[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, DEL. N.C., GA., FLA., ALA., OHIO

[Rick Halperin]

May 4



TEXAS:

13 % of Texas death row inmates wait 25 years or more for execution


Texas has executed 23 inmates since 2014, but 32 of the 238 condemned inmates 
have been awaiting execution for 25 years or more. That wait is nearly a decade 
more than the average time elapsed between conviction and execution nationally.

Scroll through the gallery to see which Texas death row inmates have waited 
more than 25 years for execution

For some Texas death row inmates, being condemned can feel like a life 
sentence.

Roughly 13 % (30 of 238) of the inmates awaiting execution in the Lone Star 
State have been on death row for 25 years or more. That length of stay is 
nearly a decade above the national average time awaiting execution of 15 years 
and 9 months.

The longest resident of death row in Texas, Raymond Riles, has been sitting in 
solitary confinement (except for doctor visits and court appearances) since 
February 1976.

Since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976, 41 inmates on death row 
have died either of natural causes or suicide while awaiting execution.

This is in a state that has executed 23 people in the last 3 years and isn't 
shy about carrying out death sentences.

But, the state is also suing the federal government to get a hold of a shipment 
of the lethal injection drug Pentobarbital.

While that is tied up in court, there's little the state can do if it runs out 
of the current supply of the sedative, prolonging the time on death row for the 
inmates and the wait for the victim's families.

(source: Houston Chronicle)






DELAWARE:

Death penalty supporters pass 1st test


Legislators from both parties say they will try to re-institute the death 
penalty in Delaware this year, but might they face an uphill battle.

The General Assembly took the 1st step towards reinstating the death penalty in 
Delaware on Wednesday when a committee voted 7-4 to send legislation to the the 
full House of Representatives for a vote.

A vote in the full House is expected on Thursday.

The "Extreme Crimes Protection Act" comfortably passed the 11-member House 
Judiciary committee, but the almost 2-hour hearing foreshadowed the intensity 
of the battle that will be waged in Legislative Hall over the coming weeks.

Supporters of the legislation said it would limit the punishment to truly 
abominable crimes that can be proved with the highest standards of truth.

But opponents of the legislation said changing the way sentences are delivered 
doesn't change their opinion that the death penalty is fundamentally wrong.

"I don't think the state should be in the business of committing homicide, no 
more than I think anyone else should be in the business of committing 
homicide," said Rep. J.J. Johnson, D-New Castle.

Delaware's current capital punishment law is unenforceable after the state 
Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional last year. In a 4-1 vote, the Court 
faulted the law for allowing a judge to find that aggravating circumstances in 
a crime merited a death sentence without a unanimous jury agreeing.

Aggravating circumstances can include things like crimes committed against a 
police officer, crimes in which hostages are taken or if the crimes that are 
"outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible or inhuman in that it involved torture 
or depravity of mind."

A group of lawmakers, both Republicans and Democrats, are pushing to change the 
law to address those concerns. Their legislation would require a unanimous jury 
to rule on the aggravating circumstances and raise the burden of proof to the 
highest standard.

"We're not trying to enact capital punishment, we're trying to restore it," 
said Rep. Steve Smyk, R-Milton, the bill's chief House sponsor.

Dozens of members of the public testified during the hearing.

Many of those speaking in favor of the bill were law enforcement officers.

"We have seen over the years that there are some truly evil people who commit 
truly heinous crimes," said Lt. Tom Brackin, head of the Delaware State Police 
Troopers Association. "The troopers I represent and myself believe you do have 
to have the ultimate punishment for the ultimate crime."

Peggy Marshall Thomas, the former chief prosecutor in Sussex County, recalled 
prosecuting a person who was convicted of five homicides, including 2 different 
incidents after being jailed the first time. She invoked the death of Lt. 
Stephen J. Ballard, who was gunned down in Bear last week.

"The murder of the uniformed officer is an extreme act of violence that 
undermines our peaceful and lawful society," she said.

