dunham said.

On the other hand, manufactured pentobarbital, known generically as nembutal, 
is a different story, McCracken said.

"... (W)hat we know is that back when nembutal was available to departments of 
correction, the expiration date was generally in the range of 2 to 2 1/2 years 
from the time of purchase," she said.

It's unclear whether Missouri's 34 vials of pentobarbital are manufactured or 
compounded. The Missouri Department of Corrections did not provide, as asked 
for in the public records request, expiration dates for the vials, saying the 
records are closed under state statutes.

(source: KBIA news)








CALIFORNIA:

Law Prof Mainero Says He'd Love to be DA but Hates the Politics



Chapman University law professor Mario Mainero wants to be Orange County's next 
district attorney, but he's reluctant to leave his beloved classroom for an 
uphill battle against 2 well-known and well-funded politicians.

"I'm not a fool. I'm not going to sit there and go, 'I think I'll run for 
this,' and watch the other 2 people have 2 or 3 million dollars each," Mainero 
said on the "Inside OC with Rick Reiff" public affairs program.

Next year's DA race is shaping up as a battle royal between 2 troubled 
political heavyweights. Incumbent Tony Rackauckas is under siege from a 
jailhouse snitch scandal that has brought judicial rebukes, case delays and 
national embarrassment to his office; challenger and OC Supervisor Todd Spitzer 
is dogged by questions about his judgment and temperament, exemplified in the 
furor over his 2015 armed confrontation with a "suspicious" man in a Wahoo's 
restaurant.

The situation has given rise to "anyone but Tony or Todd" chatter in legal and 
political circles. Some commentators have welcomed the scholarly Mainero's 
announcement that he's considering a run.

But Mainero, a Republican as are Rackauckas and Spitzer, held out little hope 
of getting the party's endorsement:

"Parties just tend to stick with what they got and not take a stand when 
there's a problem," Mainero said. "The Republican Party stood by (former OC 
Sheriff) Mike Carona until he went to prison, for all intents and purposes. The 
Republican Party is likely to stick with any incumbent."

Mainero returned to full-time teaching in 2009 after 2 1/2 often contentious 
years as then-Supervisor John Moorlach's chief of staff.

"I am not particularly in love with politics," Mainero said. "I am in love with 
policy and with trying to make things better through policy. ... That is not 
going to get done in a mountain of attack pieces from both Mr. Rackauckas and 
Mr. Spitzer. It just isn't."

He criticized Rackauckas as a poor manager who is too cozy with other 
officeholders and unwilling to prosecute political misdeeds.

He was less harsh toward Spitzer, "who I consider a friend," and who worked 
with Mainero on the establishment of the county ethics commission.

But he said Spitzer has done little more than attack Rackauckas without 
explaining how he'd reform the DA's office. "That means Todd's a politician... 
this is an office that ought not be political at all."

Mainero criticized both officials for their continued support of the death 
penalty, calling it fiscally irresponsible. He said the millions of dollars 
that go into death penalty trials, appeals and death-row housing would be 
better spent fighting gangs, sex traffickers and identity thieves.

If elected, Mainero said he would take steps to raise ethical standards and 
reduce politics in the DA's office. He said he would institute continuing 
case-law education for attorneys and investigators; report ethics violators to 
the state bar; leave it to his "professional prosecutors" to hold press 
conferences and try high-profile cases; and move away from the post-election 
practice "that has happened in prior times' of demoting or reassigning those 
who supported a different candidate.

Mainero said if he doesn't run, he'd like to see someone else step forward, 
mentioning as 1 possibility another ethics commission ally, former OC Common 
Cause President Bill Mitchell.

(source: voiceofoc.org)

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

9 people sentenced to death in Orange County since 2010. Could Scott Dekraai be 
the 10th?



Orange County prosecutions have resulted in nine death sentences since 2010. 
Admitted mass murderer Scott Dekraai could be the 10th, depending on whether a 
judge takes the death penalty off the table. Dekraai killed 8 people in Seal 
Beach in 2011, but the misuse of jailhouse informants by prosecutors and 
deputies could convince the judge that Dekraai would not receive a fair penalty 
trial.

