[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, PENN., N.C., FLA., IND.

[Rick Halperin]

Jan. 12



TEXAS----impending executions

Questions Linger for Anthony Shore, Larry Swearingen----Shore to be 1st Texan 
executed in 2018



Houston serial killer Anthony Shore faces another death date, this one Jan. 18. 
Shore was originally set for execution in October, but that got halted by the 
Harris County District Attorney's Office amid rumors he was planning to confess 
to another murder: the 1998 killing of Melissa Trotter. Except Larry Swearingen 
had been convicted of kidnapping, raping, and strangling Trotter in 2000, and 
by then was preparing for his own execution in November.

Assistant District Attorney Tom Berg said his office revoked Shore's execution 
warrant at the request of Montgomery County D.A. Brett Ligon, who believed 
Shore was colluding with Swearingen. (He says a folder was found in Shore's 
cell with information relating to Trotter's death.) Berg said the Texas Rangers 
have since interviewed Shore, who admitted he had "nothing to do" with 
Trotter's murder. Shore alleged he and Swearingen once contemplated conspiring, 
but had since "parted ways." Berg, who says his office and Ligon's have 
reviewed the interview, said Shore decided not to "take the fall" for his 
fellow inmate. Shore has exhausted his appeals; Berg said he's unaware of any 
new attempts to stay Shore's execution, and concluded that his case will see 
its "inevitable end" next Thursday.

Shore's execution is just the beginning of a busy month.

Swearingen, however, had his November execution stayed due to a filing error, 
and has since been granted additional DNA testing. Unlike Shore, who confessed 
to killing 4 girls between 1986 and 1995, Swearingen has maintained his 
innocence. His supporters, including his lawyer James Rytting, say he was in a 
county jail for outstanding traffic warrants at the time of Trotter's murder. 
The 19-year-old was last seen on Dec. 8, 1998, with Swearingen (who wasn't 
arrested until 3 days later), but her body wasn't discovered until Jan. 2. 
Rytting said forensic evidence suggests her body could not have been dumped in 
the woods until "a week or 10 days" after Swearingen was arrested.

Included in the evidence sent out for testing is Trotter's rape kit, which was 
never tested and could exonerate Swearingen should analysts uncover another DNA 
profile. Samples of hair particles found on Trotter's undergarments and the 
alleged murder weapon (a torn pair of pantyhose) will also be tested. The 
evidence was shipped out in December and testing will likely take 4 weeks.

Rytting was alarmed that the state had reissued an execution date for Shore. 
"They shouldn't be putting the guy into the ground with these questions still 
around," he said. He says 2 witnesses, with no connection to Swearingen, told 
the D.A.'s Office that Shore suggested to them that he was connected to 
Trotter's murder. The information, Rytting said, would "sure as hell" make 
Shore a suspect had it been provided prior to Swearingen's conviction. "It's a 
type of incriminating statement the prosecution seizes on all the time," he 
said. "You don't get to wiggle out of it with an 'Aw shucks, I was kidding.'"

Shore will likely mark the 1st state-sanctioned killing of 2018, and his is 
just the beginning. William Rayford is scheduled for Jan. 30, and John 
Battaglia for Feb. 1.

(source: Austin Chronicle)

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

Ending Texas' death penalty is priority for ex-governor's son now seeking 
state's top post



Andrew White told reporters Thursday that he would try to eliminate the death 
penalty if elected as Texas governor.

According to the Houston Chronicle, after speaking in a forum hosted by the 
Texas Tribune, White said he would try to commute sentences for death row 
inmates and ask the Legislature to outlaw lethal injections.

"It is a flawed system. It is not a deterrent. It does not work," White said. 
"The data says we put innocent people on death row. Our system needs to be 
changed."

His father, former Gov. Mark White, supported the death penalty, and Texas 
executed 20 inmates during his term. He later said executing prisoners was the 
"most distasteful thing I had to do" as governor. Mark White died in August at 
age 77.

