[Deathpenalty] DeathPenalty Digest, Vol 155, Issue 5

[Brody Woodman]

just......just no. i just dont give a shit

On 5 October 2017 at 12:11, <deathpenalty-request at lists.washlaw.edu> wrote:

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> Today's Topics:
>
>    1.  death penalty news----ALABAMA----Stop Execution Of Jeffrey
>       Borden (USA: 500.17) (Rick Halperin)
>    2.  death penalty news----TEXAS, FLA., ALA., LA., OHIO
>       (Rick Halperin)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Wed, 4 Oct 2017 16:04:14 -0500
> From: Rick Halperin <rhalperi at smu.edu>
> To: Death Penalty <deathpenalty at lists.washlaw.edu>
> Subject: [Deathpenalty] death penalty news----ALABAMA----Stop
>         Execution Of Jeffrey Borden (USA: 500.17)
> Message-ID: <alpine.WNT.2.00.1710041604030.4728 at 15-11017.smu.edu>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"; format=flowed
>
>
>
>
> Urgent Action
>
>
>
> STATE MOVES TO HAVE STAY OF EXECUTION LIFTED
>
> The State of Alabama has asked the US Supreme Court to lift a stay of
> execution
> granted to Jeffrey Borden, and to be allowed to execute him before
> midnight on 5 October. While the stay relates to a challenge to the state?s
> lethal injection protocol, Jeffrey Borden is said by his lawyers to have a
> severe mental disability and to be ?actively psychotic?.
>
> Write a letter, send an email, call, fax or tweet:
>
>   *  Call on the governor to stop this execution of Jeffrey Borden and to
> commute his death sentence;
>
>   *  Note with deep concern the evidence of Jeffrey Borden?s serious mental
> disability;
>
>   *  Explain that you are not seeking to downplay the seriousness of the
> crime
> or the suffering caused
>
> Friendly reminder: If you send an email, please create your own instead of
> forwarding this one!
> Contact below official by 5 October, 2017:
>
>
>
> Governor Kay Ivey Alabama State Capitol
> 600 Dexter Avenue
> Montgomery, Alabama 36130, USA
>
> Fax: +1 334 353 0004
>
> Email: http://216.226.177.218/forms/contact.aspx
>
> (If you are not based in the US, please use Amnesty?s New York office as
> your
> address: 5 Penn Plaza, 16th Floor, New York, NY 10001)
> Salutation: Dear Governor
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 2
> Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2017 06:11:42 -0500
> From: Rick Halperin <rhalperi at smu.edu>
> To: Death Penalty <deathpenalty at lists.washlaw.edu>
> Subject: [Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, FLA., ALA., LA.,
>         OHIO
> Message-ID: <alpine.WNT.2.00.1710050611330.5308 at 15-11017.smu.edu>
> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset="US-ASCII"
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Oct. 5
>
>
>
> TEXAS:
>
> Irving killer who shot his baby girl, 3-year-old son wins death row
> reprieve
>
>
>
> An Irving father sentenced to death for the revenge killing of his children
> after their mother left him has been granted a new punishment trial.
>
> Hector Rolando Medina, 38, shot 3-year-old Javier and 8-month-old Diana in
> the
> head and the neck after his girlfriend left him in March 2007. He then shot
> himself in the neck outside his Irving home.
>
> Medina was convicted of capital murder in 2008 and sent to death row, after
> defense attorney Donna Winfield didn't call a single witness or present
> closing
> arguments during the punishment phase of the trial.
>
> The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals upheld a lower court's ruling that
> Medina
> should be granted a new punishment trial because of his defense attorney's
> "deficient performance."
>
> The Dallas County district attorney's office will decide whether to again
> seek
> the death penalty against Medina. The automatic sentence for capital
> murder in
> Texas is life without the possibility of parole.
>
> "These cases are very expensive and very time-consuming," said First
> Assistant
> District Attorney Michael Snipes. "Those two factors have to be taken into
> consideration, not only in this case but in every case where a defendant is
> death penalty-eligible."
>
> The district attorney's office is seeking the death penalty against Antonio
> Cochran, who is accused of kidnapping and killing 18-year-old Zoe Hastings
> in
> 2015.
>
> Justice Michael Keasler wrote in a concurring opinion that granting Medina
> a
> new punishment trial gives the convicted child killer "a 2nd bite at the
> apple."
>
> Keasler expressed "profound disgust" at Winfield's handling of the
> punishment
> phase of the trial, saying that the attorney "intentionally torpedoed" the
> case.
>
> There was a six-week break after Medina was convicted before the punishment
> phase began. Winfield asked for more time to bring expert witnesses to the
> courthouse, but the judge denied the request.
>
> In response, Winfield refused to call any witnesses or rest her case during
> punishment. She was thrown in jail for being in contempt of court.
>
> During a hearing requesting a new trial after Medina was sentenced,
> Winfield
> said, "I wasn't going to put on a disjointed defense of Mr. Medina. ...
> That
> wasn't fair to him or to the jury."
>
> Justice Sharon Keller wrote in a dissenting opinion that Medina's defense
> attorney had "fully participated in the state's punishment case, including
> cross-examining witnesses."
>
> Prosecutors say Medina killed his children as revenge after his longtime
> girlfriend left him.
>
> Elia Martinez-Bermudez testified that Medina would hold her down and force
> her
> to have sex with him. He begged her to come back after she left him in
> January
> 2007. When she did, he threatened to kill her, the children and himself if
> she
> ever left him again.
>
> In March 2007, Medina borrowed a friend's gun and a box of bullets and then
> refused to let Martinez-Bermudez see her children when she asked. Later
> that
> day, he shot Javier and Diana and then himself.