California has 748 people on death row, 300 more than the next highest state.

California has put 513 people to death since 1893, with the vast majority of 
executions from 1920 to 1940. In 1972 the California Supreme Court decided the 
death penalty was cruel and unusual punishment. It was reinstated in 1978 but 
executions did not resume until 1992.The last execution was in 2006.

California has more people on death row than Florida and Texas combined.

Alaska and Hawaii have no death penalty. Note: New Mexico, Connecticut and 
Maryland abolished the death penalty but the law was not made retroactive so 
each state has several inmates on death row.

(source: The Orange County Register)

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

Modesto death penalty case begins with testimony from slain woman's parents



A preliminary hearing for Martin Martinez, who is accused of killing his 
girlfriend, Amanda Crews, and four others, is expected to begin Monday with 
testimony from the Modesto woman's parents.

The 5 slayings occurred July 18, 2015, at Crews' home on Nob Hill Court in east 
Modesto. In addition to Crews, 38, the victims were her daughters, 6-month-old 
Rachael and 6-year-old Elizabeth; Martinez???s mother, Anna Brown Romero, 57; 
and Martinez's 5-year-old niece, Esmeralda Navarro. Martinez was Rachael's 
father.

Crews' mother and stepfather are expected to testify in Stanislaus Superior 
Court Monday. After the parents' testimony, the hearing is scheduled to 
continue on Jan. 22.

It is very important to me and my family to move forward with this case in 
order to aid in our healing. Delays make it very difficult and prolong our 
pain.

Martinez's court-appointed attorneys on Aug. 2 asked the court to postpone next 
week's hearing because they had just received a large amount of discovery 
evidence from the prosecution. The evidence was handed over in a digital format 
that is not accessible by the defense or the prosecution.

"We're provided such a large amount of data at such a late time before the 
preliminary hearing starts," Stanislaus County Public Defender Sonny Sandhu 
said in court on Aug. 2. "We don't know whether or not this information is 
relevant."

Deputy District Attorney Rick Mury told the judge that the prosecution has made 
it clear to the Public Defender's Office through investigative reports what is 
contained in the 3 hard drives with nine terabytes of information.

Kimberly Crews, Crews' twin sister, spoke in court, asking the judge not to 
grant the defense's postponement request.

"It is very important to me and my family to move forward with this case in 
order to aid in our healing," she told the judge. "Delays make it very 
difficult and prolong our pain."

TESTIMONY CONTINUES NEXT YEAR

Judge Ricardo Cordova agreed to delay the hearing until Jan. 22, but he will 
listen to testimony from Crews' parents on Monday. Her mother's health concerns 
make it necessary for her to testify soon, the judge said, and her parents will 
be called back to the witness stand if there's any information in the digital 
data relevant to their testimony.

The preliminary hearing, which is expected to last a few weeks, will conclude 
with the judge's ruling. Cordova will determine whether there's sufficient 
evidence for Martinez to stand trial.

The defendant remains in custody at the Stanislaus County Jail. Prosecutors are 
seeking the death penalty against Martinez. He has pleaded not guilty to 5 
counts of murder.

CHILD ABUSE CASE

In a separate case, Martinez has been ordered to stand trial on charges of 
murder and child abuse in the Oct. 2, 2014, death of Crews' 2-year-old son, 
Christopher Ripley. The trial in Christopher's death has not been scheduled. 
That case has been set aside, for now, as the case in the 2015 killings moves 
forward.

Crews' son suffered severe head injuries on Sept. 30, 2014, while alone with 
Martinez. The toddler died at a Madera children's hospital after 2 days on life 
support. A child abuse expert and pediatrician at the hospital testified that 
the boy's brain had suffered severe swelling. Bleeding also was found just 
outside the brain.

Police investigators were about 2 weeks away from arresting Martinez in 
Christopher's death when the 5 other homicides occurred. The defendant was 
arrested in San Jose, several hours after the 5 bodies were discovered in the 
Modesto home.