White also said Thursday that he wants to be the "education governor," 
according to a Tribune reporter. He said that public education needs billions 
of dollars more in funding and that he doesn???t understand the system's 
financing formula.

"I have yet to meet somebody who can explain it to me. ... It's incredibly 
complicated and it shouldn't be," White said.

White has advertised himself as a "common sense" Democrat. He said at a 
candidate forum Monday that as governor, he would would close commercial tax 
loopholes to raise teachers' pay and make sure Texans have access to affordable 
health care.

"I'm an outsider with a fresh perspective to fix this mess," White said. "I 
have the ability and the judgment and the fight to beat Greg Abbott."

He is 1 of 9 Democrats running for the party's nomination. He and former Dallas 
County Sheriff Lupe Valdez are expected to be the front-runners in March's 
primary contest.

(source: Dallas Morning News)

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

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Andrew White calls for end to death penalty



Democratic gubernatorial candidate Andrew White called Thursday for Texas to 
abolish the death penalty, saying if elected governor he will work to erase the 
hallmark law that has fueled the nation's busiest death chamber in past 
decades.

Speaking with reporters after a candidate forum, White said he would commute 
the death sentences of condemned convicts, if given the chance, and would lobby 
the legislature to do away with the lethal injection law.

"It is a flawed system. It is not a deterrent. It does not work," White said 
after the forum sponsored by the Texas Tribune, an online news site. "The data 
says we put innocent people on death row. Our system needs to be changed."

White's late father, former Gov. Mark White, supported the death penalty while 
in office but in recent years became an outspoken opponent of capital 
punishment, due in part to death-row convicts who were proven innocent during 
appeals and amid growing questions about whether the system was a deterrent to 
crime as intended.

At least 1 other Democratic gubernatorial candidate, Tom Wakely, has announced 
he will seek to abolish the death penalty -- a position taken by Democrats in 
the past, contrasting with Republicans' support of the death penalty.

During the forum, White also said he supports diverting the $800 million Texas 
spends for border security to education, and letting the federal government 
pick up the tab for securing the Texas border -- an about-face from current 
state policy.

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

Texas man with scheduled execution uses letters from fellow death row inmates 
to argue for reprieve



A Fort Bend death row prisoner scheduled for execution in February for his role 
in a plot to kill his own family is begging for a reprieve in a request 
bolstered by 58 letters of support - including 7 fellow death row prisoners.

Thomas "Bart" Whitaker is slated to die on Feb. 22 for the 2003 slayings of his 
mother and younger brother, who the Sugar Land man had killed in a 
murder-for-hire scheme aimed at snagging a hefty $1 million inheritance. The 
attack wounded Whitaker's father, who has since fought against his son's death 
sentence and serves as the centerpiece of the commutation request now before 
the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles.

"There is only 1 person on Earth who is intimate with the murderous attack, the 
lives and deaths of the other victims, and the life of Thomas Whitaker - Mr. 
Whitaker's father, Kent. Kent was there," the condemned man's attorneys wrote 
in their petition.

"For the rest of us, the case against commutation to a life sentence seems 
clear. We can't forgive; we have no sympathy. But clemency is not about 
something so simple as sympathy or as formidable as forgiveness."

The petition describes the deaths in graphic detail, draws comparisons to the 
story of Cain and Abel and lays out a scene of the grieving father on his knees 
begging prosecutors to spare his son.

But Fort Bend County District Attorney John Healey defended the decision to 
continue pursuing the state's harshest punishment and pushed back against 
Whitaker's petition for clemency.

"Bart Whitaker is a master manipulator of reality," he said. "And this approach 
doesn't surprise me at all."

The 2003 killings took place just after celebratory dinner marking Whitaker's 
supposed graduation from Sam Houston State University - a milestone that never 
happened. Before the ruse of a dinner, Whitaker had arranged for 2 friends to 
wait at the family home for a burglary set-up.

