[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, FLA., ALA.

[Rick Halperin]

Feb. 11



TEXAS:

Willacy to seek ultimate penalty



Nearly 1 century has passed since a person convicted and sentenced to death in 
Willacy County has been executed by the state of Texas.

This week, 1 of 2 men accused of shooting and killing an off-duty Border Patrol 
agent and injuring the man's father in rural Willacy County will stand trial in 
the 197th state District Court.

The Willacy County District Attorney's Office is seeking the death penalty for 
both men, who are being tried separately and have pleaded not guilty to the 
charges.

Gustavo Tijerina-Sandoval, a La Villa man, is charged with capital murder and 
attempted capital murder for allegedly shooting and killing Javier Vega Jr. of 
Kingsville and injuring the agent's father, Javier Vega Sr. of La Feria, in 
August 2014. Ismael Hernandez-Vallejo of Weslaco faces the same charges.

Authorities have said the murder took place while the suspects robbed the 
Vegas, who were on a fishing excursion with their family.

While 86 years have gone by since the last convicted murderer in Willacy County 
was executed, another 8 decades have passed since the Willacy County District 
Attorney's Office has secured a death sentence after a murder conviction.

According to Texas Department of Criminal Justice online death row records, 
which date back to 1923, just 2 people from Willacy County have been sentenced 
to die in Huntsville. Both of those cases date back to the 1930s.

Those stories have largely been forgotten, until now.

HISTORY UNCOVERED

The 3rd floor of the Willacy County Courthouse, which was built in 1922, used 
to be a jail. Nowadays, the physical memories of that jail remain. There are 
bars and jail doors, and memories of inmates told through jailhouse graffiti. 
But these days, instead of prisoners, the jail cells hold court records.

In one of those cells, off in a corner of the jail, is a large black file 
cabinet. That's where staff from the Willacy County District Clerk's Office 
found the case files for Estanislado Lopez and Pio Quesada. Lopez and Quesada 
were held on the very same floor and sentenced to death in the courthouse that 
holds the only records of the cases against the men.

Lopez pleaded guilty to murdering Jesus Villareal on Aug. 24, 1931, and was 
electrocuted less than 1 year later on June 10, 1932. Quesada pleaded guilty 
Jan. 22, 1937, to killing Fernando Ramirez on Nov. 27, 1936. Unlike Lopez, 
Quesada's sentence was commuted and he was never executed. Efforts to discover 
why Quesada's sentence was commuted were not successful.

Unlike modern day death penalty cases that can take years to work their way 
through the courts, Lopez and Quesada were charged, tried and sentenced within 
1 week of their arrests. The appeals process was just months-long. And for 
Lopez, his sentence was carried out less than one year after he pleaded guilty.

However, the case files for the men still contain all of the documentation and 
are in excellent condition. There are indictments, arrest warrants, handwritten 
notes, Western Union receipts, and even appeals and notices of court-appointed 
attorneys; all neatly folded handbills reminiscent of the shape and size of a 
warrant that a proverbial western lawman would pull out of the pocket of their 
duster.

AXE MURDER

In July of 1930, Lopez, a San Antonio man who lived at a residence just 
northeast of downtown in the Alamo City for 8 years, traveled to Raymondville 
to pick cotton.

The details of what transpired next are held in handwritten notes taken by 
authorities at the Harris County jail from an account given to them by a man 
named Francisco Moreno and a confession they took from Lopez, which still bears 
the man???s signature.

In a coincidence, Moreno was arrested in Houston and placed in a cell with 
Lopez. Unfortunately for Lopez, Moreno was 1 of the 7 farm workers staying in a 
house about 4 miles east of Raymondville, along with Lopez, when the murder 
occurred.

"When I was put in the cell ... Lopez covered up his face and would not let me 
see him. I told Lopez to take his hands down from his face I want to see who 
you are," Moreno told authorities in Houston according to the records.

Moreno stated that he never saw the murder because they were all asleep, but 
when they woke up to a dog barking at sunrise and discovered the body, Lopez 
was long gone. While sharing a cell, Moreno asked Lopez where he went after the 
killing.

"Lopez said he stayed in the brush 3 or 4 days and then went some place around 
Ft. Worth and then to Waco and then to Bryan, then Lopez said to me not to tell 
any one about the killing at Raymondville Texas for they will put me in the 
electric chair, he did not tell me how he killed this man," Moreno said, 
according to the records.