Brendan O'Neill, the state's public defender, said the cost of the death 
penalty should give state leaders pause. His office alone has saved significant 
money in the period without capital punishment cases, he said.

O'Neill and many other speakers who opposed the bill also noted that those 
executed by the death penalty are disproportionately poor and black.

"If the victim is white and the defendant is black, there is a virtual 
certainty that he or she will be convicted," O'Neill said.

Those opposing the legislation repeatedly referred to capital punishment as 
"state-sanctioned violence" or "state-sanctioned murder," arguing it did 
nothing to bring peace.

"The nations with which the US most identifies...have abolished the death 
penalty," said Julie Price, representing the League of Women Voters. "They see 
capital punishment as a profound human rights violation and a shocking abuse of 
government power. "

Even the bill's opponents think it will pass the House on Thursday. The Senate 
is where the real test will take place.

Last year, before the Supreme Court ruling, the Senate passed a bill by an 
11-10 margin that would have repealed the death penalty. But since then, there 
are 3 new Senators: Sen. Anthony Delcollo, R-Marshallton, Sen. Stephanie 
Hansen, D-Middletown, and Sen. Jack Walsh, D-Stanton.

Another unknown: would Gov. John Carney sign the bill? If Carney vetoes the 
bill, supporters of reinstatement don't have the votes to override him.

In a debate during the campaign last year, Carney said he believed the Court's 
decision should stand and said he would "probably" veto a bill to reinstate 
capital punishment. He has said he would "not rule out" the death penalty in 
cases where a law enforcement officer is killed, but the current legislation is 
broader than that.

Carney has not publicly said, however, that he would veto the bill.

(source: The News Journal)



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

Delaware bill to reinstate death penalty passes committee, heads to House floor


A bill to reinstate Delaware's death penalty, which the state Supreme Court 
declared unconstitutional last year, is headed to the House floor.

Under the bill, jurors would have to find unanimously and beyond a reasonable 
doubt that a defendant should be executed.

A judge would have to agree with the jury for the death penalty to be imposed 
but would have the discretion to sentence a defendant to life in prison.

A majority of justices last year declared Delaware' s death penalty law 
unconstitutional because it allowed judges too much discretion and did not 
require that a jury find unanimously and beyond a reasonable doubt that a 
defendant deserves execution.

(source: Associcated Press)






NORTH CAROLINA:

The Paper Tiger Death Penalty in North Carolina


A rush to execute death row inmates in Arkansas led to national concern about 
the use of the death penalty. In North Carolina, juries continue to send people 
to death row. They sentenced 16 people to death in the last 10 years. But in 
that time there has not been a single execution. Some are questioning why the 
country has the death penalty if it is not being used. Others advocate for 
abolishing it altogether. They say it does not deliver the justice it intended, 
costs too much, is not administered fairly, and could amount to cruel and 
unusual punishment.

Host Frank Stasio speaks with WUNC political reporter Rusty Jacobs, Forsyth 
County District Attorney Jim O'Neil, retired Southern Pines Police Chief Gerald 
Galloway, Arkansas State Representative Rebecca Petty and Center for Death 
Penalty Litigation staff attorney David Weiss about the death penalty. Host 
Frank Stasio talks with WUNC reporter Rusty Jacobs about his upcoming feature 
on the death penalty in North Carolina. He also talks with Forsyth County 
District Attorney Jim O'Neill, retired Southern Pines Police Chief Gerald 
Galloway, Arkansas State Representative Rebecca Petty, and Center for Death 
Penalty Litigation staff attorney David Weiss about how these issues have 
played out in their careers.

(source: WUNC news)






GEORGIA----impending execution

Parole Board to hear J.W. Ledford's request for clemency


The State Board of Pardons and Paroles on Wednesday scheduled appointments on 
May 15 to hear from advocates for J.W. Ledford who want to stop his pending 
execution and from those who want to see his sentence carried out.

