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

[Rick Halperin]

Jan. 20



TEXAS:

Anthony Graves turns jailhouse writing into book, 'Infinite Hope'



He started on a typewriter, click-clacking away into the night in the quiet of 
a prison cell.

That was sometime around 2000, when Anthony Graves didn't know if he'd see the 
light of day again - back when the state still planned to execute him for a 
crime he didn't commit.

In the nearly 2 decades he spent on Texas' death row, the wrongfully convicted 
Brenham man faced 2 execution dates. His 3 sons grew up without him. The world 
moved on, but he kept writing, typing, recording his thoughts.

And then, there was hope. First, his co-defendant recanted. Then in 2006, a 
federal appeals court set aside his conviction and sentence. Finally, in 2010, 
prosecutors dropped the charges against him, and he walked out of prison a free 
man.

Author appearance

When: 7 p.m. Monday

Where: Brazos Bookstore, 2421 Bissonnet

Information: Free; 713-523-0701, brazosbookstore.com

Now, all the labor of those late nights on a jailhouse typewriter has come to 
fruition. The exonerated man's 1st book - "Infinite Hope" - was released last 
week.

In anticipation of his Monday appearance at Brazos Bookstore, Graves talked 
about his journey and his hopes for the future.

Q: So, first of all, it looks like you haven't been in the news that much in 
the past couple of years - what have you been keeping busy with?

A: I've been doing everything! I've been traveling around the world sharing my 
message about criminal justice reform, and also I spent a lot of time writing 
my book, as well as teaming up with the ACLU to be part of their Smart Justice 
initiative. And I'm also still on the board of the Houston Forensic Science 
Center.

Q: Did you always know you would write a book about this someday?

A: Yes - I knew that the story needed to be told. This story is to be shared 
with the rest of the world to awaken some people with the reality of the death 
penalty, not the theory.

Q: Before all this, what was your take on the death penalty?

A: I had no position on it - I just believed if you did the crime you did the 
time. I never thought about the death penalty itself ... In a perfect world, it 
could probably work, but we don't live in a perfect world.

Q: Do you stay in touch with any of the men you did time with?

A: Somewhat - but Texas executed most of the guys that I knew. I try to stay 
focused on the bigger picture. You try to eliminate the death penalty in the 
name of those people who were wrongfully executed. I was there when we were 
executing guilty people - but also when we were executing innocent people.

Q: Do you think any of the guys who are still in there will read your book?

A: They're anticipating it. As well as the criminal justice world - I think 
this book is going to be huge.

Q: Is your book on the banned-books list?

A: I hope that Texas prisons let it in! There's nothing in it that shouldn't 
let it in.

Q: Did you write it that way intentionally, so guys in prison could read it?

A: Yes. I wanted to make sure that those I was trying to reach out to and give 
hope to could actually receive this book.

Q: Were you a writer before this?

A: I wrote a lot of letters to people around the world asking them to save my 
life - maybe that turned me into a writer.

Q: Do you ever wonder what your life would be like otherwise?

A: No, I don't. I don't feel like I missed something - I feel like I was 
prepared for something. Because of what happened to me, I have a story to tell 
that changes people's lives, that gives people hope. Had this story not 
happened to me, I would not be able to give it to other people. I would just be 
the guy working and making babies. So in hindsight, this gave my life a lot of 
purpose that I didn't even know existed within me.

Q: Are there any ways in which it's changed you for the better? Any positive 
takeaways from a really dark time?

A: It has allowed me to put things and life in the proper perspective. It has 
taught me that what seems to be too big is not too big. It has given me a 
better appreciation for life every day. There is not a day in my life right now 
that I feel is too overwhelming, that I have problems. I'm happy to have 
whatever problems I have. I know that God is still being good to me if I can 
wake up and say that I'm still alive. Every day is a blessing, not just some 
days. That's what this whole experience has taught me. Be happy that you have 
the problems that you complain about.

Q: So it's been, what, seven years now? Does it ever still feel weird being out 
after so many years in isolation?

A: No. I deserved to be here. So it never felt weird. The thing with me that 
separated me from most is I never thought about dying - I always thought about 
living. So I lived on death row.

Q: And when you had 2 execution dates?

A: I never stopped living. When you're no longer afraid of death, you can't 
scare me with it. When I got a date, I just thought, "I'm going to live till I 
die."

Q: What's next for you?

