[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, N.J., ALA., W.VA., LA.

[Rick Halperin]

December 6


TEXAS----death sentence overturned

Texas Court of Criminal Appeals overturns death sentence for inmate Kenneth 
Wayne Thomas----Thomas' conviction stands, but he is entitled to a new 
punishment hearing based on modern standards for assessing intellectual 
disabilities, the court ruled.



Death row inmate Kenneth Wayne Thomas could see his sentence adjusted after the 
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals on Wednesday ordered a new punishment hearing 
based on Thomas' claims of intellectual disability.

In 1987, Thomas was convicted of capital murder for the 1986 slayings of 
Mildred and Fred Finch, who he stabbed to death and whose bones he broke after 
breaking into their home in South Dallas. He was sentenced to death despite 
claims of mental illness.

Most recently, after a slew of appeals, in 2014, a jury found that Thomas was 
not “a person with mental retardation,” according to court documents. But the 
state’s highest criminal court wrote Wednesday that the jury had based its 
decision on antiquated standards for determining intellectual disability, and 
that Thomas is entitled to a new punishment hearing in which jurors employ 
modern standards.

“As a matter of due process, Thomas is entitled to a new punishment hearing,” 
Judge Bert Richardson wrote for the majority on a divided court.

In 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the case of Bobby Moore that Texas was 
relying on decades-old medical standards and thus violating the Eighth 
Amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment. Since that case, 
Richardson wrote, the Court of Criminal Appeals has sent at least 6 
intellectual disability cases down to lower courts for additional fact-finding.

(source: Texas Tribune)

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

Death Watch: Lucky 13?----The state on pace for a baker’s dozen of executions 
by year end



If all goes according to the state's plan, Texas will have executed 13 inmates 
by 2018's end. After 5 failed attempts to secure a stay from the U.S. Supreme 
Court, Joseph Garcia was executed just before 7pm on Tuesday – with the very 
drug challenged in his last-minute appeals.

In the last week, Garcia's attorneys filed several new motions for a stay due 
to a "belief" that the Texas Depart­ment of Criminal Justice acquires its 
execution drug pentobarbital "from a compounding pharmacy that has been 
repeatedly cited for safety and sanitation violations by state and federal 
regulators, and has been on probation with the Texas State Board of Pharmacy 
since 2016." The filings argued that execution would violate Garcia's 8th and 
14th Amendment rights, since "substantial concerns" have been raised that the 
drug "will not be what it purports to be, will be contaminated, or will be 
otherwise substandard."

These filings came in response to a BuzzFeed News article published Wednesday, 
Nov. 28, based on documents identifying one of two manufacturers for Texas' 
lethal injection drugs: Houston's Greenpark Compounding Pharmacy, on probation 
for compounding the wrong drug for several children and forging quality control 
documents. It's also been cited by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for 
potential sterility violations.

Texas is currently defending a 2014 lawsuit that challenges the state's refusal 
to identify its drug suppliers so as to avoid botched executions. BuzzFeed 
reported that, after receiving lethal injection, Texas inmates Anthony Shore, 
Juan Castillo, Troy Clark, Christopher Young, and Danny Bible all made 
declarations of pain and a "burning" feeling before dying.

Now Alvin Braziel Jr. is staring down a death date of Dec. 11, for the 1993 
robbery-murder of Douglas White on a East­field College trail in Mesquite; 
White's wife Lora was brutally raped by his killer. 8 years later, after DNA 
linked Braziel - then serving time for another sex crime – to the rape, he was 
found guilty of capital murder. During the trial, Braziel maintained he did not 
kill White.

SCOTUS denied Braziel's last round of appeals in 2016. Attorneys Jeff Newberry 
and David Dow were later appointed substitute counsel, and on Dec. 3 filed a 
stay request and appeals at the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. At press time, 
the filings had not been made available, nor had Dow or Newberry returned the 
Chronicle's requests for comment. But according to documents shared by the 
Attorney General's Office, Braziel's argument is based in an Atkins claim, 
which ruled executing the intellectually disabled is cruel and unusual 
punishment that violates the Eighth Amendment. The state's response claims that 
relief for that request has already been denied by the CCA. If executed, 
Braziel will be the 558th Texan to be killed by the state since the death 
penalty was reinstated in 1976.

(source: Austin Chroncile)

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

Border agent indicted for capital murder in 4 Texas deaths



A U.S. Border Patrol agent who confessed to killing four sex workers told 
investigators he wanted to “clean up the streets” of his Texas border hometown, 
a prosecutor said Wednesday while announcing that a grand jury had indicted the 
man for capital murder.