As is its tradition, the morning hours are set aside for Ledford's attorneys, 
family members and friends to make a pitch for clemency. The prosecutor, and 
sometimes the lead investigators and the victim's relatives, will meet with the 
5-person board in the afternoon.

Only the courts and the Parole Board have the authority to stop his execution 
set for May 16. If the 45-year-old Ledford is put to death for the 1992 murder 
of his elderly neighbor, his will be the 1st lethal injection Georgia has 
carried out in 2017, coming of a record year when the state put 9 men to death.

Ledford was 20 years old, but had been drinking and using drugs half his life 
when he murdered his "rather feeble" 73-year-old neighbor, Dr. Harry Johnston 
on Jan. 31, 1992.

According to testimony at the death penalty trial in Murray County, Ga., 
Antoinette Johnston had just seen her husband drive away in his pickup with 
someone in the passenger seat when Ledford knocked on the door and asked to 
speak with the physician.

Ledford left when she told him her husband wasn't home, but he returned 15 to 
20 minutes later, introducing himself and asking again to see Johnston. Ledford 
left only to return a 3rd time about 10 minutes later to ask Antoinette to tell 
her husband to come to his house that evening.

The 4th time Ledford came to the Johnston house he had a knife; one that 
belonged to the elderly man. Ledford told Antoinette Johnston he need money for 
drugs, and if he didn't get it he would kill her. Ledford tied up the woman and 
left the house with 2 handguns, a rifle and a shotgun that belonged to the 
family.

Antoinette Johnston freed herself in time to see Ledford drive off in her 
husband's truck.

Within the next 30 minutes, Ledford sold the rifle and shotgun at 2 different 
pawnshops, stopped to buy cigarettes and was stopped on Highway 441 and 
arrested.

Ledford confessed.

He told investigators Johnston was giving him a ride to the grocery store when 
the older man accused him of stealing and turned around the truck and headed 
back to his house.

On the side of the Johnston garage, Ledford said, Johnston knocked him to the 
ground and then pulled a knife from a sheath in his belt. Ledford said he 
pulled his own knife and repeatedly stabbed Johnson, almost decapitating him.

Ledford dragged the body a short distance away and covered it with tree limbs.

(source: Atlanta Journal Constitution)






FLORIDA:

The Most Powerful Lawyer In Florida Is Keeping Criminal Justice Reform At 
Bay----Arthur "Buddy" Jacobs has been a stalwart advocate for retro 
superpredator-era, pro-carceral policies.


Who is Buddy Jacobs, and how does he block criminal justice reform in Florida?

On a humid June day in 2016, the Nassau Community Band played at the dedication 
ceremony of a $100,000 replica train platform in the small, exclusive, historic 
community of Fernandina Beach, about an hour northeast of Jacksonville, right 
on the Georgia/Florida border.

A century ago, a local plantation owner and a staunch confederacy supporter 
built a Florida railway through the town, giving it a brief but firm foothold 
in the trade history of Florida. That so-called golden age of Fernandina Beach 
has come and gone. Today, Fernandina Beach is home to championship golf courses 
and spas. It is a place that revels in its restored natural landscape, and the 
community's disengagement with the rest of Florida which largely cannot afford 
$1 million homes.

Giving the keynote speech was the founding member of the Amelia Island 
Fernandina Restoration Foundation, Arthur "Buddy" Jacobs. Dressed in a virginal 
white suit and straw hat, Jacobs discussed the need to preserve Fernandina 
Beach's history for the future.

Buddy Jacobs isn't a stranger to preserving history. For almost 50 years, 
Jacobs has served as General Counsel and Lobbyist for the Florida Prosecuting 
Attorneys Association - an organization that includes the 20 elected 
prosecutors for every district in Florida. Jacobs, now in his late 70s, started 
lobbying on behalf of the FPAA just a few years out of law school. The FPAA 
sees itself as primarily educational, and its voice is particularly strong in 
the state capital as it advises the legislature on criminal justice issues.