When the family of 4 returned home from the restaurant, a gunman opened fire as 
they walked through the door, killing 51-year-old Patricia Whitaker and 
19-year-old Kevin.

Afterward, as police probed the killings, Whitaker stole $10,000 from his 
father and fled to Mexico.

When authorities picked him up 15 months later, his father hired an attorney to 
argue against the capital case.

The pair of slayings came after 3 years of planning and at least one previous 
murder attempt, according to court papers.

Triggerman Chris Brashear pleaded guilty to murder a decade ago and took a life 
sentence, while the getaway driver - Steve Champagne - agreed to a 15-year plea 
deal.

Over his father's protestations, Whitaker was sentenced to death. But in the 
intervening years, his attorneys argue in Wednesday's petition, he's had an 
awakening described by other death row inmates, teachers, extended family and 
international pen pals.

"Of all the people I have met over the years Thomas Whitaker is the person I 
believe deserves clemency the most," wrote death row inmate William Speer, who 
described him as "one of the best-liked inmates" who has "worked the hardest" 
to rehabilitate himself.

"Killing him would be a crime, because the system needs men like him out on the 
farms keeping everyone calm and looking forward," Speer wrote. "Please give him 
another chance."

Healey was not impressed to hear of Whitaker's letters from fellow prisoners.

"What a noble group of supporters," he said. The decision to seek death over 
Kent Whitaker's objections, he said, stemmed from the need to represent 
"society as a whole" instead of solely weighing the opinions of the victims' 
family.

"My conscience and that of the prosecutors, I'm certain, has been clear."

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

Harris County leads Texas in life without parole sentences as death penalty 
recedes



Harris County has relied more on life without parole and death sentences and 
execution have decreased.

Once known as the "capital of capital punishment," Harris County is now doling 
out more life without parole sentences than any other county in the state.

In the 12 years since then-Gov. Rick Perry signed the life without parole or 
"LWOP" bill into law, Harris County has handed down 266 of those sentences - 
nearly 25 % of the state's total, according to data through mid-December 
obtained from the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

"It's concerning, but this is like economics or engine performance, there's no 
free lunch," said Houston defense attorney Patrick McCann. "We have far fewer 
death cases than we used to. That's a tremendous win. But now we have a lot of 
LWOP sentences."

The county's reliance on the lengthiest sentence available in capital murder 
cases comes as the Houston area - and Texas as a whole - has shifted away from 
capital punishment. For the 1st time in more than 30 years, 2017 saw no new 
death sentences and no executions of Harris County killers. And although part 
of that downturn stems from the possibility of life without parole, some 
experts see possible drawbacks.

"There has always been speculation about whether that has encouraged 
prosecutors to file capital cases more than they otherwise would because what 
better leverage do you have in a plea bargaining situation than, 'Agree with me 
or I will kill you,'" said Scott Henson policy director with the non-profit 
Just Liberty, which advocates for reducing incarceration. "The government will 
literally kill you if you don't go for life without parole and there is no 
stronger bargaining chip than that."

District Attorney Kim Ogg, whose office has overseen less than 25 life without 
parole sentences since she took the reins last year, pushed back against that 
suggestion.

"We don't use the death penalty as a plea bargaining tool," she said.

Andy Kahan, the city of Houston's victim advocate, described life without 
parole as a "saving grace" for victims' families.

"Like it or not, there's some really evil people out there that commit some 
horrible atrocities that deserve to be locked up for life," he said. "In a 
utopian world it'd be great if we didn't have to have it but that's not 
reality."

While Harris County grabs the lion's share of the state's life without parole 
sentences, Dallas County came in right behind with 120, according to Texas 
Department of Criminal Justice data through Dec. 18. Tarrant County had 69 of 
the state's 1,067 total such sentences, while Bexar County had 47 and Hidalgo 
had 26.

Without more data to compare the percent of slayings charged as capital cases 
seeking death or LWOP in Harris County before and after the introduction of the 
law, it's difficult to evaluate whether the sentencing option has had any 
measurable impact on local death penalty charging practices, pointed out Robert 
Dunham of the Death Penalty Information Center.