A: I just shot a pilot for a possible TV show with Apple Entertainment, and I 
think they'll start pitching it after my book comes out. I continue to speak 
around the country, and it's my hope to get picked up one day by a speakers 
bureau. I feel like when I'm up there on a stage speaking, that's my safe 
haven. That's my therapy, and I can't get enough of it.

(source: Houston Chronicle)

****************** ---- impending execution

Bart Whitaker faces execution for killing mother and brother in 2003



The father of a Sugar Land man sentenced to die for killing his mother and 
brother in 2003 is asking for his son's life to be spared.

"I'm very concerned. I want him to live. I love him," said Kent Whitaker of his 
son Bart.

Bart Whitaker was convicted in 2008 of the murders of his mother, Patricia, and 
his brother, Kevin.

Investigators said he hatched a plan to kill his entire family in an effort to 
receive an inheritance of more than $1 million. Bart was sentenced to death.

"Kevin and Tricia would be appalled if they knew that their brother and son was 
going to be executed as a result of these murders," said Kent Whitaker.

Kent and his son's attorneys have requested a commutation of that death 
sentence. In a document filed with the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, they 
write, "Commutation means that we as a society do not forgive or execute Bart 
Whitaker. We will instead mark him to wander his own mind within the oblivion 
of his own cell. And this punishment will continue until God decides 
otherwise."

Kent Whitaker calls that mercy.

"Mercy means that you don't get what you deserve," Kent Whitaker said.

Further, he says his son is now a changed man after serving 11 years in prison. 
He's respected by other inmates whom he helps and tutors. He's even completed 
his bachelor's degree while behind bars and is in the final stages of 
completing his master's in literature.

Kent Whitaker tells Eyewitness News he never wanted the district attorney to 
seek the death penalty. In fact, he says none of his or his wife's family 
wanted that.

The lead prosecutor on the case says nothing changes what Bart Whitaker did.

"I'm sorry for Mr. Whitaker, but I'm gonna tell you right now, justice has been 
done on this case. And anybody that says different is absolutely wrong," said 
Fred Felcman, first assistant district attorney for the Fort Bend County 
District Attorney's Office.

Bart Whitaker's execution date is set for Feb. 22. The governor or a court 
would have to step in to stop it.

The Texas Board Pardons and Paroles will review the request.

(source: ABC News)

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

Joseph Tejeda pleads not guilty in Breanna Wood's killing



A man facing the death penalty in the killing of Breanna Wood pleaded not 
guilty Thursday to 5 counts, including capital murder.

Joseph Tejeda appeared in the 105th District Court Thursday afternoon to enter 
his plea. He was escorted into the courtroom shackled at the waist with a full 
head of dark brown hair that obscured a tattoo on his hairline.

Tejeda is facing various counts. Among them are engaging in organized criminal 
activity, tampering with physical evidence and abuse of a corpse, in addition 
to the capital murder charge.

His bond totals $1 million.

During the hearing, it was decided that, having been approved to represent 
death penalty cases, Fred Jimenez would remain his lead attorney.

Earlier in the day, Magdalena Yvette Carvajal appeared in court. She and Tejeda 
are among the 7 people indicted for crimes related to Wood's death.

Carvajal pleaded not guilty a charge of tampering with physical evidence. Her 
bond was set at $150,000, and her trial date was set for March 19.

Wood was last seen in October 2016 at a convenience store in Corpus Christi 
with Tejeda. Police found Wood's body in an abandoned trailer off State Highway 
666, near Robstown in early January 2017.

Tejeda's trial date is expected to be set during a hearing next month.

(source: Corpus Christi Caller-Times)

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

Before execution, 'Tourniquet Killer' says "I made my peace"



There was relief Thursday night outside of Texas death row.

In the case of Houston's "Tourniquet Killer," there was justice- decades in the 
making.

Anthony Allen Shores became the nation's 1st prisoner executed in 2018, known 
for his signature murder technique.

Shore received lethal injection for the 1992 strangling of a 21-year-old woman 
whose body was dumped in the drive-thru of a Houston Dairy Queen. Maria del 
Carmen Estrada was 1 of 4 females Shore confessed to killing.

He was sentenced to die for the murders of 3 girls and a young woman - all 
raped and tortured in the 80's and 90's in the Heights area.

Shore's victims include:

14-year-old Laurie Lee Tremblay

21-year-old Maria Del Carmen Estrada

9-year-old Diana Rebollar

16-year-old Dana Sanchez

"Remember these faces," City of Houston victim's rights advocate Andy Kahan 
said. "This is who today is about. Anthony Allen Shores' reign of terror is 
officially over."