>
> Diana "had a tombstone before she could talk," prosecutor Felicia Oliphant
> said
> during the trial. "Is there anything sadder than that?"
>
> (source: Dallas Morning News)
>
> ***************
>
> Convicted murderer Randall Mays found competent to be executed
>
>
>
> A Henderson County man found guilty of capital murder in the shooting
> death of
> two East Texas sheriff deputies, has been found competent to be executed.
>
> Randall Mays was convicted of killing Henderson County Sheriff Deputy Tony
> Ogburn and Paul Habelt and seriously injuring Deputy Kevin Harris in May of
> 2007.
>
> The ruling of competency was made by visiting Judge Joe Clayton, of Tyler
> and a
> date has not been set for Mays' execution.
>
> Prior to the imminent execution scheduled for March 18, 2015, Mays filed a
> motion regarding competency to be executed.
>
> According to court documents, Mays was examined by several doctors. What
> the
> court ultimately determined was that Mays' mental illness does not deprive
> him
> of his understanding. The court's findings were detailed in documents
> filed in
> Henderson County:
>
> After consideration of all the credible evidence, the Court has concluded
> that
> Randall Mays has failed to meet his burden by a preponderance of the
> evidence,
> and the Court rules as follows:
>
> While Randall Mays does have some form of mental illness, it does not
> deprive
> him of the rational understanding of the connection between his crime and
> the
> punishment received.
>
> "Since Mr. Mays has been sitting on death row, he has not been diagnosed,
> treated or received prescribed medications for any mental illness or
> obsession
> that has any bearing on this inquiry," the court found.
>
> During Mays' trial, jurors heard more than a week of testimony. It took
> jurors
> just under three hours to hand down Randall Mays' death sentence for the
> murder
> of Ogburn and Habelt. Mays was sentenced by Judge Carter Terrance to the
> death
> penalty by lethal injection after the death penalty was recommended by an
> Athens jury.
>
> Mays initially entered a not guilty plea. In Mays' letter dated January 6,
> 2013, to his wife, he described the crime scene and provided specific
> details
> of the officers' actions. Also, less than a month prior to the original
> execution date of March 18, 2015, Mays wrote a detailed letter to his
> sister
> regarding the cost of necessary materials needed to build "the wood box"
> and
> gave information on where to obtain the supplies. In the same letter, he
> informed her of the burial plots purchased for the Mays family in Dunbar
> cemetery.
>
> A 911 tape was played from the day of the shooting and pictures of the
> crime
> scene were also shown in court. At one point Mays became visibly shaken and
> began to weep during the proceedings.
>
> The Court allowed the testimony of 2 mental health experts on the subject
> of
> Mays' state of mind during the shootings. They testified about Mays'
> paranoia
> and depression leading up to when he allegedly shot the Henderson County
> deputies.
>
> It was also revealed in court that Mays' older brother, Noble Mays, was
> executed in 1995 for a capital murder offense.
>
> The Henderson County District Attorney's Office confirmed to KLTV that on
> Monday Mays was found competent by a judge to be executed.
>
> District Attorney Mark Hall, who was joined by First Assistant Nancy Rumar
> in
> arguing the competency case in August, released a statement saying that he
> believes the Judge made the correct call.
>
> Hall intends to file a motion for the Court to set an execution date but
> anticipates that before it is carried out, Mays will make a motion that the
> Court of Criminal Appeals (CCA) review Judge Clayton's order and enter a
> judgment of whether to adopt the order, findings, and recommendations.
>
> The CCA will determine whether any existing execution date should be
> withdrawn
> and a stay of execution issued while the court is conducting its review.
> Otherwise, the execution will be carried out as ordered.
>
> (source: NewsWest9.com)
>
> ************
>
> Leaving the death penalty behind
>
>
>
> With 17 executions to date, plus 13 scheduled for the remainder of 2017,
> the
> U.S. may see a historically low number of executions this year, according
> to a
> mid-year review by the Death Penalty Information Center (DPIC). Death
> sentences, executions, and death penalty support has been waning since
> capital
> punishment's heyday in the late 1990s, and it appears that this trend will
> continue far beyond 2017. As capital punishment undergoes a historic
> decline
> and its constitutionality is challenged, states are adopting death penalty
> reforms, while some are abandoning the practice altogether, which is making
> executions and death sentences ever more rare.
>
> Recently, the Florida Supreme Court required the Sunshine State to cease
> its
> longstanding unconstitutional practice of delivering death sentences
> without a
> unanimous jury decision. As a result, the Florida legislature passed a bill
> requiring unanimous jury recommendations in order to sentence someone to
> die,
> bringing the state in compliance with past court rulings. Roughly 200
> Florida
> death row inmates must be resentenced following the invalidation of their
> death
> sentences due to non-unanimous jury recommendations. Previously, judges
> were
> allowed to sentence defendants to death without a unanimous jury
> recommendation. Judges could even override a jury's recommendation
> altogether.
> But following Perry v. State, which struck down this statute, Alabama is
> left
> as the only state where judges may still impose death sentences despite a
> jury's recommendation.
>
> Yet, even as Alabama maintains the death penalty, its lawmakers are also
> looking to alter the state???s death penalty practices, which may
> significantly
> curtail use. The Alabama legislature sent the Governor a bill that would
> ban
> judges from delivering death sentences in cases where the jury recommended
> life
> incarceration. This process of judicial override has resulted in
> politically
> motivated decision-making in which 92% of all judicial overrides since 1976
> were used to overrule life sentences in favor of the death penalty. This
> violates a bedrock principle of the criminal justice system whereby a jury
> of
> our peers retains the final authority in trials. The legislature's desire
> to
> end judicial overrides signals a greater commitment to the role of jurors
> in
> the criminal justice system and may result in fewer death sentences.