"The raw numbers may tell us something and what they tell us is not a 
surprise," Dunham said. "But the raw numbers don't tell us a lot."

Just over 17 % of the state's population lives in Harris County, according to 
Texas Department of State Health Services population projections for 2016. That 
makes for an LWOP rate of 6 sentences per 100,000 residents, which is higher 
than in all but two counties with populations over 100,000.

In comparison to murder figures, the relatively large number of life without 
parole sentences looks less surprising. According to an analysis of DPS data, 
in 2016 Harris County accounted for 27.7 % of the state's murders and 22.7 % of 
the murders cleared.

Harris County has led the way in the use of life without parole sentencing.

And while Harris County accounts for a disproportionate number of total 
executions nationwide - more than any other county or entire state, except the 
rest of Texas - it has generated only a small fraction of the total life 
without parole sentences across the country, based on TDCJ figures and a 2017 
Sentencing Project report.

"Where the corporate culture has changed is the willingness to seek death," 
McCann said, referring to local prosecutors. "Cases that 10 years ago would 
have been death even with LWOP are now charged as non-death," McCann said. "But 
that doesn't mean that they've stopped charging the LWOP cases."

To some extent, Texas' relatively low LWOP use compared to national numbers may 
stem from the fact that prosecutors have only had the option for life without 
parole since 2005. Before that, the harshest choices were death - or the 
possibility of release after 40 years.

"Life without parole became an option because of a turnaway from the death 
penalty," said Elizabeth Henneke executive director of the Lone Star Justice 
Alliance. "It was considered a more humane option than the death penalty and 
increasingly juries seemed to be uncomfortable with death as the only option."

Texas became the last death penalty state to adopt the option, after Harris 
County prosecutors dropped their opposition. Initially it only applied to 
capital murder, but later the law was expanded to include crimes like repeated 
sexual assault of a child.

>From the statute's inception, Harris County was one of its biggest users.

"It's not surprising because Harris County is also the driver of the death 
penalty numbers and most juvenile commitments as well," Henneke said. "Across 
the board Harris County is the incarceration county."

Last year, one of the county's most high-profile life without parole sentences 
was handed down to Shannon Miles, the man who fatally shot Harris County Deputy 
Darren Goforth at a gas station during a brutal August 2015 ambush. After 
months of wrangling over competency issues, defense and prosecutors agreed to a 
controversial plea deal allowing the mentally ill man to avoid the death 
penalty.

Also in 2017, James Tinsley netted a life without parole sentence after he was 
convicted of fatally shooting 3 men at a northside car dealership. Another 19 
defendants were given the state's 2nd-harshest sentence last year as of 
mid-December.

Even though it could save convicted killers from death row, Henneke offered 
concerns about the medical costs associated with housing a growing cadre of 
elderly prisoners, especially given their relatively low recidivism rates.

"What it means is that one county is driving a statewide policy with statewide 
financial implication because the rest of the state is going to be paying for 
housing these extra long sentences," she said.

Unlike with death-sentenced cases, there's no automatic appointment of 
post-conviction appellate counsel and no punishment phase of the trial, which 
makes the whole process quicker and cheaper.

"Life without parole was an unintentional gift to major urban prosecutors' 
offices," McCann said. "It makes it very easy to dispose of a large number of 
violent and often youthful offenders without any more thought than one would 
need to toss away a piece garbage."

Shannon Edmonds, staff attorney and director of governmental relations for the 
Texas District and County Attorneys Association, said his group doesn't have an 
official position on the matter.

"It kind of tickles me that defense lawyers are upset that prosecutors aren't 
trying to kill their clients," he said. "Even if the punishment was a minimum 
of 40 years on a capital life sentence, they still complained that prosecutors 
used the death penalty to get a guilty plea. That's not anything unique to life 
without parole."