Webb County District Attorney Isidro Alaniz said he will seek the death penalty 
for the September slayings and that evidence presented to the grand jury showed 
Juan David Ortiz killed the women “in a cold, callous and calculating way.”

“The scheme in this case, from Ortiz’s own words, was to clean up the streets 
of Laredo by targeting this community of individuals who he perceived to be 
disposable, that no one would miss and that he did not give value to,” Alaniz 
said at a news conference.

Alaniz said Ortiz, 35, believed law enforcement didn’t do enough to curb 
prostitution, so he was “doing a service” by killing the women.

A suspect can be charged with capital murder if he is suspected in more than 
one killing in the same scheme with an overarching motive, Alaniz said. Three 
of the women were shot to death, and the fourth was also shot but died of blunt 
force trauma.

Alaniz said the horrific nature of the killings and Ortiz’s vigilante mentality 
were factors in his decision to pursue the death penalty. Ortiz, who has been 
held on murder charges in the Webb County jail on a $2.5 million bond since his 
Sept. 15 arrest in Laredo, presents a clear danger to society, he said.

The Border Patrol intel supervisor and Navy veteran seemed to be living a 
typical suburban life with his wife and two children when the killings 
occurred. He was only arrested after 1 victim was able to escape him and asked 
a state trooper for help.

“By day, he was a family man. The evidence shows that he was a supervisor, that 
he would go about his daily activities like anybody here. He appeared normal by 
all accounts and circumstances,” Alaniz said. “At the nighttime, he was 
somebody else — hunting the streets ... for this community of people and 
arbitrarily deciding who he was going to kill next.”

Alaniz said Ortiz knew some of the victims but he wouldn’t elaborate on what 
kind of relationship they had. Melissa Ramirez, 29, was slain on Sept. 3, and 
42-year-old Claudine Luera was killed on Sept. 13.

On Sept. 14, he picked up another woman, Erika Pena, who told investigators 
that Ortiz acted oddly when she brought up Ramirez’s slaying and later pointed 
a gun at her while they were in his truck at a gas station, according to court 
documents. Pena said Ortiz grabbed her shirt as she tried to get out of the 
truck, but she pulled it off and ran, finding a state trooper who was refueling 
his vehicle.

Ortiz fled and, he later told investigators, he then picked up and killed his 
last 2 victims — 35-year-old Guiselda Alicia Cantu and 28-year-old Janelle 
Ortiz, a transgender woman whose birth name was Humberto Ortiz.

With Pena’s help, authorities were able to track Ortiz to a hotel parking 
garage where he was arrested.

“I believe that if Erika Pena would not have escaped that day that there would 
be more victims right now in this case,” Alaniz said.

Ortiz also was indicted Wednesday on charges of aggravated assault with a 
deadly weapon and unlawful restraint in the attack on Pena, and a charge of 
evading arrest or detention.

Ortiz’s attorney did not immediately return a call for comment Wednesday.

The Border Patrol placed Ortiz on indefinite, unpaid suspension after his 
arrest. On Wednesday, the agency did not respond to a request for an update on 
his employment status.

(source: Associated Press)








NEW JERSEY:

Colts Neck killings spur calls for death penalty in N.J.



Following the grisly deaths of a family in Colts Next last month, lawmakers in 
a mostly rural swath of northwest New Jersey are calling for the reinstatement 
of the death penalty in the state.

“The gruesome murder of the Caneiro family is proof that we must reinstate the 
death penalty," state Sen. Steven Oroho and Assemblymen Parker Space and Harold 
Wirths, all Republicans from District 24, said in a statement.

Paul Caneiro, 51, is accused of killing his brother, Keith, 50, Keith’s wife, 
Jennifer, 45, and the couple’s 2 young children, 8-year-old Sophia and 
11-year-old Jesse.

Caneiro, of Ocean Township, is charged with 4 counts of 1st-degree murder. His 
attorneys have maintained he is innocent and that he loved his family dearly.

Calling this the “most brutal” case in his career, Monmouth County Prosecutor 
Christopher Gramiccioni said last week that he would approve this as a capital 
punishment case, if it was an option in New Jersey.

Caneiro faces 30 years to life in prison on each count of murder, along with 
additional prison time on weapons offenses and aggravated arson charges.

In 1982, state Sen. John F. Russo, a Democrat from Ocean County, wrote the 
statute that reinstated the death penalty in New Jersey. Russo was motivated by 
the death of his 77-year-old father, who was fatally shot during a robbery 
attempt in Asbury Park on New Year’s Eve in 1970.