Prosecutors believe Martinez killed Crews and his mother with a knife. The 
criminal complaint in the case includes knife enhancements in the deaths of 
Crews and Romero. Those enhancements do not appear on the murder charges for 
the children. Authorities have not said how they died.

(source: modbee.com)








USA:

Death Penalty Fast Facts



Here's a look at the death penalty in the United States.

Facts:

As of August 2017, capital punishment is legal in 31 US states.

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, 20 people were executed in 
the United States in 2016, the lowest number since 1991. The number of death 
sentences imposed was 30, a 39% decline from 2015's 40-year low.

There were 2,902 people on death row in the United States on October 1, 2016, 
the most recent date for which data is available.

Since 1976, when the death penalty was reinstated by the US Supreme Court, 
1,458 people have been executed (as of July 28, 2017).

Since 1973, there have been 159 death row exonerations (as of April 19, 2017). 
27 of them are from the state of Florida.

Between January 1, 2017 and July 28, 2017, 16 executions were carried out in 
seven states, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

Federal Government:

The US government and US military have 61 people awaiting execution. (As of 
July 25, 2017)

The US government has executed 4 people since 1963.

Females:

There are 54 women on death row in the United States (as of October 1, 2016).

16 women have been executed since the reinstatement of the death penalty (as of 
October 1, 2016).

Juveniles:

22 individuals were executed between 1985 and 2003 for crimes committed as 
juveniles.

March 1, 2005 - Roper v. Simmons. The Supreme Court rules that the execution of 
juvenile offenders is unconstitutional.

Since 1976, 282 individuals have been granted clemency for humanitarian 
reasons.

For federal death row inmates, the president alone has the power to grant a 
pardon.

Timeline:

1834 - Pennsylvania becomes the 1st state to move executions into correctional 
facilities, ending public executions.

1838 - Discretionary death penalty statutes are enacted in Tennessee.

1846 - Michigan becomes the 1st state to abolish the death penalty for all 
crimes except treason.

1890 - William Kemmler becomes the 1st person executed by electrocution.

1907-1917 - 9 states abolish the death penalty for all crimes or strictly limit 
it. By 1920, 5 of those states had reinstated it.

1924 - The use of cyanide gas is introduced as an execution method.

1930s - Executions reach the highest levels in American history, averaging 167 
per year.

June 29, 1972 - Furman v. Georgia. The Supreme Court effectively voids 40 death 
penalty statutes and suspends the death penalty.

1976 - Gregg v. Georgia. The death penalty is reinstated.

January 17, 1977 - A 10-year moratorium on executions ends with the execution 
of Gary Gilmore by firing squad in Utah.

1977 - Oklahoma becomes the 1st state to adopt lethal injection as a means of 
execution.

December 7, 1982 - Charles Brooks becomes the 1st person executed by lethal 
injection.

1984 - Velma Barfield of North Carolina becomes the 1st woman executed since 
reinstatement of the death penalty.

1986 - Ford v. Wainwright. Execution of insane persons is banned.

1987 - McCleskey v. Kemp. Racial disparities are not recognized as a 
constitutional violation of "equal protection of the law" unless intentional 
racial discrimination against the defendant can be shown.

1988 - Thompson v. Oklahoma. Executions of offenders age 15 and younger at the 
time of their crimes are declared unconstitutional.

1989 - Stanford v. Kentucky, and Wilkins v. Missouri. The Eighth Amendment does 
not prohibit the death penalty for crimes committed at age 16 or 17.

1994 - President Bill Clinton signs the Violent Crime Control and Law 
Enforcement Act that expands the federal death penalty.

1996 - The last execution by hanging takes place in Delaware, with the death of 
Billy Bailey.

January 31, 2000 - A moratorium on executions is declared by Illinois Governor 
George Ryan. Since 1976, Illinois is the 1st state to block executions.

2002 - Atkins v. Virginia. The Supreme Court rules that the execution of 
mentally retarded defendants violates the Eighth Amendment's ban on cruel and 
unusual punishment.

January 2003 - Before leaving office, Governor George Ryan grants clemency to 
all of the remaining 167 inmates on Illinois's death row, due to the flawed 
process that led to the death sentences.