Florida's prison population increased by more than 1000% and correction 
spending increased 98% - 1.1 billion dollars - between 1994 and 2014. During 
that time, Jacobs has been a stalwart advocate for retro superpredator-era 
pro-carceral policies. Indeed, Buddy Jacobs is one of the most powerful forces 
keeping the state stuck in the past.

Perhaps Florida's biggest criminal justice issue right is its long struggle 
with the state's excessive use of the death penalty. In a 2016 report by the 
Fair Punishment Project, 4 counties in Florida ranked among the "deadliest" 16 
places (out of over 3,000 counties) in the country.

Florida's death row is so expansive in part due to its unusual and outdated law 
allowing a non-unanimous jury to sentence a defendant to death. A 2016 study 
found that nearly 3/4 of Florida's death row inmates were condemned to die 
without the agreement of 12 jurors. Beginning in 2004, the Florida Supreme 
Court highlighted the serious constitutional problems with this scheme and it 
urged the legislature to pass a unanimity requirement to correct the problem 
while bringing Florida in line with other states (no other state in the country 
allows a bare majority of jurors to recommend a death sentence).

Florida sends more kids to adult prison than any other state in America.

But Jacobs, on behalf of the FPAA, vehemently opposed these changes at every 
opportunity. He urged the legislature to allow non-unanimous jury verdicts in 
capital cases, a position that is in line with his belief that jurors are "too 
compassionate." Last year, the Florida Supreme Court held that this aspect of 
Florida's capital punishment statute violated the constitution, which 
effectively vacated at least 150 death sentence. Ultimately, the Florida 
legislature finally made unanimous juries a requirement this year, but the 
FPAA's decade-long opposition to the change will cost taxpayers millions of 
dollars in re-sentencings and victim family members unquantifiable suffering.

Jacobs also advocates on behalf of the FPAA on other controversial issues. In a 
brief from 2001, Jacobs opposed legislation that would allow 1st-time drug 
offenders to get treatment in lieu of jail time - a diversion-type program that 
exists in many jurisdictions. He also supported a law making it harder to 
obtain public records. And he lobbied in favor of a law allowing prosecutors to 
falsify court records to conceal the histories of informants. (Ultimately, the 
Florida Supreme Court forbade the practice).

Florida sends more kids to adult prison than any other state in America. Yet, 
as recently as last year, Jacobs opposed reforms to Florida's direct file 
policy, which allows prosecutors to send juveniles as young as 14 years-old 
directly to adult court without a hearing. Jacobs called these kids 'hardened 
and bad folks" and fed into old myths about juvenile "superpredators." "These 
are not Sunday school going-to-prayer-meeting young people. These are bad 
hardened criminals that wreak havoc over the state of Florida," Jacobs 
concluded. But, a 2014 Human Rights Watch Report found that his fiery rhetoric 
lacks support in fact: 60% of kids transferred to adult court were incarcerated 
for nonviolent offenses.

The irony, though, is that while Jacobs shows little mercy for those seeking a 
second chance, he has experienced considerable personal legal turmoil. Trouble 
first hit Jacobs in 1991, when prosecutors had him indicted for helping to 
orchestrate a fraudulent municipal bond scheme in St. Louis. He entered into a 
pretrial diversion program, accepted probation, and paid a $52,500 fee. Then, 7 
years later, he was charged with participating in a bond scheme involving an 
industrial park in Fernandina Beach. The case ultimately was dismissed, but 
financial and tax problems continued to plague Jacobs.

According to bankruptcy filings, Jacobs failed to pay taxes on his income for 
most of the 1990s. In 1995, he declared bankruptcy on his law practice "largely 
because of those tax debts." Jacobs continued to argue into the 2000s that he 
didn't need to pay his tax obligations because his failure to pay wasn't 
intentional. The United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit disagreed; 
in 2007, the Court issued an opinion holding that "the record overwhelmingly 
shows that Mr. Jacobs willfully attempted to evade or defeat his taxes," 
arguing that his behavior ' giving lavish gifts, using corporate funds for 
personal transactions, and refusing to pay taxes - were "badges of fraud."