In December 2007, the state Legislature voted to make New Jersey the 1st state 
to abolish the death penalty in 42 years. The state Assembly voted 44-36 to 
pass the bill, and Gov. Jon Corzine signed it into law days later.

Oroho, Wirths and Space, who together represent parts of Sussex, Warren and 
Morris counties, made an attempt in 2016 to get legislation passed to reinstate 
the death penalty to no avail. Their current bills have yet to receive a 
committee hearing. District 24 is among the most conservative parts of New 
Jersey.

Space said the “most effective deterrent out there” is the death penalty.

Cases in federal court, however, can still be tried with the death penalty.

In 2015, the Justice Department authorized former U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman to 
seek the death penalty against Farad Roland, a leader of a violent sub-set of 
the Bloods street gang in Newark. Roland, 33, admitted in January to having a 
role in five shooting deaths and accepted a plea deal that will have him behind 
bars for 45 years.

“The Colts Neck murderer deserves nothing less than the death penalty,” Oroho 
said in the statement. “We can no longer ignore the public calls for action in 
gruesome cases like these."

(source: nj.com)








ALABAMA:

US Supreme Court Weighs Execution of Prisoner With Severe Dementia----The U.S. 
Supreme Court is considering whether the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against 
cruel and unusual punishment bars the execution of an inmate suffering severe 
dementia.



The U.S. Supreme Court is considering whether the Eighth Amendment’s 
prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment bars the execution of an 
inmate suffering severe dementia. Put bluntly, can a state execute a prisoner 
who no longer remembers his own name, much less committing the capital crime of 
conviction? In October, the Supreme Court heard oral argument in Madison v. 
Alabama, a case that will determine whether the Eighth Amendment prohibits the 
execution of a prisoner whose medical condition deprives him of any memory of 
his offense.

In 1985, Vernon Madison killed a police officer in Mobile, Alabama. Madison was 
convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death. While awaiting execution on 
Alabama’s death row, Madison suffered several strokes and was diagnosed with 
acute vascular dementia; his cognitive functioning is massively impaired and he 
has a very limited ability to remember events. In particular, Madison cannot 
recall any details of his crime or trial.

In January 2018, Madison requested a stay of execution. In his petition, 
Madison claimed that he lacked the competency to be executed. The state court 
denied Madison’s petition, but the Supreme Court granted the stay—and 
ultimately a full writ of certiorari—in order to consider Madison’s Eighth 
Amendment claim.

Madison argued that his execution would violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on 
cruel and unusual punishment and would contravene U.S. Supreme Court precedent 
barring the execution of mentally disabled or insane prisoners, see Panetti v. 
Quarterman (2007) (mentally disabled); Ford v. Wainwright (1986) (insane). 
Additionally, Madison stated that his execution would not serve the underlying 
rationales of the death penalty; because Madison does not understand why he is 
being executed, his execution would not deter future crimes and would not 
punish Madison for his crime.

By contrast, Alabama maintained that whether Madison remembers his crime is not 
dispositive in determining whether he may be executed for that crime. Rather, 
Alabama contended that Madison understands the reasons for his execution and 
therefore may be executed in accordance with the Eighth Amendment. In support 
of this argument, Alabama relied on the findings of the court-appointed 
psychologist, who concluded that “Madison has a rational understanding that he 
is to be executed for killing a police officer in 1985."

At oral argument, Chief Justice John Roberts took a lead role in trying to 
clarify the issues presented in Madison’s case. For Roberts, the first issue 
was whether “someone who doesn’t remember the details of their crime” is 
properly analogized to the examples of insane or disabled prisoners whose 
execution has been held unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. In response to 
this first issue, Madison’s lawyer quickly acknowledged that Madison’s 
inability to remember the details of his crime does not, without more, make his 
execution unconstitutional.

Second, Roberts stated that the court needed to examine whether dementia meets 
the Ford standard for incompetence—and therefore renders unconstitutional the 
execution of a prisoner suffering dementia. On this second point, Thomas Govan, 
Alabama’s deputy attorney general conceded that, “if someone has vascular 
dementia or any other mental illness, if it precludes them from having a 
rational understanding of their punishment, and that they will die when they’re 
executed, they would meet the Ford and Panetti standard.” With this concession, 
Roberts articulated the narrow issue in this case as “whether Madison himself 
meets the Ford and Panetti standard?”