June 2004 - New York's death penalty law is declared unconstitutional by the 
state's high court.

March 1, 2005 - Roper v. Simmons. The Supreme Court rules that the execution of 
juvenile killers is unconstitutional. The 5-4 decision tosses out the death 
sentence of a Missouri man who was 17 years old when he murdered a St. Louis 
area woman in 1993.

December 2, 2005 - The execution of Kenneth Lee Boyd in North Carolina marks 
the 1,000th time the death penalty has been carried out since it was reinstated 
by the Supreme Court in 1976. Boyd, 57, is executed for the 1988 murders of his 
wife, Julie Curry Boyd, and father-in-law, Thomas Dillard Curry.

June 12, 2006 - The Supreme Court rules that death row inmates can challenge 
the use of lethal injection as a method of execution.

December 15, 2006 - Florida Governor Jeb Bush suspends the death penalty after 
the execution of prisoner Angel Diaz. Diaz had to be given 2 injections, and it 
took more than 30 minutes for him to die.

December 17, 2007 - New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine signs legislation banning 
the death penalty in the state. The death sentences of 8 men are commuted to 
life terms.

December 31, 2007 - Due to the de facto moratorium on executions, pending the 
Supreme Court's ruling, only 42 people in the US are executed in 2007. It is 
the lowest total in more than 10 years.

April 14, 2008 - In a 7-2 ruling, the Supreme Court upholds Kentucky's use of 
lethal injection. Between September 2007, when the Court took on the case, and 
April 2008 no one was executed in the US.

March 18, 2009 - Governor Bill Richardson of New Mexico signs legislation 
repealing the death penalty in his state. His actions will not affect 2 
prisoners currently on death row: Robert Fry, who killed a woman in 2000, and 
Tim Allen, who killed a 17-year-old girl in 1994.

November 13, 2009 - Ohio becomes the 1st state to switch to a method of lethal 
injection using a single drug, rather than the 3-drug method used by other 
states.

2010 - Execution by firing squad is used for the last time in Utah, with the 
death of Ronnie Lee Gardner.

March 9, 2011 - Illinois Governor Pat Quinn announces that he has signed 
legislation eliminating the death penalty in his state, more than 10 years 
after the state halted executions.

March 16, 2011 - The Drug Enforcement Agency seizes Georgia's supply of 
thiopental, over questions of where the state obtained the drug. US 
manufacturer Hospira stopped producing the drug in 2009. The countries that 
still produce the drug do not allow it to be exported to the US for use in 
lethal injections.

May 20, 2011 - The Georgia Department of Corrections announces that 
pentobarbital will be substituted for thiopental in the three-drug lethal 
injection process.

July 1, 2011 - Lundbeck Inc., the company that makes pentobarbital (brand name 
Nembutal), the drug used in lethal injections, announces it will restrict the 
use of its product from prisons carrying out capital punishment.

July 7, 2011 - Humberto Leal Garcia Jr., a Mexican national, is executed by 
lethal injection in Texas for the 1994 kidnap, rape and murder of Adra Sauceda 
in San Antonio. Despite pleas from the US State Department and the White House, 
Texas Governor Rick Perry does not grant clemency and the US Supreme Court does 
not intervene.

November 22, 2011 - Governor John Kitzhaber of Oregon grants a reprieve to Gary 
Haugen, who was scheduled to be executed December 6. Kitzhaber, a licensed 
physician, also puts a moratorium on all state executions for the remainder of 
his term in office.

April 25, 2012 - Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy signs S.B. 280, An Act 
Revising the Penalty for Capital Felonies, into law. The law goes into effect 
immediately and replaces the death penalty with life without the possibility of 
parole. The law is not retroactive to those already on death row.

June 22, 2012 - The Arkansas Supreme Court strikes down the state's execution 
law, calling the form of lethal injection the state uses unconstitutional.

August 7, 2012 - The Supreme Court allows the execution of Marvin Wilson, 54, a 
Texas inmate with low IQ.

November 6, 2012 - A measure to repeal the death penalty in California fails.