Shore admitted to the rape, torture and murders of all his victims.

(source: ABC News)








PENNSYLVANIA:

Krasner's softened rhetoric on death penalty worries supporters



For decades, Larry Krasner's position on seeking the death penalty has been 
defined by 1 word: "Never."

As a candidate in last year's Democratic primary for district attorney, the 
longtime civil rights lawyer averred that he was "the only candidate running 
... who explicitly pledges to never seek the death penalty." His post-victory 
platform reasserted that "he will never pursue a death sentence in any case." 
It was 1 of many unequivocal campaign promises that helped him clinch the 
primary and subsequent election.

But since taking office, Philly's new DA has made more equivocal remarks on 
capital punishment that have worried - and angered - some of his staunchest 
supporters.

The initial remark came at a media briefing last week, where Krasner fielded 
questions about suddenly dismissing 31 attorneys and other staffers as well as 
a flurry of new hires and interim appointments.

When the conversation turned to policy, Krasner outlined the DAO's homicide 
sentencing committee, an appointed board that recommends sentences in many 
homicide cases. While the final decision rests with the DA himself, Krasner 
noted that this committee's yet-to-be-appointed members could push a death 
penalty recommendation in certain cases.

"You never want to say never, but their decisions and my decisions are going to 
be informed by the fact that the death penalty is never imposed in 
Pennsylvania," he said, referring to Gov. Tom Wolf's moratorium on state 
execution.

Some observers were startled by the shift in Krasner's language. Others wanted 
more context.

Asked for clarification Wednesday, Krasner's office issued a similarly tempered 
response.

"DA Larry Krasner has consistently stated that he personally opposes the death 
penalty," DA spokesman Ben Waxman said in an email to Philly Weekly. "His 
statement about the committee's procedures represents no change in his personal 
beliefs about the death penalty. Ultimately those beliefs will inform his 
exercise of discretion in accepting or rejecting the committee's 
recommendation."

Pressed over whether "never" still means "never" with regard to seeking capital 
punishment as DA, Krasner's office declined further comment.

Several of Krasner's staunchest supporters who were briefed on these comments 
expressed concern over what they perceived as his notably softened rhetoric.

Jondhi Harrell, founder of the Center for Returning Citizens and a member of 
the pro-Krasner Coalition for a Just DA, said he personally attended campaign 
events in which the longtime civil rights attorney spoke of nothing but 
"never."

"Is DA Krasner the same person as Candidate Krasner, or will we begin to see a 
watering down, a dilution of the key components that caused community 
activists, returning citizens and a public hungry for social justice to 
overwhelmingly support his campaign?" Harrell queried in an email. "While 
staunch supporters wish to believe in the integrity of campaign promises, the 
reality comes with the day-to-day decisions of the office."

Lorraine Haw, a member of the Coalition to Abolish Death by Incarceration, 
called it a "backtrack." Haw's brother was murdered in Philadelphia more than 
25 years ago. Despite the fact that Pennsylvania hasn't executed an inmate 
since 1999, she is lobbying to have her brother's killer removed from death 
row.

"He's got to realize the same way we got him up there, we can bring him down," 
Haw said of Krasner. "He can't sit here and sell us dreams because we can get 
dreams for free."

Asa Khalif of Black Lives Matter in Pennsylvania, who campaigned heavily for 
Krasner, also took note of the shift in the DA's tone.

"Every politician, including Larry Krasner - especially Larry Krasner - must 
and will be held accountable to the campaign promises they ran on, and we can 
accept nothing less," Khalif said Wednesday.

Despite concerns, supporters still have high hopes for how Krasner will adjust 
to the political pressures of the office. Many viewed his termination of 
long-tenured prosecutors and top unit brass as a campaign promise delivered. 
And in terms of carceral policy, Krasner has already helped negotiate parole 
for juvenile lifer Johnny Berry, who has spent the last 23 years behind bars, 
the Inquirer reports.

"I have to give Krasner credit," said Berry, upon hearing the prosecutor's 
offer for reduced sentence. "He held true to his promise. He definitely changed 
the culture of the office."

But when it comes to the death penalty, outcry can strike prosecutors mightily 
from all sides.