>
> It's not just sentencing changes in states like Alabama and Florida that
> are
> causing our record low death penalty usage - the public at large is simply
> losing faith with the system. According to a 2016 PEW research survey,
> national
> support for the death penalty is below 50% for the 1st time in decades. In
> light of this development, we've seen a number of states walk away from the
> death penalty. Connecticut and Delaware have continued to empty their death
> rows after their death penalty statutes were declared unconstitutional.
> Adding
> to the concerns about the system, 3 people have been exonerated from death
> row
> in 2017 so far, bringing the total number of exonerations up to 159 since
> 1973.
> However, despite apparent breakthroughs on the issue, there is still
> reason for
> concern.
>
> While executions are waning in most places, there are a few outlier states
> that
> may witness an uptick in executions. Despite executing the fewest people
> in 2
> decades in 2016, Texas has already executed 4 individuals in 2017, and
> Ohio is
> potentially set to execute 5 people between now and the end of the year.
> Gov.
> Kasich of Ohio even announced an astounding 27 new execution dates through
> 2021, despite Ohio's history with botched executions and wrongful
> convictions.
> In Ohio, 9 people have been exonerated from death row. Those same
> exonerees are
> now urging the Governor via petition to consider the consequences of
> potentially executing 27 people in the next few years. They know firsthand
> that
> the death penalty poses a great risk due to its irreversible nature.
>
> Capital punishment is not going away just yet. Undoubtedly, there will be
> challenges to face in 2017 and the years to come. But it's becoming
> increasingly likely that remaining states will continue to drastically
> curtail
> or even eliminate their death penalty programs altogether. The evidence is
> clear. Wrongful convictions, botched executions, miscarriages of justice,
> and
> the death penalty's high costs have caused the public to lose their
> support for
> the death penalty. It's hopeful that states will respond to this growing
> sentiment by leaving the death penalty behind once and for all.
>
> (source: Brian Bensimon, a government major at the University of Texas, is
> a
> Charles Koch Institute Communications Fellow with Conservatives Concerned
> About
> the Death Penalty, a Project of EJUSA----The (Univ. Texas) Daily Texan)
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> FLORIDA----impending execution
>
> Florida man asks US Supreme Court to halt planned execution
>
>
>
> A Florida inmate convicted of killing 2 people decades ago has asked the
> U.S.
> Supreme Court to halt Thursday's scheduled execution.
>
>
> Attorneys for Michael Lambrix filed the appeal Tuesday. Lambrix was
> convicted
> of killing Clarence Moore and Aleisha Bryant. Prosecutors said he killed
> the
> pair in 1983 outside his trailer near LaBelle, northeast of Fort Myers,
> after
> an evening of drinking.
>
> Lambrix argued that the execution, scheduled for 6 p.m. Thursday, should be
> halted after Florida's death penalty sentencing method was found to be
> unconstitutional. The state has since required a unanimous jury vote in
> death
> cases.
>
> The jury was not unanimous in either of Lambrix's death sentence
> decisions, but
> Florida's Supreme Court has said the new rules do not apply to cases as
> old as
> his.
>
> (source: Associated Press)
>
> ********************************
>
> Vigil for Shropshire man's death row pen pal
>
>
>
> A British pen pal of a convicted Florida killer on death row will be
> holding a
> vigil as he waits to hear if a last-ditch appeal has succeeded.
>
> Mike Lambrix is due to be executed tonight by lethal injection after 33
> years
> on death row.
>
> Speaking to US media, Lambrix said recent changes to the law meant his
> death
> sentence was unconstitutional.
>
> Jan Arriens, from Bishop's Castle in Shropshire, has been writing to
> Lambrix
> since 1991.
>
> Mr Arriens said Lambrix currently has 3 appeals before the US Supreme
> Court,
> including one handwritten by the killer himself, running to 25 pages.
>
> It is possible Lambrix won't find out if 1 of his appeals has been
> successful
> "until he's on the gurney waiting for the lethal injection to be applied,"
> Mr
> Arriens said.
>
> "We're having a vigil with a small number of people here in Bishop's
> Castle,"
> he said.
>
> "We'll be sitting here not knowing what's happened unless a stay comes
> through.
> If it goes ahead, we won't know until we get a text from a witness."
>
> According to the Jacksonville Daily Record, Lambrix murdered a couple he
> had
> invited to his trailer for dinner.
>
> He was accused of attacking Clarence Moore Jr when they were alone outside
> the
> trailer, then calling Aleisha Bryant outside, where she was kicked in the
> head
> and strangled.
>
> Mr Arriens said Lambrix claims he hit the man in self defence after
> finding Ms
> Bryant strangled.
>
> But the Florida state's version was he killed both victims intentionally.
>
> 'Deliberate murder'
>
> Under recent changes to the law in Florida, Mr Arriens said Lambrix would
> not
> have been sentenced to death because jurors did not vote unanimously for
> his
> execution.
>
> Lambrix told US media: "It won't be an execution. It'll be a deliberate
> act of
> murder.
>
> "Myself and everybody sentenced to death since 1974 who had anything less
> than
> a unanimous jury verdict were illegally and unconstitutionally sentenced to
> death."
>
> Mr Arriens won't know if his pen pal has died until after Lambrix's
> scheduled
> execution at 23:00 BST (18:00 local time).