(source for all: Houston Chronicle)








PENNSYLVANIA:

Notorious Baby/Grandma Killer Raghu Yandamuri to be Executed Feb. 23 in 
Pennsylvania



Raghunandan Yandamuri, convicted of the 2012 brutal murders of 61-year-old 
Satyavathi Venna, and her 10-month-old granddaughter Saanvi Venna, in 
Pennsylvania, will be executed Feb. 23, according to a statement issued by the 
Pennsylvania Department of Corrections Jan. 8.

Yandamuri will be the 1st Indian American to receive the death penalty. He is 
scheduled to die by lethal injection. As he awaits his end, Yandamuri is being 
held at the Greene State Correctional Institution, a maximum security prison in 
Waynesburg, Pennsylvania.

Following his conviction in 2014, the Andhra Pradesh native - who came to the 
U.S. on an H-1B visa - asked that the death penalty be imposed upon him. "I 
don't want this hearing. I would rather take the death penalty," Yandamuri told 
Montgomery County Common Pleas Court Judge Steven O'Neill before he was 
sentenced.

The convicted killer later appealed his sentence, saying 2 other men were 
involved in the murders and kidnapping of baby Saanvi. Yandamuri lost his 
appeal last April (see earlier India-West story here).

After he was arrested in 2012, the killer provided a chilling account of how he 
entered the Vennas' apartment while Saanvi's parents, Venkata and Latha, were 
at work. He fatally stabbed Satyavathi - who was attempting to protect her 
granddaughter - before kidnapping the baby, which he hoped to use to obtain 
$50,000 in ransom from her parents.

Yandamuri and his wife Komali were friends with the Vennas and lived in the 
same apartment building in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania.

After kidnapping Saanvi, Yandamuri covered her mouth and stuffed the baby in a 
suitcase, then left her at a basement gym in the apartment building, where she 
suffocated to death. During a frantic 3-day search by police and the local 
community, Yandamuri handed out missing baby flyers.

Yandamuri was arrested later that week at a local gambling casino. Earlier 
India-West stories reported that Yandamuri had accrued $35,000 in gambling 
debts and had filed for bankruptcy while working in Northern California. His 
wife Komali was pregnant at the time of the murders.

[my note: this is NOT a serious execution date]

(source: indiawest.com)








NORTH CAROLINA:

Accused killer, in a call from jail, pleaded for an alibi for night of 2 
slayings



Spectators and jurors were riveted in a 7th-floor courtroom Thursday while 
listening to an audio recording of an accused killer.

It was nearly 2 years ago when Donovan Richardson called a friend from the Wake 
County jail and pleaded with her to provide him with an alibi for the night of 
a home invasion that led to the shooting deaths of 2 longtime friends in 2014.

"You are like an angel to me right now," Richardson said to his friend. "I 
kinda need you to be my alibi. I need you to say I was there. I was not 
somewhere else."

"Yeah," the friend, Jamila Gillam of Angier, replied.

Thursday marked the 6th day of testimony in the capital double murder case of 
Richardson, 24, of Holly Springs. Prosecutors say Richardson, along with 
Gregory A. Crawford of Fuquay-Varina, broke into the Fuquay-Varina home of 
Arthur Lee Brown in the early morning hours of July 18, 2014.

A 3rd accomplice, Kevin Bernard Britt of Holly Springs, waited outside in a 
truck for the burglars.

Brown, a popular 74-year-old construction company owner, and his friend and 
longtime employee, David Eugene McKoy, 66, were both shot and killed in Brown's 
home.

Crawford last year was sentenced to life in prison. Britt has not gone to 
trial, but has been cooperating with investigators. Richardson could face the 
death penalty if he is convicted of 1st-degree murder.

On Thursday afternoon, prosecutor Matt Lively called Gillam to the witness 
stand. She told the court that on May 16, 2016, she was at her home with 
Tykeiyah Alexander, Richardson's girlfriend. Gillam told the court that while 
she was there, Richardson made a collect call to Alexander from the Wake County 
jail, where he has been in custody since his arrest on Aug. 3, 2014.