Lopez killed the man by striking him with an axe while he slept. Lopez gave his 
account of the murder and signed it in the handwritten letter.

The night of the murder was July 15, 1930, and everyone in the house had been 
drinking. Lopez said he was scared of the victim, so he chopped him in the head 
1 time while he was sleeping. According to Lopez, the victim had urinated in 
his face and, along with several other men, had tried to have sex with him. 
It's hard to tell from the document whether Lopez is alleging the men tried to 
rape him or proposition him for sex, and the wording in the document is 
profane.

"After I hit him in the head he did not have a chance to say a word," Lopez is 
accounted as saying.

After the sentence, Lopez appealed it. His attorneys argued that the death 
penalty should not have been assigned because Willacy County prosecutors failed 
to show he murdered the man with malice. A little more than 6 months after his 
appeal, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed his sentence.

Just shy of 3 months later, Lopez was taken to the electric chair.

"In accordance with the judgment of the District Court of Willacy County, the 
said Estanislado Lopez was duly executed on the 10th day of June, A.D. 1932, at 
the hour of 12:03 A.M., by Warden W.W. Waid, by causing to pass through his 
body a current of electricity of sufficient intensity to cause his death. And 
the said Estanislado Lopez was pronounced dead by Dr. V.G. Isvekov, eight (8) 
minutes after the application of the electric current," the warden's return 
after execution states.

That document also shows that Lopez stayed in the Willacy County Courthouse 
jail up until May 11, 1932, one month before his execution. Lopez is buried in 
the prison cemetery.

MOTIVE UNKNOWN

On Nov. 27, 1936, Pio Quesada freely admitted to Texas Rangers and U.S. Customs 
officers that he murdered Fernando Ramirez. He even led the authorities to the 
shotgun he used but, according to the documentation, he never provided 
authorities with a motive.

The indictment states that Quesada stabbed Ramirez multiple times and then shot 
him to death.

Quesada pleaded guilty Jan. 20, 1937, and 2 days later he was sentenced to 
death. Quesada immediately appealed. His attorneys argued that the 197th state 
District Court should not have allowed his confession because it was not 
voluntary.

According to appeals documentation, the court allowed testimony from Texas 
Ranger Power Fenner; U.S. Customs Patrol officers Bland Durham and Capt. 
Kilbourn; Texas Ranger Joe Bridges and Willacy County Deputy Sheriff Larry 
Gomez.

The law enforcement officers apparently told him, '"You must go and show us 
these things,' meaning a gun and a knife. And further, 'Why do you want to fool 
around about showing us this gun? You might as well go on and show it to us and 
not lose so much time.' Such testimony that such confession, if made by 
defendant, was made under the force and threats of the said officers, and not 
voluntarily made, as required by the law, reduced to writing and signed by the 
defendant, after having been previously duly warned."

Transcripts of that testimony are included in the case file and paint a picture 
of what happened Nov. 27, 1936 in Raymondville.

Fenner testified that when the Texas Rangers received notice of the killing, 
they proceeded to the scene of the crime, which is where Quesada lived. Fenner 
said the body had 9 or 10 knife wounds and a shotgun wound.

"Pio told us of sitting in the car with Fernando and going in the house and 
getting water with Fernando, and the last time he entered the house with him to 
get the water, he took the shot gun out and then he drove up to where he shot 
Fernando," Fenner testified. "He said Fernando drove the car. He went with us 
to this point where the car was. He told us that after they got out to where 
the car was, he pulled Fernando out of the car and shot him."

Durham, the U.S. Customs Patrol officer, testified he personally knew Quesada 
and asked him to take them to where the gun was, which he did. Durham's 
testimony, however, is different than that of Fenner.

"Pio said when they got out of the car, Fernando had the gun in his hand, and 
he took it from his hand and walked him ahead of the car 50 feet and stood him 
up and killed him," Durham testified. "He did not say anything about what 
Fernando said to him."

Joe Bridges, a Texas Ranger from Hebbronville, who came to Raymondville with 
Fenner to investigate the killing, also testified that Quesada agreed to show 
them where the gun was and admitted to killing the man.