>
> He added: "He knows the end could well come today."
>
> (source: BBC News)
>
> *******************************
>
> Push for stay of execution for Michael Lambrix
>
>
>
> Michael Lambrix has maintained his innocence for 34 years, but he said he
> won't
> repeat the claim, out of respect for the victims' families, if it comes
> time
> for him to make a final statement at his execution.
>
> Michael Lambrix is a Plant City high school dropout. He had run-ins with
> the
> law at an early age.
>
> "Just stupid stuff. writing bad checks, and stealing a couple cars,"
> Lambrix
> explained.
>
> Lambrix was arrested after his girlfriend was stopped in Tampa driving the
> victim's car.
>
> "A witness that the jury in my 1st trial found so un-credible that they
> couldn't reach any verdict," he said.
>
> Florida's Catholic Bishops have sent a letter to Governor Rick Scott,
> asking
> him to stop the pending execution. It cites both constitutional and moral
> grounds.
>
> Ingrid DelGado of the Florida Catholic Conference said, "Had Mr. Lambrix
> been
> sentenced after 2002, his case would be eligible for resentencing, but
> also Mr.
> Lambrix has indicated he was offered a plea deal, which had he accepted
> it, he
> would have already returned to society."
>
> During an hour-long interview, Lambrix repeatedly professed his innocence.
>
> "In fact, I'll be the only honorably discharged disabled veteran Governor
> Scott
> has ever killed," he said.
>
> But the death row inmate says he will not repeat his claims of innocence
> if it
> comes to making a final statement at his execution.
>
> Lambrix said, "The last thing I want to do is cause any more pain or
> suffering
> to the Bryant family."
>
> Instead, Lambrix will say the Lord's Prayer
>
> Lambrix said, "I have no doubt whatsoever that I'm going to wake up to a
> better
> existence."
>
> Lambrix's family, including his mother, stepfather, sisters, and children
> are
> all at the prison. All are being counseled about grief in what could be the
> final hours of Michael Lambrix's life.
>
> A spokesman for Governor Rick Scott said, "Signing death warrants is one
> of the
> governor's most solemn duties. The governor's top concern is always with
> the
> families of the victims of these horrible crimes."
>
> (source: WJHG news)
>
> **************************
>
> Prosecutors seek death penalty for mother, daughter charged in toddler's
> beating death
>
>
>
> Prosecutors plan to seek the death penalty for an Orlando mother and
> daughter
> accused in the beating death of a toddler on July 7.
>
> A grand jury in late August indicted Callene M. Barton, 58, and Lakesha
> Lewis,
> 29, on charges of 1st-degree murder, witness intimidation and child
> neglect.
>
> The 2 are accused of beating 3-year-old Xavier Mokarzel-Satchel with a
> plastic
> wand from window blinds before Barton threw the boy against a wall. Xavier
> died
> hours later from blunt-force trauma to his head.
>
> In court documents, prosecutors listed Xavier's young age and the fact
> that he
> was "particularly vulnerable" among the case's aggravating circumstances to
> justify seeking the death penalty if they are convicted.
>
> Xavier was the son of Lewis's live-in girlfriend, Brandi Marie Mokarzel,
> 23, of
> Orlando.
>
> Mokarzel previously testified that the abuse that led to her son's death
> began
> back months before. She said the women beat him with slippers, plastic
> spoons
> and the wand ultimately used in Xavier's death.
>
> Xavier's fatal beating was a punishment for helping himself to yogurt and
> milk
> and making a mess, Mokarzel told investigators. Photos from the scene
> showed a
> milk jug on the kitchen floor with the cap off and little pieces of the
> plastic
> wand scattered around the living room.
>
> As Xavier laid dying, Mokarzel said Lewis and Barton told her they would
> have
> her and Xavier hurt or killed if she told officers about the abuse.
>
> Mokarzel is charged with child neglect.
>
> (source: Orlando Sentinel)
>
> **********************
>
> Florida to seek death penalty against suspect in "killer clown" cold case
>
>
>
> Prosecutors say they will seek the death penalty against a woman accused of
> dressing up like a clown in 1990 and fatally shooting the wife of her
> future
> husband.
>
> State Attorney Dave Aronberg issued a statement Wednesday saying he will
> seek
> the death penalty against 54-year-old Sheila Keen Warren, who was ordered
> held
> without bond at a court hearing.
>
> She was extradited Tuesday from Abingdon, Virginia, where she lived with
> her
> husband Michael Warren for years.
>
> Sheila Warren was arrested last month. Officials say Marlene Warren was
> shot in
> the face by a clown delivering carnations and balloons. Investigators say
> a new
> DNA testing gave them what they needed to make an arrest.
>
> Attorney Richard Lubin said Sheila Warren "vehemently denies" the killing.
>
> Detectives who were giving the case a fresh look in 2014 learned that in
> 2002,
> Keen Warren had married the victim's husband, Michael Warren. A cold case
> detective said several witnesses told police that Keen Warren -- then
> Sheila
> Keen -- and Michael Warren were having an affair. Both, however, have
> denied
> that they were romantically involved at the time of the 1990 murder.
>
> Michael Warren was with his now wife when she was arrested in Virginia and
> was
> re-interviewed in the case, police say.
>
> He has not been charged, but police refused to rule him out as a suspect.
>
> Detectives vowed to "work diligently" to determine if anyone else was
> involved
> in the slaying.
>
> (source: CBS News)
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ALABAMA----impending execution
>
> Divided court opens door for Alabama execution
>
>
>
> In a brief order entered yesterday afternoon, the Supreme Court allowed the
> execution of an Alabama inmate to go forward. The state had asked the
> court to
> intervene after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit put the
> execution on hold; the ruling means that the execution of Jeffrey Borden
> can
> proceed as scheduled this evening.