May 2, 2013 - Maryland's governor signs a bill repealing the death penalty. The 
legislation goes into effect October 1.

January 16, 2014 - Ohio executes inmate Dennis McGuire with a new combination 
of drugs, due to the unavailability of drugs such as pentobarbital. The state 
uses a combination of the drugs midazolam, a sedative, and the painkiller 
hydromorphone, according to the state corrections department. The execution 
process takes 24 minutes, and McGuire appears to be gasping for air for 10 to 
13 minutes, according to witness Alan Johnson, a reporter with the Columbus 
Dispatch.

February 11, 2014 - Washington Governor Jay Inslee announces that he is issuing 
a moratorium on death penalty cases during his term in office.

May 22, 2014 - Tennessee becomes the 1st state to make death by electric chair 
mandatory when lethal injection drugs are unavailable.

May 28, 2014 - A judge in Ohio issues an order temporarily suspending 
executions in the state so that authorities can further study new lethal 
injection protocols.

July 23, 2014 - Arizona uses a new combination of drugs for the lethal 
injection to execute Joseph Woods, a convicted murderer. After the injection, 
it reportedly took him nearly 2 hours to die. A state review board later rules 
that future executions will be conducted with a 3-drug formula or a single drug 
injection if the state can obtain pentobarbital.

September 4, 2014 - The Oklahoma Department of Public Safety issues a report 
about the botched execution of Clayton Lockett on April 29, 2014. Complications 
with the placement of an IV into Lockett played a significant role in problems 
with his execution, according to the report. It took 43 minutes for him to die.

December 31, 2014 - Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley commutes the death 
sentences of the 4 last men in the state scheduled for execution. It is 1 of 
his final acts in office.

January 8, 2015 - Ohio announces that it is reincorporating thiopental sodium, 
a drug which it used in executions from 1999-2011, into its execution policy. 
The state is also dropping the 2-drug regimen of midazolam and hydromorphone.

January 23, 2015 - The Supreme Court agrees to hear a case concerning the 
lethal injection protocol in Oklahoma. The inmates claim that the state 
protocol violates the Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

January 30, 2015 - The Ohio State Department of Rehabilitation and Correction 
announces it will delay the executions of 7 death row inmates while searching 
for an adequate supply of drugs that complies with its new execution protocol.

February 13, 2015 - Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf halts all executions in his 
state, citing the state's "error prone" justice system and "inherent biases" 
among his reasons for the moratorium. Philadelphia District Attorney R. Seth 
Williams later announces he has filed a petition to block Gov. Wolf halting 
executions, claiming the moratorium is an unconstitutional takeover of powers.

March 23, 2015 - Utah Governor Gary Herbert signs legislation making the firing 
squad an authorized method of death if the drugs required for lethal injection 
are unavailable.

May 20, 2015 - The Nebraska legislature passes a bill to repeal the state's 
death penalty and replace it with life without parole.

June 29, 2015 - The Supreme Court rules, in a 5-4 decision, that the use of the 
sedative midazolam in lethal injections is not a violation of the 
constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment. Midazolam is 1 of 3 drugs 
that are combined to carry out the death penalty in Oklahoma.

October 19, 2015 - Ohio delays executions until 2017, citing difficulties 
obtaining the necessary drugs.

May 23, 2016 - The Supreme Court rules 7-1 in favor of black death row inmate 
Timothy Foster, who contended there was racial discrimination in his 1987 jury 
selection. "The focus on race in the prosecution's file plainly demonstrates a 
concerted effort to keep black prospective jurors off the jury," Chief Justice 
John Roberts wrote in the majority opinion.

August 2, 2016 - The Delaware Supreme Court rules the state's death penalty law 
unconstitutional. Attorney General Matt Denn later announces that he will not 
appeal the decision.

November 8, 2016 - Voters in California, Nebraska and Oklahoma are asked to 
weigh in on the death penalty with referendum questions on ballots. In all 3 
states, majorities vote in favor of the death penalty.

December 8, 2016 - Once a temporary stay issued by Supreme Court Justice 
Clarence Thomas is lifted, Alabama executes Ronald B. Smith. According to a 
witness, the death row inmate coughed and heaved for about 13 minutes after the 
injection process began.