Last year, a legal battle erupted in Florida between Republican Gov. Rick Scott 
and State Attorney Aramis Ayala, who had long refused to seek capital 
convictions - even when unanimously recommended by a panel of assistant 
prosecutors. The case eventually went to the Florida Supreme Court, which ruled 
that Ayala had to at least consider the death penalty in certain cases. She has 
since taken on her first capital case.

Sources in the Philly DAO worry that a similar scenario could unfold should a 
Republican succeed in ousting Wolf, who is up for reelection this year.

State Sen. Scott Wagner, a populist Republican candidate from York County, has 
made pro-death penalty remarks on the campaign trail following the death 
sentence handed to Eric Frein, the Poconos man who shot and killed a State 
Police trooper last year. Under Wolf's moratorium, the sentence remains purely 
symbolic. Wagner has vowed to immediately lift Wolf's moratorium should he take 
the reins in Harrisburg.

However Krasner handles these unforeseeable pressures, his believers say 
they'll be watching.

"On the day that the Krasner DA office pursues a death penalty case, that 
promise is dead," Harrell said. "What other principles may fall by the wayside 
under the weight of political opposition and reality? It is up to those who 
fought and struggled to elect him to hold him accountable to the principles and 
promises we believed in."

(source: cityandstatepa.com)








NORTH CAROLINA:

Donovan Richardson trial: Jury deliberations continue in Wake trial



A Wake County jury continued its deliberations Friday in the death penalty 
trial of man accused of a double homicide in Fuquay-Varina nearly 4 years ago.

Donovan Richardson is 1 of 3 men accused in the fatal shooting of Arthur Lee 
Brown, 78, and David Eugene McKoy, 66, on July 19, 2014 at a home on Howard 
Road. Investigators have said the killing likely stemmed from a robbery of the 
2 victims.

Gregory Crawford pleaded guilty in May 2016 to charges of 1st-degree murder, 
robbery with a dangerous weapon and burglary in connection with the slayings. 
He was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

Kevin Britt was charged with 2 counts of 1st-degree murder, robbery with a 
dangerous weapon and burglary. He has not been sentenced yet, but he did plead 
guilty to being an accessory to murder. He also testified against Richardson 
during his trial.

Jurors only have 3 options when weighing Richardson's fate: the can find him 
guilty of 1st-degree or 2nd-degree murder or they could return a not guilty 
verdict. If they vote to convict him of 1st-degree murder, they would then 
decide whether he should face the death penalty.

The jury deciding Richardson's fate had only been deliberating the case for 
just an hour on Tuesday before taking a break to accommodate a winter weather 
system that dropped up to a foot of snow on the Triangle. Jurors returned 
Friday at 11 a.m. to continue their deliberations.

Wake County jurors have not imposed the death penalty on any defendants since 
2007, and any decision on a death penalty verdict would require a unanimous 
decision by all 12 jurors hearing the case.

Jury selection in the trial happened during December, and opening arguments in 
the case began on Jan. 8.

The double murder shocked residents in the neighborhood where Brown and McKoy 
shared a home.

Their bodies were found by a relative who was checking on them. The home's 
front glass sliding door had been shattered, and authorities said the men had 
been robbed.

(source: WRAL news)








SOUTH CAROLINA:

Electric chair



While 55 countries retain the death penalty and 37 countries abolished it de 
facto, having had no executions in years; 103 countries have formally abolished 
it including those in Western Europe. The Eighth Amendment to the Constitution 
prohibits cruel and unusual punishment. This amendment appears to be forgotten 
in our country.

Arkansas hurried to execute last year death row inmates before its lethal drug 
expired. Recently it was disclosed that our beautiful South Carolina lacks 
lethal injection drugs for execution. Many states have unbelievably raised the 
specter of allowing the electric chair back in our arsenal for ending the life 
of death-row inmates.

While we are emulating countries such as Iran, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, China and 
North Korea, isn't it time for the United States, which prides itself on 
freedom and democracy, to enforce our Eighth Amendment and copy Turkmenistan, 
Madagascar, Fiji, Surinam, Nauru, Benin and Mongolia?

Isaac Cohen

Saturday Road

Mount Pleasant

(source: Letter to the Editor, Charleston Post and Courier)

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

Lawsuit: Bad mental health care led to prison stranglings



Families of 2 of the 4 inmates strangled in a South Carolina prison cell last 
April are suing the state, saying the prison provided woefully inadequate 
mental health care.