Despite his checkered background, Jacobs maintains a consistent optimism about 
himself and his ability to bounce back, telling 1 reporter, "I think that 
everyone has something good about them. I even have some good things about me." 
In his bankruptcy pleadings, Jacobs says he is "not trying to wipe the slate 
clean" but merely seeks forgiveness, "to eliminate that portion which has 
become old and faded" so that he can move on.

If only he could grant the same to the citizens of Florida who lack the same 
platform.

(source: Opinion; Ron Sullivan, Contributor Clinical Professor of Law and the 
Director of the Criminal Justice Institute at Harvard Law School----Huffington 
Post)

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

Cuts planned for office of anti-death-penalty prosecutor


Florida legislators plan to take more than $1 million and 21 jobs away from a 
state prosecutor who announced she won't seek the death penalty anymore.

Top Republicans announced the plan on Wednesday, the same day an association of 
Florida prosecutors said that Gov. Rick Scott can legally take away almost 2 
dozen cases from State Attorney Aramis Ayala in Orlando for refusing to seek 
the death penalty.

Ayala has said previously that the planned $1.3 million cut and loss of jobs 
could severely impact her office's ability to prosecute crimes.

The state prosecutor has come under fire after she announced she wouldn't seek 
the death penalty in the case of Markeith Loyd or any other case. Loyd is 
charged with killing an Orlando police lieutenant and his pregnant 
ex-girlfriend earlier this year.

Scott took the Loyd case and almost 2 dozen other cases away from Ayala and 
reassigned them to a neighboring prosecutor. Ayala is challenging those orders 
before the Florida Supreme Court, saying the governor had no authority to do 
so.

The Florida Prosecuting Attorneys Association filed a friend-of-the-court brief 
Wednesday saying the governor did have the authority.

The prosecutors association said Ayala was attempting to legislate from her 
office in violation of the Florida Constitution.

The brief called Ayala's decision not seek the death penalty "an abuse of 
discretion and a neglect of her duties."

(source: Associated Press)






ALABAMA:

House Judiciary Committee approves nitrogen death penalty option


A bill that would provide nitrogen hypoxia as an execution option for death row 
inmates was approved by the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday.

State Bill 12, sponsored by Sen. Trip Pittman, R-Montrose, came about due to 
complications with obtaining and administering the drugs necessary for lethal 
injections, the most common execution method.

Media witnesses to the execution of Ronald Bert Smith last December said Smith 
gasped and coughed for 13 minutes after receiving midazolam, a drug meant to 
sedate Smith prior to the lethal injection, and the execution took 34 minutes. 
Pittman also cites death row inmate Thomas Arthur as a reason for the bill. 
Arthur escaped execution for the seventh time amid concerns over Alabama's 
lethal injection process. Arthur argued it was inhumane; meanwhile, 
pharmaceutical companies were becoming more reluctant to sell the drugs needed 
for the lethal cocktail. Pittman's bill originally suggested death by firing 
squad as an alternative execution method, but he changed it to nitrogen hypoxia 
after speaking corrections officers and the Attorney General's office, both of 
whom he said support the nitrogen bill.

"It's not only more humane, but what I think is the most humane," Pittman said.

Pittman said nitrogen hypoxia, a type of asphyxiation caused by nitrogen 
displacing and depriving the tissue of oxygen, offers a painless death. 
Although the method has not been tested in any country let alone any state, 
death by nitrogen made headlines in India when a young man committed suicide by 
inhaling nitrogen after searching the internet for a painless method of death, 
according to a 2016 article by the Hindustan Times.