>
> Borden was sentenced to death for the murders of his estranged wife and her
> father on Christmas Eve 1993. He shot Cheryl Borden in the back of her
> head in
> front of their children; he then shot his father-in-law in the back as he
> attempted to run to safety. Borden's challenge to his execution has been a
> common one in death-penalty cases in recent years: He argues that the
> 3-drug
> protocol that the state plans to use to execute him violates the
> Constitution's
> bar on cruel and unusual punishment. In particular, he contends, the 1st
> drug
> in that protocol - midazolam - will sedate him but cannot guarantee that he
> will not feel excruciating pain from the drugs that follow.
>
> A federal district court in Alabama dismissed his claims, but the 11th
> Circuit
> reversed and ordered the district court to order an evidentiary hearing.
> Last
> week the court of appeals put the execution on hold to give the lower court
> enough time to consider Borden's claims. That prompted Alabama to go to the
> Supreme Court on Monday, where it told the justices that "Alabama has
> already
> carried out 4 executions using this protocol. Any questions concerning
> 3-drug
> midazolam protocols have effectively been answered."
>
> 3 justices - Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor -
> indicated that they would have denied the state's request, leaving Borden 2
> justices short of the support that he needed to block his execution.
>
> (source: scotusblog.com)
>
> *******************
>
> U.S. Supreme Court clears Thursday execution in Alabama
>
>
>
> The U.S. Supreme Court Wednesday cleared the way for Alabama's planned
> execution Thursday of inmate Jeffrey Lynn Borden for the Christmas Eve 1993
> shooting deaths of his estranged wife and her father in Gardendale.
>
> The U.S. Supreme Court issued an order granting the request of the Alabama
> Attorney General's Office to vacate the injunction blocking the execution
> that
> had been issued by the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals last week. The
> Attorney General's Office had appealed the 11th Circuit's order to the U.S.
> Supreme Court on Monday.
>
> In the order from the U.S. Supreme Court 3 associate justices - Ruth Bader
> Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, and Sonia Sotomayor - said they would have
> denied the
> Attorney General's request and kept the injunction blocking the execution
> in
> place.
>
> The execution is scheduled for 6 p.m. Thursday at the Holman Correctional
> Facility in Atmore.
>
> Borden has been on death row 22 years, and was convicted of the murders of
> Cheryl Borden and her father Roland Harris. The murders took place at a
> family
> gathering in Gardendale on Christmas Eve 1993.
>
> On Tuesday morning attorneys for Borden filed a response to the Alabama
> Attorney General's Office motion saying the stay of execution should
> remain in
> place.
>
> (source: al.com)
>
> *********************
>
> Inmate asks high court to keep execution on hold
>
>
>
> An Alabama inmate is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to keep his execution on
> hold.
>
>
>
> Lawyers for 56-year-old Jeffery Lynn Borden on Tuesday asked justices to
> uphold
> the injunction currently blocking Borden's execution scheduled for
> Thursday.
>
> Borden has challenged the humanness of Alabama's lethal injection
> procedure.
> His lawyers said the state is making a "macabre and cynical attempt" to end
> that legal challenge by executing him.
>
> Alabama asked the high court to overturn an injunction issued last week by
> the
> 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
>
> The state argued justices have allowed other executions to proceed using
> the
> same drug combination, and Borden's should go forward as well.
>
> Borden was convicted of killing his estranged wife, Cheryl Borden, and her
> father, Roland Harris, during a 1993 Christmas Eve gathering.
>
> (source: Montgomery Advertiser)
>
> ************************
>
> Urgent Action
>
>
>
> STATE MOVES TO HAVE STAY OF EXECUTION LIFTED
>
> The State of Alabama has asked the US Supreme Court to lift a stay of
> execution
> granted to Jeffrey Borden, and to be allowed to execute him before
> midnight on
> 5 October. While the stay relates to a challenge to the state???s lethal
> injection protocol, Jeffrey Borden is said by his lawyers to have a severe
> mental disability and to be "actively psychotic".
>
> ??? Write a letter, send an email, call, fax or tweet:
>
> * Call on the governor to stop this execution of Jeffrey Borden and to
> commute
> his death sentence;
>
> * Note with deep concern the evidence of Jeffrey Borden's serious mental
> disability;
>
> * Explain that you are not seeking to downplay the seriousness of the
> crime or
> the suffering caused
>
> Friendly reminder: If you send an email, please create your own instead of
> forwarding this one!
>
> Contact below official by 5 October, 2017:
>
> Governor Kay Ivey
>
> Alabama State Capitol, 600 Dexter Avenue
>
> Montgomery, Alabama 36130
>
> USA
>
> Fax: +1 334 353 0004
>
> Email: http://216.226.177.218/forms/contact.aspx
>
> (If you are not based in the US, please use Amnesty's New York office as
> your
> address:
>
> 5 Penn Plaza, 16th Floor, New York, NY 10001)
>
> Salutation: Dear Governor
>
> (source: Amnesty International USA)
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> LOUISIANA:
>
> Former death row inmate John Thompson, who became advocate for the
> exonerated,
> dies at 55
>
>
>
> John Thompson, a former death row inmate who narrowly escaped execution in
> 1999, then won his release from prison and a fleeting $14 million judgment
> against the Orleans Parish District Attorney's Office over a shocking case
> of
> prosecutorial misconduct, died Tuesday at a local hospital.