The lawsuits filed by relatives of 56-year-old Jimmy Ham and 35-year-old Jason 
Kelley say counselors often announced a prisoner's mental health diagnosis in 
front of other inmates to embarrass them.

The lawsuit also says counselors used checklists not approved by a psychiatrist 
instead of having conversations with prisoners.

Inmates Denver Simmons and Jacob Philip are charged with murder in the deaths 
of the 4 inmates.

Simmons told the Associated Press they lured the inmates into their cells 
individually and killed them so they could get the death penalty.

The Corrections Department says it doesn't comment on pending lawsuits.

(source: Associated Press)

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

Supreme Court silent so far on challenges to shield laws that protect execution 
drugs



Brian Keith Terrell maintained his innocence until the end. It was a painful 
conclusion that may have been unconstitutional, he sought to argue.

Convicted in 1992 of killing 70-year-old John Watson of Covington, Georgia, 
Terrell appealed and lost, then challenged Georgia's secrecy law which shields 
the source of drugs used in executions.

His 2015 challenge came as a number of inmates across the country died in 
botched executions in which they writhed, appeared to gasp for air, and made 
noises or indications of pain even though they were supposed to be unconscious 
or paralyzed. In one case, an inmate took up to two hours to die.

Lawyers for the condemned blamed new drugs, ways of making them or their 
sources, including compounding pharmacies, which are only lightly regulated by 
the federal government.

Legal questions surrounding the issue are arriving now in South Carolina as 
prison officials across the country have scrambled for execution drugs after 
pharmaceutical companies stopped sending them if they were to be used for 
executions.

Terrell's lawyers argued on appeal that they feared a botched execution without 
more information about the compounding pharmacy producing the drug. They argued 
that a drug for executions received earlier that year by the state was 
improperly cloudy. An expert for Terrell testified had it been injected it 
would have caused "immense pain."

Georgia's secrecy law prohibited disclosure of the source of the drugs.

The 11th U.S. Court of Appeals rejected the appeal but not without voicing 
concerns about a process that seemingly prevented a condemned inmate from 
acquiring evidence to prove that his execution might be unconstitutionally 
cruel and unusual punishment.

"The shroud of secrecy imposed by Georgia law effectively insulates the state 
of Georgia's source, quality and composition of pentobarbital from any 
scrutiny, leaving the condemned without any meaningful notice or opportunity to 
be heard about the specific risks he faces from the state's reliance on an 
unidentified compounding pharmacy," Judge Beverly Martin wrote. "This leaves 
Mr. Terrell with no ability to plead facts necessary to meet the demanding 
burden the law imposes on him."

The next day in December 2015, Terrell was strapped to a gurney, and a nurse 
took an hour to place the IV needles in his arms, the Atlanta 
Journal-Constitution reported. Terrell winced in pain, mouthed "didn't do it" 
and later was pronounced dead, according to reports.

14 states now have secrecy laws to protect the source of drugs used in 
executions.

Some lawmakers, including state Sen. William Timmons of Greenville, want South 
Carolina to become No. 15.

Stalled executions

They argue that South Carolina has not carried out an execution since 2011 
because all the state's execution drugs have expired, and it is difficult if 
not impossible to find more as long as the source of the drugs can be publicly 
disclosed. Without the drugs, victims' families in murder cases are faced with 
uncertainty about the death penalty, supporters of a shield law say.

Those representing the inmates argue that all of the state's condemned inmates 
are still in some process of appeal and therefore there is no urgency to the 
issue of lethal injection. They also argue that without knowing the source of 
the drugs, South Carolina might see something go wrong in its executions.

"I think that if we don't know where they come from or who makes them or how 
they are made or are tested, I think that leads to definitely a greater risk of 
something going wrong," said Lindsey Vann, executive director of Justice 360, 
which represents death-row inmates.

36 inmates await execution on the state's death row, according to the state 
attorney general's office, and 11 have reached the point at which they have 
chosen their method of being killed. All but 1 have chosen lethal injection, 
the default method. The other has selected the electric chair.

Timmons has proposed both a shield law and a bill that would require the 
electric chair be used if lethal injection is unavailable.

South Carolina stopped using the electric chair as its mandatory means of 
execution in the 1990s, when lethal injection became the preferred method in 
other states after supporters argued it was a more humane method. James Earl 
Reed was the last inmate to die in South Carolina's chair, in 2008.

According to information prepared by the state attorney general's office, 
shield laws around the nation have been challenged in court, but there has not 
been a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that executions should be halted if a 
condemned inmate does not know enough about the drugs being prepared to kill 
him.