The U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board published a 2003 study 
that found that 80 people died from incidentally inhaling nitrogen between 1992 
and 2002. Nitrogen hypoxia has also been tested and used as a euthanasia method 
on animals with the American Veterinary Medical Association recommending it 
chiefly for birds and encouraging the use of a sedative if used on larger 
animals.

Only 2 states have approved nitrogen as an execution method: Mississippi and 
Oklahoma. It has never been administered or tested as a method of execution. 4 
states - Arizona, Missouri, California and Wyoming - allow for death by gas 
chamber, but those 4 states use cyanide gas. The last cyanide gas execution was 
in 1999.

It is unknown is if the state would use a gas mask or a gas chamber to 
administer the nitrogen. Nitrogen is viewed as a more humane alternative 
because there is no electrocution, bullet or deadly drug involved, but 
opponents say the bill allows for human experimentation due to the lack of 
testing of nitrogen as an agent of death.

"The (method) that has been passed has not been tested . . . we don't know what 
it's gong to cost us," said Sen. Bobby Singleton, D-Greensboro, before it was 
passed by the Senate.

Pittman said another benefit of nitrogen would be its availability.

Only a handful of members of the House Judiciary Committee voted in favor of 
the bill, but none opposed.

(source: Montgomery Advertiser)

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

A quick death in Alabama


Alabama recently took a small but important step forward in reforming its 
criminal justice system when the legislature voted to eliminate judicial 
override in capital cases last month, but all of that progress could come to a 
screeching halt if the "Fair Justice Act" is allowed to pass. The deceitfully 
named bill (it is neither fair nor just) would shorten the time for appeals and 
reduce already inadequate resources that death row prisoners have when 
appealing their convictions. Alabama has clearly put its head in the sand and 
is ignoring its own disgraceful experience with wrongful convictions and the 
death penalty, as well as current recommendations from other states.

The Act, also known as SB 187, creates a unitary appeals process, which means 
that a capital defendant would pursue a direct appeal and post-conviction 
litigation simultaneously. It also imposes deadlines on filing the 2 separate 
processes, and additionally imposes deadlines for judges to rule on 
post-conviction litigation. Fast-tracking capital cases right to the execution 
chamber may be appealing to some, but these timelines ignore the purpose of the 
separate processes, the realities of capital litigation, and the risk these 
changes would pose to innocent defendants.

SB 187 has many flaws and the experiences of Colorado and Oklahoma highlight 
some of the worst. A unitary appeals system requires two attorneys to be 
appointed simultaneously for a single capital defendant. Both attorneys will 
require access to the defendant and access to copies of trial files and the 
record, which can be lengthy and expensive to procure. This is where wasted 
resources come into play. In a consecutive appeals process, attorneys often 
pass along the compiled files to the next attorney in line - here there will be 
2 copies of everything, and who pays for that? The people of Alabama.

In a recent op-ed, Attorney General Steven Marshall argues that Alabama needs 
the Fair Justice Act, falsely stating that Anthony Ray Hinton, recently freed 
after spending 30 years on death row, would actually have been freed sooner 
under this Act.

Mr. Hinton has written an opinion piece too, noting that under the Fair Justice 
Act he likely would have been executed for crime he didn't commit. He writes: 
"We do need significant reforms in Alabama but the legislation pending before 
the State House of Representatives is not the right way to proceed and would 
almost certainly have gotten me killed." Hinton is 1 of 6 men who were 
wrongfully sentenced to death in the state since 1976.

Hinton, who has more moral authority on this subject than anyone in Alabama, 
stresses: "Executions are carried out in the name of the people of Alabama and 
we should all be concerned if we make our system less reliable and the 
execution of innocent people more likely."

If Alabama lawmakers are genuinely interested in fair justice, they would not 
ignore the numerous reforms recommended in the 294-page report recently issued 
by the bipartisan Oklahoma Death Penalty Review Commission. And they certainly 
should be interested in fully funding a statewide public defender system with 
qualified counsel.