Lively activated a recording of the call in the courtroom. Alexander could be 
heard talking with Richardson for a short period before handing the phone to 
Gillam.

"Hey Donovan," Gillam said.

"What's up?" Richardson replied.

"What's going on?" Gillam asked.

Richardson asked if he was on speaker phone. When Gillam told Richardson he 
was, the accused killer asked her to take him off so they could speak 
privately.

"All you got to say is I was there. I need an alibi. You know what I'm saying?" 
said Richardson.

Later in the conversation, Richardson told Gillam, "When my lawyer calls and 
ask what time was it, say it was early in the morning and I was there with you. 
I got you. You know I love you."

"I love you," Gillam replied.

Alexander was pregnant with Richardson's child when he was arrested. The child 
could be heard in the background of the recording while Richardson spoke with 
Gillam and Alexander.

The child's mother got back on the phone with Richardson. "This is crazy," she 
repeated several times.

"Donovan, don't make me cry," she added before promising to accept his next 
collect call from the jail and hanging up.

During cross-examination Thursday by defense attorney Joseph Zeszotarski, 
Gillam said neither prosecutors nor defense attorneys suggested she provide 
Richardson with an alibi.

Wake prosecutor Howard Cummings on Thursday asked Wake County Superior Court 
Judge Graham Shirley to place Richardson in solitary confinement, where he 
would not have access to a telephone or digital devices until the trial ends.

"He needs to be excommunicated until we finish this trial," said Cummings, who 
requested that Richardson only have contact with detention officials or his 
attorneys. "It appears he has people on the outside who are willing to do 
things for him."

Shirley said he would inquire with jail officials about Richardson's housing 
status.

The trial resumes Tuesday morning.

(source: newsobserver.com)








FLORIDA----new death sentence

Man Sentenced To Death In Wilton Manors Murders



It took 2 hours for a Broward jury to sentence convicted killer Peter Avsenew 
to death Thursday afternoon.

Last November, Avsenew was found guilty in the murder Stephen Adams and Kevin 
Powell in their Wilton Manors home during Christmas 2010.

Avsenew fired his attorneys shortly after his conviction and represented 
himself during the penalty phase of his case. He showed no emotion when the 
jury's decision was announced.

Thursday morning he read a statement to the jury which read in part, "I have no 
regrets in my life and I am proud of every decision I ever made. Nobody knows 
what happened that day, everyone can speculate, you would need an Ouija board 
for that."

Prosecutors say Avsenew met the couple after posting a suggestive ad on 
Craigslist. They say Avsenew shot the couple to death and then stole their 
credit cards and car.

Afterwards, they say Avsenew traveled to his mother's home. She became 
suspicious and turned him into authorities.

Avsenew claimed that he came home and found the couple dead and fled in a 
panic.

Prosecutor Shari Tate said in closing arguments, "He made a choice and the 
choice has consequences."

(source: CBS News)

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

Man who murdered gay couple flipped off the victims' families as he was 
sentenced to death



A man convicted of killing a gay couple in Florida flipped off the victims' 
families after the jury recommended the death penalty.

Peter Avsenew, 32, was convicted of murder in the 2010 deaths of Kevin Mark 
Powell, 47, and Stephen Adams, 52, in Wilton Manners, a city near Ft. 
Lauderdale with a large LGBT population. Prosecutors said Avsenew used 
Craigslist to get invited to the victims' home and then killed and robbed them, 
leaving with their money, a car, and other belongings.

During the sentencing hearing, he opted to defend himself instead of letting 
his lawyer present arguments. He expressed no regret and did not ask the jury 
to spare his life.

"My job here is simple," he said. "I don't have to prove anything to you as 
clearly the state's proven. All I have to do is be here and behave. It's up to 
you to decide life or death based on the information provided to you throughout 
this entire trial."