February 22, 2017 - The Supreme Court rules in favor of Duane Buck, a death row 
inmate in Texas whose defense lawyers introduced evidence at trial that he was 
more likely to be dangerous in the future because he is black.

April 2017 - Of the 8 prisoners Arkansas had planned to execute before the 
state's supply of a lethal injection drug expires, 4 are put to death: Ledell 
Lee, Jack Jones, Marcel Williams, and Kenneth Williams. The other 4 - Jason 
McGehee, Stacey Johnson, Don Davis and Bruce Ward - receive stays of execution.

April 20, 2017 - The FDA rules that imported vials of the execution drug sodium 
thiopental, ordered by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice and the Arizona 
Department of Corrections, must be destroyed or exported within 90 days. The 
FDA had seized the shipment in 2015. Sodium thiopental is not approved in the 
United States.

April 25, 2017 - The Oklahoma Death Penalty Review Commission releases a report 
recommending the continuation of the moratorium on the death penalty, citing 
the need for significant reforms.

(source: CNN)

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

Gary Lee Sampson loses latest bid to escape death penalty



Triple-killer Gary Lee Sampson has lost his latest bid to escape his pending 
death sentence.

Judge Leo Sorokin, who oversaw the 8-week trial that led to Sampson's sentence 
early this year, issued an 85-page decision this week denying a slew of 
post-trial motions making 18 different arguments for a new trial. Sorokin also 
ordered the U.S. District Court clerk to make public nearly all sealed 
documents in the case over the coming weeks.

In the decision, Sorokin considered defense arguments on issues ranging from 
Sampson's competency to stand trial to victim-impact statements from relatives 
of the 2 South Shore men he stabbed to death in an 4-day killing spree in 2001. 
Sampson, who never denied the murders, was tried separately for strangling a 
3rd man to death in New Hampshire.

Sorokin noted in the lengthy decision that he had given an unusual degree of 
attention to Sampson's post-trial motions, which judges typically deny with a 
single sentence.

"This is no run-of-the-mine case," Sorokin wrote. "Sampson brutally and 
incomprehensibly murdered Philip McCloskey, Jonathan Rizzo, and Robert Whitney. 
He faces the ultimate, irreversible punishment for 2 of those killings."

Sampson, a 57-year-old former drifter who grew up in Abington, has been behind 
bars since July 2001, when he turned himself in to Vermont police and confessed 
to killing the three men.

Sampson carjacked and murdered McCloskey, a 69-year-old retired plumber from 
Abington, on July 24, 2001, after McCloskey stopped by the side of the road and 
offered him a ride. 3 days later, Sampson carjacked Rizzo, a 19-year-old 
college student who had also pulled over to help Sampson, and forced the 
teenager to drive at knife point to Abington, where he killed Rizzo and stole 
his car. Sampson then drove to New Hampshire and murdered Whitney after 
breaking into an empty lake home.

Sampson plead guilty to all charges and was sentenced to death following a 2003 
penalty-phase trial, which is required in federal death penalty cases. But the 
sentence was thrown out eight years later after Judge Mark Wolf determined that 
a juror in the trial had lied about her background. A new set of jurors began 
hearing testimony this past November.

In deciding whether Sampson should die for the murders, the jury was tasked 
with weighing 7 aggravating factors presented by prosecutors against dozens of 
mitigating factors outlined by Sampson's defense. The 115 mitigating factors 
raised by defense attorneys included what they said was a lifelong history of 
brain injuries, dyslexia, substance abuse and family problems.

Among the arguments Sampson made for a new trial in his post-trial motions was 
his contention that he should have been allowed to present all 308 mitigating 
factors originally proposed by his attorneys. Sampson also argued that his 
defense attorneys should have been allowed to withdraw from the case mid trial 
because Sampson "made credible threats of violence" against them.

Sorokin found no merit in any of the arguments and denied several post-trial 
motions. The judge also ordered the clerk to make public all but 3 documents 
that had remained under seal even after Sampson's sentence was imposed.

(source: The Patriot Ledger)