The 14 states that have shield laws are Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, 
Virginia, Florida, Arkansas, Arizona, Louisiana, Missouri, Ohio, Oklahoma, 
South Dakota, Texas and Delaware.

When the Supreme Court upheld lethal injection in 2008, it ruled that the 
3-drug execution method then in use could continue as long as it did not pose a 
substantial risk of harm before the death of the inmate. To challenge a 
particular lethal injection, inmates would also have to show there was a 
feasible alternative to the drugs at issue, the court said.

Condemned inmates have attacked the new drug protocols arguing they pose a risk 
of harm or violate the 8th Amendment to the Constitution???s ban on cruel and 
unusual punishment. But secrecy laws have prevented the inmates from pursuing 
avenues to prove their cases because they cannot discover the source of the 
drugs.

Heightened fears

Their fears have been heightened by news reports of what some have described as 
botched or unusual executions.

According to an article in the Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology last 
year, an article included in the South Carolina attorney general's packet, on 
Oct. 15, 2013, William Happ of Florida became the 1st prisoner in the nation to 
be executed with the sedative midalozam hydrochloride.

According to a report in the Broward County Sun-Sentinel, it took Happ about 13 
minutes to die. The Journal reported that witnesses said there appeared to be 
more body movements and he appeared to be conscious longer than in traditional 
lethal injections.

"At times his eyes fluttered, he swallowed hard, his head twitched, his chest 
heaved," reporter Tonya Alanez wrote.

On April 29, 2014, Oklahoma used the same drug in the execution of Clayton 
Lockett. He "writhed, moaned and clenched his teeth," according to the Journal, 
and appeared to be conscious even though his execution drug was a sedative. The 
execution took 43 minutes, according to the Journal, and an autopsy later said 
the cause of death was the drugs. A report on what went wrong stated that an IV 
line had become dislodged from his groin and some of the drugs were not 
entering the veins.

On January 16, 2014, Ohio used midalozam and hydromorphone for the execution of 
Dennis McGuire, the first time the combination had been used for an execution, 
according to the Journal. McGuire made several loud snorting noises and opened 
his mouth as if gasping during the 15-minute execution, according to the 
Journal.

Arizona used the same drug combination on Joseph Wood in his 2014 execution. 
Reporter Michael Kiefer of The Republic, who witnessed the execution, reported 
that it took more than 2 hours.

"It was death by apnea," he wrote. "And it went on for an hour and a half. I 
made a pencil stroke on a pad of paper, each time his mouth opened, and ticked 
off more than 640, which was not all of them, because the doctor came in at 
least 4 times and blocked my view."

In the Oklahoma execution of Charles Frederick Warner in 2015, an autopsy found 
he had been given the wrong drug, potassium acetate instead of potassium 
chloride, according to reports.

The Journal reported that a study of U.S. lethal injections between 1900 and 
2010 found that 7.1 % were botched compared to 3 % for other types of 
executions. In all of the recent cases of botched executions, the inmates died.

Dissenting voices

Some judges have voiced concerns about the process in appeals or at the trial 
level.

Georgia Supreme Court Justice Robert Benham, who with another justice dissented 
in the 2014 opinion rejecting the appeal of a condemned inmate, wrote of his 
concerns over the Lockett execution.

"I write because I fear this state is on a path that, at the very least, denies 
Hill and other death row inmates their rights to due process and, at the very 
worst, leads to the macabre results that occurred in Oklahoma," he wrote.

Benham wrote that certainty is a requirement in the death penalty and the 
state's secrecy law "does nothing to achieve a high level of certainty."

Martin wrote that there should be a way to address both an inmate's rights to 
know more about the drugs being prepared to kill him and the need to protect 
the source of such drugs.

"Surely, if we can protect grand jury proceedings and commercial trade secrets, 
we can come up with a process that protects the important interests of both 
Georgia and Mr. Terrell as the state carries out 'the gravest sentence our 
society may impose,'" she wrote.

The drugs used in the traditional, 3-drug lethal injection for American 
executions initially approved by the U.S. Supreme Court came from Europe until 
policy concerns stopped that supply.

According to the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, the United 
Kingdom in 2010 banned the exportation of sodium thiopental, the 1st of the 3 
drugs, to the United States in 2010. The next year, a Danish company that makes 
pentobarbital refused to sell the drug to any U.S. prison that held executions. 
Then the European Union banned exportation of any drug that could be used for 
capital punishment.