"And he said he was ready to go. He spoke Spanish. I can't say it as he said 
it, but I can repeat the substance of it. (which the witness does, in English.) 
'I don't deny it. I am the one that did it. There is nothing further to do 
about it,'" Bridges said during testimony.

On June 4, 1937, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals tossed out the appeal. 
Quesada was scheduled to be executed an hour before sunrise July 23, 1937.

However, the governor at the time commuted his death sentence to life in 
prison.

MODERN DAY DEATH PENALTY

Unlike the 1930s, when Quesada and Lopez were arrested, tried, convicted and 
sentenced in less than 2 weeks, death penalty trials can take years.

Tijerina-Sandoval and Hernandez-Vallejo have been in jail since 2014. Their 
lawyers have filed numerous motions in preparing for the trial and earlier this 
month announced that both suspects are ready for trial.

Tijerina-Sandoval is expected to go to trial 1st, followed by 
Hernandez-Vallejo. If convicted and sentenced to death, it will be the 1st time 
that has happened in Willacy County in 81 years.

The 1st trial is scheduled for Tuesday in the 197th state District Court.

(source: valleymorningstar.com)

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

How US death penalty capital changed its mind



Texas remains the strictest applicant of the US death penalty but its 
increasing reluctance to put criminals to death reflects a national trend.

Kent Whitaker supported the death penalty until his son, who arranged for a 
gunman to kill Mr Whitaker and the rest of his family, landed on death row in 
Texas.

Now Mr Whitaker, the sole survivor of the attack, is desperately seeking 
clemency for Thomas Whitaker before his execution scheduled on 22 February.

"The petition is based on a legal overstep that shouldn't have happened," says 
Mr Whitaker. "The district attorney chose to pursue the death penalty despite 
every victim involved, myself, the relatives of my wife, begging him not to do 
it."

Shot in the upper chest in the 2003 attack, Mr Whitaker barely survived the 
ambush after hearing the sound of the bullets that killed his youngest, Kevin, 
a college sophomore, and his wife Tricia.

Mr Whitaker has asked the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles to recommend to 
Texas Governor Greg Abbott to commute his son's sentence to life in prison.

"I'm not asking them to forgive him as that's not their business," he says.

"But I don't want on 22 February to have to relive what happened to Tricia and 
Kevin, and lose the last member of my direct family in the name of justice that 
I think is wrong."

Despite Mr Whitaker's predicament, both executions and the awarding of death 
sentences are actually decreasing in Texas, reflecting a nationwide trend.

"The culture now is different," says Kristin Houle, executive director of the 
Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty (TCADP). "There isn't the same 
appetite for it from either the public or elected officials."

Since 1976 and the US Supreme Court upholding capital punishment, 1,468 people 
have been executed in the US - 548 in Texas.

Harris County became known as the execution capital of America when it was 
executing the highest number of people in all of Texas' counties.

But for the last 3 years, it has not imposed any death sentences, while 2017 
was the 1st year since 1985 it did not execute anyone.

Executions in Texas peaked in 2000 when there were 40. Last year there were 7, 
matching 2016 for the lowest number of executions in two decades, amid a 
national total of 23.

"Whatever happens in Texas does have a ripple effect because it has been so 
notorious for its death penalty practices," says Ms Houle. "So any move away 
has a significant impact on the rest of the country."

The shift in opinion - increasingly in conservative circles, too - follows 
decades of death penalty use during which it has proven exorbitantly expensive 
compared to putting someone in prison for life, ineffective in making society 
safer, while open to manipulation from ambitious prosecutors and old-fashioned 
human error, observers say.

"More people know about the risks of innocent people being executed after TV 
programmes like 60 Minutes," says Heather Beaudoin, of Conservatives Concerned 
About the Death Penalty. "They're thinking: 'Wow, this can happen - are we 
willing to risk it?'"

Other concerns include: drug shortages for lethal injections adding to the 
bureaucratic maelstrom and expense; increased mistrust of government; and 
botched executions leaving victims and relatives of the condemned and prison 
guards traumatised.

"The death penalty wouldn't have survived in America if it weren't for 
evangelical Christians," notes Shane Claiborne, a prominent Christian activist 
and best-selling author. "Where evangelical Christians are most concentrated is 
where the death penalty survives."

But, Mr Claiborne notes, younger evangelicals in states like Texas are 
increasingly embracing a pro-life interpretation that goes beyond the confines 
of the abortion debate to also include the likes of the Black Lives Matter 
movement, immigration and those on death row.