Alabama did not appear to persuade a majority of the justices that Madison fell 
short of that standard. Govan explained that “there is no confusion from 
Madison’s perspective” regarding his incarceration or execution. Further, Govan 
argued that a state court had already decided that, even now, Madison possessed 
a rational understanding of his crime and execution. Justice Sonia Sotomayor 
curtly rejected this interpretation, stating that Madison is “just not rational 
in the way you and I understand it.” Madison’s attorney further emphasized that 
Madison cannot have this understanding because dementia robs its victims of the 
ability to sustain understanding over a period of time. More fundamentally, 
Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Elena Kagan appeared to discount Govan’s 
argument that the state court’s inquiry into Madison’s rationality was 
sufficiently thorough.

The court could issue its decision anytime between now and June 2019. When 
announced, the Madison case will provide important insights about the Eighth 
Amendment’s restriction on capital punishment of the mentally disabled.

(source: Stephen A. Miller practices in the commercial litigation group at 
Cozen O’Connor’s Philadelphia office. Prior to joining the firm, he clerked for 
Justice Antonin Scalia on the U.S. Supreme Court and served as a federal 
prosecutor for 9 years in the Southern District of New York and the Eastern 
District of Pennsylvania.----Rachel Collins Clarke also practices in the firm’s 
commercial litigation group. Prior to joining the firm, she served as an 
Assistant District Attorney in Philadelphia and graduated from Georgetown 
University Law Center.----law.com)








WEST VIRGINIA:

Local Author Details Executions Conducted at Former West Virginia Penitentiary 
in Moundsville



Moundsville author C.J. Plogger spoke Tuesday about his new book, “Pronounced 
Dead: The Executions at the West Virginia Penitentiary,” at the Ohio County 
Public Library.

Drawing upon penal records and old newspaper accounts, Moundsville author C.J. 
Plogger has researched the 94 executions conducted at the former West Virginia 
Penitentiary over a 60-year period from 1899 to 1959.

He appeared Tuesday at the Ohio County Public Library’s Lunch With Books 
program to talk about his new book, “Pronounced Dead: The Executions at the 
West Virginia Penitentiary."

Plogger serves as pastor of Ash Avenue Church of God in Moundsville and leads 
tours at the former prison. Regarding the book’s topic, he said, “I personally 
do not believe in capital punishment."

He said 94 men were executed at the penitentiary; a woman was sentenced to 
death, but received a last-minute pardon. The executions included 85 hangings 
and nine electrocutions. The state abolished the death penalty in 1965.

The last execution occurred on April 3, 1959, when Elmer David Bruner was 
electrocuted for the killing of a Huntington woman. While Bruner was on death 
row, he received a letter from an 11-year-old Moundsville girl; in response, he 
sent her “a beautiful letter” and a jigsaw puzzle that he had made, Plogger 
said. The framed puzzle was displayed during Plogger’s presentation.

14 men were put to death for killing their wives, he said. They included Frank 
Hyer who, according to a newspaper account, was so heavy that his head popped 
off when he was hanged on June 19, 1931.

Of those executed, 40 were black, he said. Noting the racial disparity, he said 
they accounted for 43 % of the executions, at a time when the state’s 
population was only 8 % black.

The last public execution in the state occurred in 1897 at Ripley, where 
souvenirs and food were sold beforehand and pandemonium ensued, he said.

In reaction to that incident, the Legislature ordered that a special enclosure 
be built within the penitentiary’s walls to exclude public view of executions. 
The so-called “death house,” a brick and stone building, was constructed at a 
cost of $6,000 in September 1899, he said.

For hangings, prisoners walked 13 steps to the gallows and were placed in a 
noose with 13 knots as a symbolic nod to the 13 people — 12 jurors and a judge 
— who convicted them, he said.

Shep Caldwell, of McDowell County, was the first man to be hanged at the new 
facility on Oct. 10, 1899. Caldwell, a married man, fatally shot his mistress 
in a rage after he saw her with a boyfriend, Plogger said.

Frank H. Johnson, the state’s first serial killer, was hanged July 17, 1908. On 
the eve of his death, he confessed to five murders. Plogger showed a Wheeling 
Register article about the hanging, under the headline, "Black Friday at the 
Penitentiary."

Harry F. Powers, a con man who allegedly murdered 55 women, was hanged in March 
1938. Moundsville native Davis Grubb’s 1953 novel, “Night of the Hunter,” and 
Jayne Anne Phillips’ 2013 novel, “Quiet Dell,” were inspired by Powers’ story.

A triple hanging — of Philip Cannizzaro, Dick Ferry and Nick Salamante, members 
of the Sicilian “Black Handers” — took place Jan. 4, 1924, the author said. The 
group acquired its nickname for a habit of dipping victims’ hands in ink, he 
explained.

Another triple hanging occurred in 1938 for men convicted of kidnapping a 
minister who later died. Plogger said they were sentenced under a federal law 
enacted after the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby.