>
> The cause was a heart attack, said local prison reform advocate Norris
> Henderson, a friend who knew Thompson from their years at the Louisiana
> State
> Penitentiary at Angola.
>
> Thompson was 55.
>
> After his release in 2003, Thompson became a national voice for victims of
> prosecutorial abuses. Locally, he founded Resurrection After Exoneration, a
> re-entry and support program for released inmates on St. Bernard Avenue.
>
> "John was a good person. All he wanted to do with the rest of his life was
> kind
> of give back," Henderson said. "He traveled across the country, educating
> public defenders about the attorney-client relationship - how they have to
> listen to their clients. When you hear a bunch of stories about 'I didn't
> do
> it,' people get jaded."
>
> Thompson's own prosecution involved hidden blood evidence in a carjacking
> case
> that former District Attorney Harry Connick's office used to help secure
> his
> conviction and death sentence in the high-profile murder of New Orleans
> hotel
> executive Ray Liuzza Jr.
>
> Thompson was accused in both crimes, which took place a few months apart in
> 1984.
>
> Connick's office tried him first in the carjacking. A jury convicted him,
> and a
> judge handed Thompson a 49-year prison sentence. Thompson then declined to
> take
> the witness stand in his murder trial, knowing the earlier conviction would
> come into play if he testified.
>
> He'd spent 14 years on death row and was just 30 days from an execution
> date
> that appeared certain when an investigator discovered blood evidence from
> the
> carjacking victim's clothes that the state never revealed. It was the
> carjacker's blood, but it wasn't Thompson's.
>
> A former prosecutor then revealed that Gerry Deegan, one of the
> prosecutors who
> tried Thompson, confessed on his death bed in 1994 that he intentionally
> hid
> the blood evidence.
>
> Both convictions were thrown out, and Thompson was acquitted in a 2003
> retrial
> for Liuzza's murder. Thompson testified in his own defense, along with new
> witnesses who contradicted the state's evidence. He was released that day
> and
> later won a federal jury verdict for $14 million in 2007.
>
> But in a 5-4 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court dissolved that award, ruling
> in
> 2011 that a district attorney's office can't be held liable for a single
> violation of Brady v. Maryland, the 1963 decision that requires
> prosecutors to
> turn over all favorable evidence to the defense.
>
> Thompson had failed to show there was a pattern of violations in Connick's
> office that would demonstrate "deliberate indifference" in failing to train
> prosecutors, the court found in an opinion authored by Justice Clarence
> Thomas.
>
> Thompson wasn't shy afterward in accusing Connick's office of criminal
> acts, in
> his case and others.
>
> "I don't care about the money. I just want to know why the prosecutors who
> hid
> evidence, sent me to prison for something I didn't do and nearly had me
> killed
> are not in jail themselves," Thompson wrote in a 2011 editorial published
> in
> The New York Times. "There were no ethics charges against them, no criminal
> charges, no one was fired and now, according to the Supreme Court, no one
> can
> be sued."
>
> Thompson was always clear that, while he was not a killer, he was no angel
> at
> the time of his arrest.
>
> He was a hustler and small-time drug dealer when police fingered him in
> Liuzza's killing. He said he had sold a marijuana joint laced with PCP to a
> customer who paid him with the murder weapon and a ring that had belonged
> to
> Liuzza.
>
> When Thompson first arrived on death row in 1987, he entered his assigned
> cell
> to find the belongings of Sterling Rault, who had just been executed - 1
> of 8
> executions that year in Louisiana, all by electric chair.
>
> "My mind would light with images of me being strapped to the chair, the
> sound
> of electricity ringing in my head," Thompson wrote later.
>
> At first, he was hot-headed and regularly disciplined by prison officials.
> Older prisoners such as Mwalimu Johnson and Robert King Wilkerson helped
> him
> break the pattern, Thompson said.
>
> "When I got out of the hole, Mwalimu would say, 'When you gonna stop that?
> You
> can't win that war,'" Thompson said.
>
> "You use that ink pen, use that pencil," Wilkerson told him, advising
> Thompson
> to fight the system in court.
>
> Thompson lost his grandmother, who raised him, and his father while he sat
> on
> death row in the mid-1990s. His sons, Dedric and John Jr., were 6 and 4
> when he
> was arrested. They grew up thinking he was a killer, and during visits to
> Angola, they spoke with their father through a steel-mesh window the size
> of a
> cereal box.
>
> Thompson, though, was intent on maintaining contact.
>
> "I remember one time, when he was talking with me on the phone, I had
> complained about the school shoes my mom had bought me. Not a week later, a
> brand-new pair of sneakers arrived at my house, from him," said Dedric
> West,
> who's now 38.
>
> West also recalled a visit to Angola when Thompson was nearing 1 of his 6
> execution dates.
>
> "He asked me to promise him that I wasn't going to be angry with the
> system and
> then do something that he didn't approve of," he said. "He wanted to make
> sure
> that I didn't have any ill feelings toward society. And I understood that.
> So I
> promised him."
>
> When a court assigned Thompson his last execution date, for May 1999, he
> sold
> his belongings to other prisoners to raise money for his family. Those
> inmates
> sent money orders to Carol Kolinchak, one of Thompson's lawyers, with
> directions.
>
> "To the last, he wanted to do his best to support them," Kolinchak said.
> "That's what he was thinking about in those moments."
>
> After his acquittal, Thompson got back in touch with a childhood friend,
> Laverne Thompson. They wed in June 2003 and moved into a Habitat for
> Humanity-built house in the St. Roch neighborhood.