As prisons scrambled to find other drugs or to have compounding pharmacies 
produce them, states enacted secrecy laws out of a fear that harassment against 
the companies might stop them from producing the drugs. This in turn led 
inmates to file right-of-access lawsuits seeking information about the 
companies and the drugs.

In some cases judges have granted inmates' requests, but other courts have 
denied them. The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to review cases from condemned 
inmates claiming a right to such information.

In 2015, Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented in an appeal in which inmates 
claimed the use of midazolam amounted to cruel and unusual punishment, claims 
rejected by the majority of the court.

"The states may well be reluctant to pull back the curtain for fear of how the 
rest of us might react to what we see," she wrote. "But we deserve to know the 
price of our collective comfort before we blindly allow a state to make 
condemned inmates pay it in our names."

(source: greenvilleonline.com)








FLORIDA----new execution date

Scott sets execution in murder of college student



Gov. Rick Scott on Friday scheduled a Feb. 22 execution for death row inmate 
Eric Scott Branch, who was convicted of murdering a University of West Florida 
student in 1993.

Branch, now 46, was accused of sexually assaulting and murdering Susan Morris 
after accosting her when she went to her car following an evening class in 
January 1993, according to a 2006 Florida Supreme Court ruling.

Morris' body was found later in nearby woods. An Escambia County jury convicted 
Branch in 1994 of 1st-degree murder and sexual battery.

(source: news4jax.com)

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

In Fort Pierce death penalty resentencing, prosecutors no longer seeking 
execution



After more than a decade on death row, convicted killer Steven Douglas Hayward 
will instead be given a life sentence when he returns to court Jan. 24.

Though prosecutors filed a notice of intent to seek the death penalty again for 
Hayward, Chief Assistant State Attorney Tom Bakkedahl said they will not follow 
through.

"We're no longer seeking the death penalty, at the request of the victim's 
family," said Bakkedahl, of the 19th Judicial Circuit that includes the 
Treasure Coast and Okeechobee County.

Hayward is 1 of 6 death penalty cases from the Treasure Coast returning to 
court for a sentencing do-over after rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court and the 
Florida Supreme Court invalidated death sentences that followed 
less-than-unanimous jury recommendations.

He was convicted and sentenced to death in June 2007 for robbing and shooting 
in the chest and thigh Daniel DeStefano, a 32-year-old Fort Pierce Tribune 
newspaper carrier. DeStefano was delivering newspapers to convenience stores 
along Avenue D in Fort Pierce about 4 a.m. Feb. 1, 2005.

Before DeStefano died a day after the shooting, he told a Fort Pierce police 
officer he had shot back at his attacker with a gun he carried. He had a 
concealed weapon permit.

In the sentencing phase of Hayward's trial, the jury voted 8-4 for a death 
sentence. The state's new death penalty law, enacted in March, requires a jury 
to reach a unanimous decision in recommending death.

"We reached out to the family, and they were extremely distraught and upset 
about the Supreme Court ruling," Bakkedahl said.

The family has been more than 12 years into the process, Bakkedahl said, and 
was expecting about another 5 years for when the death sentence would be 
executed.

"Recognizing that they would have to start that process all over again, they 
quite frankly just couldn't handle it," he said. "It was too much for them."

Bakkedahl said he and State Attorney Bruce Colton decided to honor the wishes 
of DeStefano's family.

"I don't think I can put into words the emotions that they're feeling," 
Bakkedahl said.

So, Circuit Judge James McCann, who issued the original death sentence in 2007, 
will have no choice but to sentence Hayward to life in prison.

The DeStefano killing was Hayward's second murder conviction. In February 1988, 
he fatally shot Sebien DeRoche outside a Fort Pierce bar. He pleaded no contest 
to 2nd-degree murder and armed robbery. He was sentenced to 35 years in prison, 
but was given early release after 16 years because of state laws in effect at 
the time.

Bakkedahl said notices of intent to seek the death penalty have been filed in 
each of the remaining 5 death penalty cases from the Treasure Coast that must 
have a sentencing do-over. But no decisions have been made on how prosecutors 
will proceed, he said.

"Each case is different," Bakkedahl said. "The victims' families in each case 
are going to take a different position.

"We will consult with the families in each of those, and then make a decision 
based on the facts, the new law and the family's wishes."