Meanwhile, the 2005 introduction in Texas courts of life without parole as a 
sentencing option in capital cases has helped decrease the number of death 
sentences and executions.

"When you sit with a victim's family and say it could take 10 years for an 
execution or they can be done with it now [through a life sentence without 
parole], they say they want to move on with their lives," says Texas criminal 
defence lawyer Keith Hampton, who is representing the Whitaker clemency case.

Another change in the Texas criminal justice landscape that's had an impact is 
increasing scepticism about gauging the "future dangerousness" a felon poses to 
society, which plays a critical role in the awarding of death sentences in only 
Texas and Oregon.

"When it comes to so-called lethal prediction you might as well gaze into a 
crystal ball, the predictions are that unreliable," Mr Hampton says. "Studies 
show, and prison staff report, that those serving life sentences are the best 
behaved."

As a result, Mr Hampton explains, prosecutors know juries are less willing to 
tolerate the pursuit of a death sentence and the additional expense and time it 
involves.

Big drop in global executions - Amnesty

Those who support the death penalty point out the decreasing trend also 
reflects a nationwide drop in murder rates, and that the death penalty 
continues playing an effective role, and retains public support, with the small 
percentage of eligible homicides.

"Watching an execution is the most mentally draining experience, but it should 
be utilised for those who commit the most heinous, diabolical, despicable 
crimes known to man that cry out for the ultimate punishment," says Andy Kahan, 
a crime victim advocate for the City of Houston, who has accompanied victims to 
witness 8 executions.

"Everyone has a right to disagree. I wouldn't be surprised if the death penalty 
eventually goes. The law is subject to change. Everything comes in cycles."

Both sides in the debate cite studies supporting respective claims about the 
death penalty achieving or not achieving deterrence - currently studies 
supporting the latter appear to have the upper hand.

"Anyone who says the death penalty has no deterrent effect either doesn't know 
what they are talking about or are lying," says Kent Scheidegger, legal 
director of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, which has supported death 
penalty cases throughout the country.

"The debate over studies supporting its deterrent effect is whether they have 
sufficiently shown it."

Despite Texas' punitive reputation, Ms Houle notes it was the 1st state to pass 
legislation giving defendants access to the courts if the science behind a 
conviction changed or was debunked, and had led the way nationally at 
compensating those wrongfully incarcerated.

At the same time, however, trends such as racial bias in the Texas courts 
remain a concern.

----

Capital punishment in the US

The death penalty is a legal punishment in 31 US states

Since 1976 Texas has carried out the most executions (548), followed by 
Virginia (113) and Oklahoma (112)

There are 2,817 inmates on death row in the US

California has the most prisoners on death row, 746, but has carried out only 
13 executions since 1976

[source: Death Penalty Information Center]

----

Over the last 5 years, 70% of death sentences have been imposed on people of 
colour - more than 1/2 of these sentences were for African-American defendants, 
according to TCADP.

Also, though less than 13% of Texas's population is African American, they 
constitute 43.8% of death row inmates, according to the Texas Department of 
Criminal Justice.

Death penalty critics also highlight how arbitrarily it is applied based on 
factors such as a crime's location or the whim of a district attorney.

Mr Whitaker's petition noted how the gunman was given a life sentence after 
pleading guilty to murder, while the getaway driver agreed to a 15-year plea 
deal and testified against Whitaker.

Comprising seven individuals who neither meet publicly nor have to physically 
confer with each other, the board can give its decision at any moment up to the 
day of execution.

The execution of Thomas Whitaker would be the 4th this year in America - all 
carried out by Texas.

"Texas claims to be a victims' rights state," My Whitaker says. "What I am 
asking is that this means something even when the victim wants mercy and not 
vengeance."

(source: BBC News)

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

Ex-Texas death row inmate now questions prosecutors



A man who was exonerated after spending 12 years on Texas' death row is getting 
the chance to question lawyers who are running to become Dallas' top 
prosecutor.

Anthony Graves on Saturday moderated a panel of candidates for Dallas County 
district attorney. He called the event an opportunity to push forward changes 
in the criminal justice system in the nation's most active death penalty state.