"I have no regrets in my life and I am proud of the decisions I've made. No one 
really knows what happened that day. Everyone can speculate what ifs and maybes 
until they're blue in the face, which they'll never really know."

Prosecutors showed the jury pictures of the victims. It took them 2 hours to 
agree to recommend the death penalty.

Minutes after the sentencing, he flipped off the victims' families, showing 
that it wasn't so easy to "be here and behave."

"In my heart of hearts, I knew that he was making that gesture to us, and then 
he admitted that he made the gesture to our family," Said Marci Craig, one of 
the victim's sisters.

"After what happened in that courtroom just now, I'm happy that he's being put 
to the death penalty," said Missy Badget, sister of the other victim.

The judge described that gesture as "unwise," because he has not yet been 
formally sentenced. The jury can only recommend the death penalty; a judge has 
to order it.

Avsenew's attorneys argued that he went to the couple's house and found them 
already dead, and that he didn't call 911 because he was working for the couple 
as an escort.

Prosecutors said that there was no evidence that Avsenew worked as an escort. 
Shortly after the couple's deaths, he showed up at his mother's door and said 
that he had done "something worse than ever before."

While staying with his mother, he searched the web several times for 
information about the investigation into the killings. He also threatened his 
mother: "Peter has chased me with a Samurai sword," Jeanne Avsenew told the 
court. "Peter has had a gun, had a shotgun with my name on the bullet."

When she checked her computer's browser history, she saw that he searched the 
web a few times for information about the investigation into the killings, and 
she got worried. "All I can think of is if he did that to them, what will he do 
to me?"

She turned her son into the police.

Adams and Powell met at Cleveland Pride in the early 80's.

"They fell in love, and they've been together ever since," Powell's brother 
said.

lgbtqnation.com)

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

Dontae Morris' death sentence in Tampa murder vacated by Florida Supreme Court



Murder suspect Dontae Morris in court for a hearing. The Florida Supreme Court 
on Thursday tossed out Morris' death sentence in the murder of Derek The 
Florida Supreme Court on Thursday overturned the death sentence of Dontae 
Morris in the 2010 killing of Derek Anderson in Tampa.

The justices upheld Morris' 1st-degree murder conviction, but in a 5-2 decision 
they ruled that Morris must be resentenced because of the U.S. Supreme Court 
ruling in Hurst vs. Florida that the state's former death penalty sentencing 
system was unconstitutional because it limited the role of the jury in capital 
punishment cases.

In its decision Thursday, the court said: "Because the jury in this case 
recommended death by a vote of 10 to 2, we cannot determine that the jury 
unanimously found that the aggravators outweighed the mitigators ... The error 
in Morris' sentencing was not harmless beyond a reasonable doubt."

Morris is also on death row for the murders of 2 Tampa police officers, Jeffrey 
Kocab and David Curtis that occurred 42 days later. Last year, the court upheld 
the death sentences in that case, which had a unanimous jury.

Anderson, 21, was shot in the back outside his mother's east Tampa apartment on 
May 18, 2010. He had just arrived home after doing laundry at a friend's house, 
carrying a load of clean clothing in a backpack.

A friend of Morris testified that he called her a few days after the murder and 
confessed that he shot Anderson. The friend, Ashley Price, claimed Morris told 
her he and Anderson had argued earlier that day because Anderson was selling 
marijuana on what Morris considered to be his "turf."

Police were unable to link Morris to the crime until June 29, 2010, when he 
murdered Curtis and Kocab during a traffic stop. Curtis, who pulled over a car 
driven by Morris' then-girlfriend, discovered that Morris had a warrant for 
writing bad checks. When Curtis moved to arrest him, Morris drew a gun and shot 
each officer once.

A Florida Department of Law Enforcement analysis of the 2 bullets he fired 
revealed they came from the same gun used to murder Anderson.

On appeal, Morris' defense argued that his conviction should be overturned. 
Among other issues, they cited the notoriety of the case and the judge's 
decision to keep the trial in Hillsborough County. But the high court ruled 
that there was no evidence that the jury knew anything about Morris's crimes 
before the trial.