The youngest man executed was Phillip Eumen, 18, hanged Aug. 20, 1926, for 
killing a grocery store owner.

Inmate Henry Jackson was hanged Sept. 10, 1926, for stabbing guard Earl 
Langfitt with a homemade shank in March of that year. Langfitt was the first 
correctional officer to die in the line of duty, Plogger said.

The only Moundsville native to be executed was Raymond Styres, put to death on 
May 13, 1938, for killing the wife of a Wheeling casino owner, Plogger said.

(source: The Intelligencer)



LOUISIANA:

Man's death sentence in 2011 CarQuest double murder thrown out; convictions 
affirmed



A Baton Rouge man's death sentence in the 2011 slaying of 2 CarQuest Auto Parts 
employees at the company's Airline Highway store near Siegen Lane was thrown 
out Wednesday by the Louisiana Supreme Court.

The high court, however, affirmed Lee Turner Jr.'s 2015 1st-degree murder 
convictions in the fatal shooting of Edward "Eddie" Gurtner III, 43, of Denham 
Springs, and Randy Chaney, 55, of Greenwell Springs.

Turner began working for CarQuest in Baton Rouge just 11 days before he killed 
the men during a Sunday afternoon robbery.

The Supreme Court said it tossed Turner's death sentence because state District 
Judge Richard Anderson issued a ruling in the middle of jury selection that 
prevented the defense from inquiring into prospective jurors' ability to fairly 
consider voting for a life sentence in a case involving a double murder 
committed during an armed robbery.

The high court sent the case back to Anderson for a new sentencing hearing.

One of Turner’s appellate attorneys, Caroline Tillman with the Capital Appeals 
Project in New Orleans, hailed the Supreme Court’s ruling.

“The importance of a fair jury in a death penalty trial cannot be overstated, 
and we are thankful that the Louisiana Supreme Court has stepped in,” she said.

East Baton Rouge Parish District Attorney Hillar Moore III said his office is 
grateful that Turner’s convictions were affirmed “but nonetheless express our 
respectful disappointment … with respect to sentencing.""

“After enduring 13 days of jury selection followed by 9 days of trial, 
resulting in unanimous convictions and verdicts of death, the victims’ family 
members are still without closure with regard to the consequences (Turner) will 
face for killing Randy Chaney and Eddie Gurtner,” Moore said.

Moore said his office will “evaluate our future actions with respect to the 
sentencing after the new year."

Turner’s trial attorneys, East Baton Rouge Parish assistant public defenders 
Margaret Lagattuta and Scott Collier, noted Wednesday that they objected to 
Anderson’s ruling at the time it was made.

Collier said he knew the trial court’s ruling during jury selection excluding 
questions about armed robbery “would be a major issue on appeal."

“Our objections then have saved Lee Turner’s life today,” Lagattuta added.

Scott Crichton authored the Supreme Court decision and wrote that Anderson’s 
ruling categorically prohibiting Turner’s attorneys from referencing armed 
robbery to potential jurors “runs afoul” of prior state Supreme Court 
decisions.

“The general allegations of the case at hand necessarily included the fact that 
there were 2 victims and that the victims were killed during an armed robbery. 
Indeed, these were the exact statutory aggravators set forth in the state’s 
notice of intent to seek the death penalty,” Crichton stated. “The trial 
court’s blanket prohibition against referencing armed robbery was therefore an 
abuse of discretion."

Turner’s appellate attorneys argued that Anderson’s ruling mandated reversal of 
his convictions as well, but the Supreme Court disagreed, saying the error 
required only overturning his death sentence.

Justices Greg Guidry and Jeff Hughes agreed with their Supreme Court 
colleagues’ upholding of Turner’s convictions but dissented with their decision 
to reverse his death sentence and order a new sentencing hearing.

Turner, 28 and formerly of New Orleans, confessed the day after the March 27, 
2011, killings that he shot Chaney first, then Gurtner after forcing him to 
open the store safe. Gurtner died with the store's keys, including a key to the 
safe, in his hand. A search warrant led to the discovery of bank bags and 
CarQuest deposit slips in a garbage can outside the Ritterman Avenue home where 
Turner was staying with an uncle.

Gurtner managed the store where the shooting occurred. He wasn't scheduled to 
work that day but went in to catch up on restocking and to hang a mirror in the 
store's bathroom. He was shot a dozen times, including several times in the 
back, as he tried to run from Turner. Chaney was the assistant manager of the 
company's Staring Lane location but was helping out at the Airline Highway 
store that ill-fated day. He was shot once in the back of the head.

(source: The Advocate)