>
> Though he devoted himself to exposing prosecutorial corruption, Thompson
> maintained a sense of humor that revealed itself in easy laughter at the
> antics
> of his grandchildren. A gifted mimic, he often would parrot the voices of
> arrogant public officials.
>
> Still, he said he continued to feel the effects of his time inside prison.
>
> "I'm still struggling," he said often. "I'm still struggling every day."
>
> Emily Maw, director of the Innocence Project New Orleans, described
> Thompson as
> "an amazing force in the world" and a "national legend" who fought for
> justice
> as a New Orleanian, not only as a death row survivor.
>
> "He was nearly murdered by the state, so Clarence Thomas taking away a jury
> verdict was nothing for John, except that it said in the halls of power
> your
> life still doesn't matter," Maw said hours after Thompson's death.
>
> "He was always strong and thoughtful and defiant. I can't say it didn't
> affect
> him, that it wasn't gut-wrenching for him to be formally told that he did
> not
> matter enough ... that none of that mattered enough," she added.
>
> "But he did what he always did with the dreadful injustices life threw at
> him
> over and over again: He decided to use it to fight for accountability and
> more
> justice for people who came after him."
>
> Thompson is survived by his wife and 2 sons.
>
> (source: The New Orleans Advocate)
>
> *************************
>
> John Thompson, Cleared After 14 Years on Death Row, Dies at 55
>
>
>
> On May 20, 1999, the day before his younger son's high school graduation,
> John
> Thompson was scheduled to be electrocuted in the Louisiana State
> Penitentiary.
> He had survived 6 other execution dates, but he was running out of
> miracles.
>
> Early in 1985, when he was 22, Mr. Thompson had been arrested in New
> Orleans
> for a carjacking and for the separate murder of a local hotel executive.
>
> By 1999, he had spent 14 years on death row at the notorious
> maximum-security
> prison farm known as Angola, named for the nation from which blacks who
> worked
> on a former plantation there had been abducted by slave traders.
>
> Just 30 days before his scheduled execution, a private investigator hired
> by
> his lawyers stumbled upon a forgotten microfiche.
>
> The film included images of a laboratory report that had been received by
> the
> district attorney 2 days before Mr. Thompson's trial was to begin. The
> report
> categorically undermined the prosecution's case, revealing that the blood
> type
> of whoever committed the carjacking did not match Mr. Thompson's.
>
> Moreover, in a deathbed confession, a former assistant prosecutor admitted
> he
> had deliberately hidden the blood evidence from Mr. Thompson's trial
> lawyers.
>
> After tests confirmed that Mr. Thompson's blood type and DNA did not match
> the
> perpetrator's, his robbery conviction was overturned. In 2002, the murder
> verdict was reversed. A year later, he was retried and acquitted after the
> jury
> deliberated for 35 minutes.
>
> Mr. Thompson was awarded $14 million in damages by a Louisiana jury in
> 2007 -
> $1 million for every year he was isolated for 23 hours a day in a
> windowless
> cell, awaiting his execution.
>
> But in 2011, an ideologically split United States Supreme Court ruled 5 to
> 4
> that Mr. Thompson was not entitled to damages after all.
>
> Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who dissented, said at least 5 prosecutors had
> been complicit in violating Mr. Thompson's constitutional rights because
> "they
> kept from him, year upon year, evidence vital to his defense."
>
> But Justice Clarence Thomas, writing for the majority, said Mr. Thompson
> had
> not demonstrated that the office of District Attorney Harry Connick Sr.
> (father
> of the singer) had systematically withheld exculpatory evidence,
> particularly
> from black defendants, or had not trained his assistants sufficiently.
>
> "The role of a prosecutor," Justice Thomas wrote, "is to see that justice
> is
> done. By their own admission, the prosecutors who tried Thompson's armed
> robbery case failed to carry out this responsibility.
>
> "But the only issue before us," he added, "is whether Connick, as the
> policy
> maker for the district attorney's office, was deliberately indifferent to
> the
> need to train the attorneys under his authority."
>
> Mr. Thompson died of a heart attack on Tuesday in a New Orleans hospital,
> according to Emily Maw, director of the Innocence Project New Orleans,
> which
> helped represent him in his appeals. He was 55.
>
> In the decade since he was exonerated, Mr. Thompson had married, become a
> churchgoer and established an organization called Resurrection After
> Exoneration to help and house former inmates in similar predicaments.
>
> "I don't care about the money," he wrote in an Op-Ed article in The New
> York
> Times in 2011. "I just want to know why the prosecutors who hid evidence,
> sent
> me to prison for something I didn't do and nearly had me killed are not in
> jail
> themselves.
>
> "There were no ethics charges against them," he continued, "no criminal
> charges, no one was fired and now, according to the Supreme Court, no one
> can
> be sued."
>
> Mr. Thompson was born in New Orleans on Sept. 6, 1962. By the time his
> mother,
> Josephine Thompson, gave birth, John's father, Charles Jackson, was
> serving a
> life sentence for murder.
>
> Raised mostly by his grandparents in the Central City neighborhood, he
> dropped
> out of high school and fathered 2 sons by 2 different girlfriends while
> still a
> teenager.
>
> On Jan. 17, 1985, the police kicked in the door of his grandmother's house
> while Mr. Thompson was there and as his girlfriend, mother and 2 sons -
> John
> Jr., 4, and Dedric, 6 - huddled in terror.
>
> The carjacking of a vehicle carrying young siblings had occurred a few
> weeks
> before, on Dec. 28, 1984. Mr. Thompson was charged with that crime and
> also,
> along with a co-defendant, Kevin Freeman, with murdering a local hotel
> executive, Ray Liuzza Jr., on Dec. 6. Mr. Freeman implicated Mr. Thompson.