The Hillsborough State Attorney's Office will have to decide whether to seek a 
new death sentence for Morris in the Anderson case.

He remains on death row for the police killings.

(source: Tampa Bay Times)








INDIANA:

7th Circuit reverses death sentence for murderer Baer



Despite the "atrocious" nature of a murderer's crimes, the 7th Circuit Court of 
Appeals reversed his death sentence in a habeas petition, finding prosecutorial 
misconduct and misleading jury instructions likely influenced the jury's 
decision to sentence him to death.

Fredrick Baer approached Cory Clark on her front porch near Lapel and asked to 
use her phone. He then followed her into the home with the intent to rape her, 
but later cut her throat instead. He then inflicted the same fate on Clark's 
4-year old daughter, Jenna, before stealing money from Clark's purse and 
leaving the apartment.

Baer was eventually arrested and admitted to the crimes, and the trial 
proceeded on the issue of whether he was guilty but mentally ill, or just 
guilty. During voir dire, Madison County Prosecutor Rodney Cummings repeatedly 
stated the incorrect legal standard for a guilty but mentally ill conviction 
and incorrectly told prospective jurors that such a conviction might preclude a 
death sentence, the 7th Circuit found.

Baer's counsel failed to object to these statements, and the jury eventually 
found Baer guilty as charged.

He was sentenced to death in Marion Superior Court, and the Indiana Supreme 
Court upheld that sentence on direct appeal. The court also upheld the denial 
of his petition for post-conviction relief in 2011.

Baer then moved for habeas corpus in the Indiana Southern District Court, which 
denied the petition and also denied him a certificate of appealability. The 7th 
Circuit Court of Appeals, however, granted a certificate of appealability, and 
Baer brought 3 arguments before the court, 2 of which were addressed in a 
Thursday opinion reversing the denial of his petition for habeas corpus in 
Fredrick Michael Baer v. Ron Neal, 15-1933.

Specifically, Baer argued his counsel was ineffective for failing to object to 
jury instructions that likely precluded the jury from considering mitigating 
evidence, and for failing to object to numerous instances of prosecutorial 
misconduct.

During the sentencing phase of the trial, the jury was instructed to consider 
that Baer's "capacity to appreciate the criminality of (his) conduct or to 
conform that conduct to the requirements of the law was substantially impaired 
as a result of mental disease or defect" as a mitigator. However, this 
instructor excluded the words "or intoxication" - germane here because Baer 
claimed he had been using methamphetamine on the day of the murders.

Baer's counsel failed to object to the modification of that instruction or to a 
"voluntary intoxication" instruction that allowed intoxication to be a defense 
if the intoxication was involuntary. Those failures constituted prejudicial 
ineffective assistance of counsel because "a reasonable juror could have 
understood the complete penalty phase jury instructions as foreclosing the 
evidence of voluntary intoxication from consideration...," Judge Ann Claire 
Williams wrote in a 37-page opinion Thursday.

Similarly, defense counsel's failure to object to the prosecutor's prejudicial 
comments at trial was prejudicially ineffective, Williams wrote. In addition to 
his incorrect statements during voir dire, Williams said the prosecutor also 
told prospective jurors that Clark's family wanted Baer to be sentenced to 
death, and inserted his personal opinion and facts that were not in evidence 
into other portions of the trial.

"Can we be certain that Baer would not have been sentence to death if given a 
fair trial and effective counsel? No," the judge wrote. "But, it is 'reasonably 
likely' that without the prosecutor's injection of impermissible statements and 
incorrect law the jurors would not have recommended death."

Thus, the Indiana Supreme Court unreasonably applied Strickland v. Washington, 
466 U.S. 668 (1984), to Baer's claims, Williams wrote, so the 7th Circuit 
reversed the denial of his district court habeas petition and remanded his case 
for further proceedings and resentencing.

(source: The Indiana Lawyer)