Convicted in 1994 of murder, Graves was cleared in 2010 after an alleged 
accomplice recanted his testimony that Graves was involved and an investigation 
found misconduct by the district attorney in the case. That prosecutor was 
later disbarred.

Graves now serves as the smart justice initiatives manager for the American 
Civil Liberties Union of Texas.

He says he understands a top prosecutor's power "better than most."

(source: Associated Press)








FLORIDA:

A call to conscience on march to death



"A miscarriage of justice."

That's what the Florida Senate's Criminal Justice Committee says about the 
death march taking place at the Florida Supreme Court.

By a 3-2 vote this week, the Senate committee approved legislation (SB 870) 
that calls on the court to abandon its arbitrary distinction between death row 
inmates who do or don???t deserve new sentencing hearings since Florida's old 
sentencing law was found unconstitutional in January 2016.

The description is correct. The court's apparent indifference to fair play is 
staggering. It reflects poorly on the court and on the character of the state.

The Florida court refuses to make the U.S. Supreme Court's 2016 ruling 
retroactive to inmates - an estimated 163 of them - whose death sentences were 
considered "final" before June 24, 2002. That's when a ruling in an Arizona 
case put Florida on notice that its death sentencing law would likely be thrown 
out. But it took 14 more years for that shoe to fall in a case known as Hurst 
v. Florida, which says a jury, not a judge, must determine if the facts warrant 
execution.

For prisoners whose sentences became "final" during that interval, the Florida 
court has been granting new hearings, for the most part, to those whose juries 
didn't vote unanimously for death.

In a series of identical orders over the past 2 weeks, the court rejected all 
80 petitions for new hearings. In only 15 of those cases did the jury 
unanimously recommend the death penalty. In 47 cases, at least 2 jurors voted 
against death. 11 juries were split by votes of 7 to 5.

All would be affected by SB 870, which says the court's decision to deny them a 
new sentencing hearing "will result in a miscarriage of justice for those 
inmates." It is "the intent of the legislature" that they should be covered by 
the precedent set by the Hurst decision.

Still, on Tuesday, the court continued its march for death. It unanimously 
denied a stay of execution for Eric Scott Branch, who is scheduled to be put to 
death Feb. 22 for the 1993 rape-murder of Susan Morris, a University of West 
Florida student.

Branch is among the 80 inmates who have lost their bids for new sentencing 
hearings. The jury vote in his case was 10-2. He also has a separate appeal on 
other issues pending before the court.

Branch's attorneys urged the court to consider that "a wave" of petitions from 
Florida's death row "is set to flood that United States Supreme Court's docket" 
shortly after Branch's execution date. If the court rules against Florida in 
those cases, they said, "the injustice in (Branch's) case will be irreparable."

The Florida court did not explain why it denied the stay, which the U.S. 
Supreme Court could still grant. But the Florida court's usual practice is to 
leave that sort of decision to the high court, often at the 11th hour.

SB 870 is sponsored by Sen. Randolph Bracy, D-Ocoee, chair of the criminal 
justice committee. In a legal sense, the legislation would not overrule the 
court. Such an attempt would probably be unconstitutional.

But the declaration of legislative intent would "send a powerful message to the 
U.S. Supreme Court," according to Karen Gottlieb of the Florida Center for 
Capital Representation at Florida International University.

The bill is, of course, a long way from passage, a prospect that must be rated 
unlikely given the Legislature's history of embracing the death penalty. But 
the committee's bipartisan vote is a welcome note of conscience on an issue 
that cries out for it.

(source: decaturdaily.com)








ALABAMA:

Alabama Court Lets 2 Capital Convictions Stand



The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals is refusing challenges filed by 2 death 
row inmates convicted of murder.

The judges on Friday upheld the conviction and death sentence of Jordaan Stanly 
Creque. He was convicted of killing Jeffrey Mark Graff and Jessie Jose Aguilar 
during the robbery of a Krystal restaurant in Decatur in 2011.

The court rejected claims including one that Creque was interrogated in 
violation of his constitutional rights.

The appellate court also upheld a lower court decision refusing a challenge by 
David Dewayne Riley. He was convicted of capital murder in Lauderdale County in 
the 2007 killing of store clerk Scott Michael Kirtley during a robbery.

The judges rejected Riley's claim that a court improperly used a proposed order 
by prosecutors in refusing his appeal.

(source: Associated Press)