>
> "A few weeks earlier he had sold me a ring and a gun," Mr. Thompson said
> of Mr.
> Freeman in the Op-Ed article. "It turned out that the ring belonged to the
> victim and the gun was the murder weapon.
>
> "My picture was on the news, and a man called in to report that I looked
> like
> someone who had recently tried to rob his children," Mr. Thompson
> continued.
> "Suddenly I was accused of that crime, too. I was tried for the robbery
> 1st. My
> lawyers never knew there was blood evidence at the scene, and I was
> convicted
> based on the victims' identification.
>
> "After that, my lawyers thought it was best if I didn't testify at the
> murder
> trial. And now that I officially had a history of violent crime because of
> the
> robbery conviction, the prosecutors used it to get the death penalty."
>
> After being sentenced to 49 years in prison for the carjacking that he
> insisted
> he did not commit, Mr. Thompson was convicted of murder and received the
> death
> penalty.
>
> Less than 2 months after he was released in 2003, after a total of 18
> years in
> prison, he married Laverne Jackson, with whom he had grown up and who
> attended
> church with his mother.
>
> He is survived by his wife; his mother, Josephine Casey; two half-brothers,
> Jermaine and Charles Jackson; a half-sister, Shermaine Jackson; 5
> stepchildren;
> and 12 grandchildren and stepgrandchildren.
>
> At various points in his appeals and civil suit, Mr. Thompson was
> represented
> without fee by, among others, Michael L. Banks and J. Gordon Cooney Jr. of
> Morgan, Lewis & Bockius in Philadelphia and Ms. Maw of the Innocence
> Project.
> She was assisted by Barry Scheck, director of the Innocence Project
> nationwide.
>
> In a 2003 interview on the website probono.net, Mr. Banks said, "The
> initial
> linchpin to our success was proving that John was not responsible for an
> unrelated carjacking that effectively prevented him from testifying in his
> own
> defense during the murder trial."
>
> Mr. Scheck said in a phone interview that initially "his lawyers didn't
> necessarily think he was innocent; they were just trying to save his life."
> But, he added, "the more they went into it, the whole thing unraveled."
>
> Similar cases have continued to emerge in New Orleans as recently as this
> year,
> Mr. Scheck said.
>
> In the Thompson case, after the blood test results pointed to Mr.
> Thompson's
> innocence, a former prosecutor, Michael Riehlmann, disclosed that several
> years
> earlier, an ailing junior assistant, Gerry Deegan, as he was nearing
> death, had
> confessed that he gone into an evidence room and removed the pants from
> which
> the bloodstains were taken in order to keep them from the defense.
>
> Mr. Connick, the district attorney, did not seek re-election in 2003. His
> successor, Leon A. Cannizzaro Jr., expressed relief when the Supreme Court
> reversed the civil award. With interest, it would have amounted to nearly
> $20
> million - more than the annual budget of the prosecutor's office.
>
> Mr. Thompson was stunned.
>
> "If I'd spilled hot coffee on myself, I could have sued the person who
> served
> me the coffee," he said. "But I can't sue the prosecutors who nearly
> murdered
> me."
>
> Ms. Maw, of the Innocence Project, recalled that Mr. Thompson had
> maintained
> his commitment to reforming the judicial system from the moment he was
> released.
>
> "He was angry, and yet he had astounding strength from the moment he got
> out
> and a need to channel his anger to doing good in the world," she said in a
> phone interview. "And that is what he did until he died."
>
> (source: New York Times)
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> OHIO----death sentence overturned
>
> Ohio court overturns death sentence in bartender's death
>
>
>
> The knife collection of a man accused of raping and killing a female
> bartender
> should not have been introduced into evidence at trial because the weapons
> weren't used in the slaying, a divided Ohio Supreme Court ruled Wednesday
> as it
> overturned the conviction and death sentence of the accused.
>
> The ruling sends the case of defendant Joseph Thomas back to northeastern
> Ohio's Lake County for a new trial.
>
> Thomas, 33, was convicted and sentenced to death in 2012 for the slaying of
> Annie McSween 2 years earlier.
>
> Prosecutors say Thomas attacked the 49-year-old McSween by her car after
> she
> asked him to leave the bar where she worked.
>
> Writing for the majority, Justice Terrence O'Donnell said the trial judge
> improperly allowed into evidence a knife collection belonging to Thomas
> but not
> involved in the killing. Allowing the 5 knives was misleading given the
> circumstantial case against Thomas, O'Donnell said.
>
> "This evidence painted Thomas as someone with bad character and allowed the
> jury to convict him on the basis that he acted in conformity with it,"
> O'Donnell said.
>
> Justice Patrick Fischer, writing for the minority, noted that prosecutors
> argued Thomas was known to carry a blue knife, and that knife was missing
> from
> his collection. Fischer acknowledged it was a "close question" whether
> introducing that evidence was a mistake.
>
> Lake County Prosecutor Charles Coulson said Wednesday he'll ask the court
> to
> reconsider its decision.
>
> The knife collection "was introduced because the defendant had a blue
> knife,
> people saw the defendant having a blue knife that night, when we go to his
> collection, the blue knife is missing," Coulson said. "So that's
> circumstantial
> evidence toward part of the crime."
>
> The prosecutor has 30 days to file for reconsideration.
>
> John Parker, Thomas' defense attorney, said he was happy with the ruling.
>
> (source: The Republic)
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Subject: Digest Footer
>
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> ------------------------------
>
> End of DeathPenalty Digest, Vol 155, Issue 5
> ********************************************
>

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