Because of the problems created by Oklahoma's unitary appeals process - similar 
to that proposed in SB 187 - the Oklahoma Commission is recommending reverting 
back to a system where direct appeal and post-conviction processes would 
proceed consecutively - a system Alabama already has in place.

Colorado, which 2 decades ago adopted a unitary process much like the one set 
out in SB 187, learned a similar lesson. Now, even the original supporter of 
the law, former Colorado state representative Jeanne Adkins, admits that it has 
failed.

Last week, in stunted debate before the Alabama House Judiciary Committee, this 
relevant and compelling evidence about the failure of a unitary appeals process 
- as experienced by other states - was ignored and this morally objectionable 
legislation advanced.

If this Act passes, it will put innocent men like Anthony Ray Hinton at risk 
and it will move Alabama backwards and undermine much of the progress that has 
been made. Hopefully, reasonable lawmakers in the House will take a closer look 
and recognize that this "Fair Justice Act" is neither of those things and vote 
no.

(source: opinion; Ronald Sullivan Jr. is a professor at the Harvard Law School, 
where he serves as the Director of the Criminal Justice Institute---- 
Montgomery Advertiser)






OHIO:

New judge, jury to decide convicted serial killer's fate


A new jury in August will begin deciding whether to recommend the death 
sentence for a convicted serial killer.

That timetable was outlined Wednesday in Hamilton County Common Pleas Court, 
where Anthony Kirkland appeared with his attorneys.

Kirkland, 48, was sentenced to death in 2010, but last year the Ohio Supreme 
Court ordered a new mitigation and sentencing hearing. In all, Kirkland has 
been convicted of killing 5 women and girls and burning their bodies.

He told detectives he burned the bodies of his victims because "fire purifies," 
court documents say.

Four of the killings happened between 2006 and 2009. He also killed a woman in 
1987 - for spurning his sexual advances, prosecutors said. He pleaded guilty 
and served 16 years in prison.

A jury will be selected for the resentencing. The hearing, initially scheduled 
for this month, is now set to begin Aug. 21 before Judge Patrick Dinkelacker, 
who will ultimately decide whether to impose a death sentence. The previous 
judge recused himself from the case.

Among the challenges to Kirkland's death sentence was that prosecutors, in 
arguments during the trial's penalty phase, made numerous statements to the 
jury that were improper.

In 2014, the Ohio Supreme Court found that the prosecution's statements "were 
improper and substantially prejudicial." But the court conducted its own 
evaluation and determined that Kirkland deserved the death penalty.

After a 2016 ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court, which said a death sentence must 
be based on a jury's verdict - not a judge's findings - the Ohio Supreme Court 
ordered the resentencing.

Kirkland was found guilty in 2010 of killing Casonya "Sharee" Crawford, 14, and 
Esme Kenney, 13. Before the trial began, he pleaded guilty in the deaths of 
Kimya Rolison, 25, and Mary Jo Newton, 45.

Sharee was killed in May 2006 while walking home from a friend's house. A month 
later, the burned remains of Newton's body were found in Avondale. In 2008, 
Rolison's body was discovered. She had been stabbed and burned.

Kirkland was caught on March 7, 2009, the same day he killed Esme as she jogged 
around the reservoir in Spring Grove Village. He choked her to death with a 
rag, court documents say, then set her body on fire.

During the penalty phase of Kirkland's trial, prosecutors told jurors that 
Kirkland already was going to prison for the rest of his life for killing 
Rolison and Newton.

"So I guess Casonya and Esme are just freebies for him," a prosecutor told 
jurors, according to an Ohio Supreme Court decision.

The high court said those statements were improper. It said a prosecutor can't 
argue that "a sentence less than death is meaningless and would not hold the 
defendant accountable for a victim???s death when he is already serving a life 
sentence."

The court also found that prosecutors improperly talked about what the victims 
might have felt and also referenced facts that were not presented during the 
trial.

(source: cincinnati.com)