Had DiStefano's family been adamant that they wanted to continue to pursue the 
death penalty, Bakkedahl said, "that's exactly what we would have done."

DeStefano's family recognized they would have to go through this entire 
process, he said, and that 1 of 2 things would happen.

"The jury would recommend death, and then they would have to live with the 
incessant litigation over the next 17 years again," Bakkedahl said, "or 2, the 
jury would not recommend death, and they would have gone through all of this 
for nothing."

Bakkedahl said victims' families are "completely left out of this equation" 
when courts rule on how the death penalty can be given.

"The system has treated them (DeStefano's family) so poorly as a result of this 
ruling that they have no faith that they'd get justice in the form of the death 
penalty, and they would just rather not go through this process all over 
again," he said.

Florida judges are resentencing nearly 600 people convicted of murder and 
sentenced to life in prison as teenagers. TCPalm compiled these local cases.

(source: tcpalm.com)

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

Death penalty trial begins in 2013 death of man who answered escort ad



As Gustavo Mora Falsetti Cabral's widow cried silently in a Palm Beach County 
courtroom, a prosecutor on Friday described the final harrowing moments of 
Cabral's life.

After he answered an escort ad on the website Backpage.com, Assistant State 
Attorney Aleathea McRoberts explained to a jury, Cabral was robbed, kidnapped 
and tortured until someone - either Jefty Joseph or Ilmart Christophe - put a 
bullet in his head inside an abandoned building in unincorporated Lake Worth.

"It won't matter under the law that you won't know who pulled the trigger," 
McRoberts said, marking the start of Joseph's trial. "Both are guilty under the 
law."

Although prosecutors are seeking the death penalty against both Joseph and 
Christophe, it was Joseph's trial that began Friday after more than 3 days of 
jury selection in the case. Christophe is awaiting trial.

If McRoberts and Assistant State Attorney Terri Skiles convince a jury that 
Joseph is guilty of 1st-degree murder, they will try to make the 24-year-old 
Lake Worth man the 1st person in nearly 2 decades to receive a death sentence 
in Palm Beach County state court.

Though each man named the other as the killer, McRoberts told jurors both are 
equally guilty of the murder that she said came after they kidnapped, tortured 
and terrorized Cabral.

In her opening statements, McRoberts said Cabral, 31, had recently moved to 
Pompano Beach from his native Brazil, where he left behind a wife and 2 kids to 
come to the United States and open a mixed martial arts gym.

Though Joseph initially described for investigators a night of gambling and 
drinking with Cabral, who he claimed he'd known since they were children, 
investigators would later piece together a different version of events through 
surveillance video and the statement of a third person arrested weeks after the 
Dec. 1, 2013 murder.

Koral Ben Shimon, 24, of Greenacres, was the woman behind the escort ad Cabral 
answered, which advertised her as "Belle Ayrab Barbie/Sexy Angeline Latina." 
Surveillance records show Ben Shimon and Cabral met at a Super 8 Motel in 
Coconut Creek.

Ben Shimon, who will testify against Joseph as part of a plea agreement in 
which prosecutors agreed to drop murder charges against her in exchange for a 
10-year prison sentence on robbery and kidnapping charges, told police she and 
the 2 men planned to rob Cabral. She said they took $400 from his pockets, then 
forced him to call his credit card company to try to raise his credit card 
limits so they could take more, according to arrest reports.

At some point during the trial next week, Ben Shimon is expected to testify 
that Christophe told her to drive to his mother's Lake Worth home in the Indian 
Pines community and Christophe and Joseph followed in Cabral's car after they 
tied Cabral up and forced him from the hotel room at gunpoint. She is expected 
to testify that she was unaware that her 2 accomplices were going to kill 
Cabral.

In his 1st words in the trial to jurors Friday, Joseph's attorney, Scott Skier, 
said there simply wasn't enough evidence to support prosecutors' version of 
events.

Referencing the movie "Jerry McGuire" and urging jurors to demand prosecutors 
"show me the evidence," Skier said the most important evidence in the case 
appears to show that Cabral hadn't been kidnapped at all.

If Cabral, an MMA fighter had been in a situation where someone tried to tie 
him down in a hotel room, certainly there would be more signs of a struggle, 
Skier said. And although a hotel security officer will testify that the sight 
of Cabral leaving with the two men and young woman appeared strange, Skier 
said, the worker will also say that Cabral didn't appear to be taken against 
his will.

Had he been kidnapped, Skier said, surely Cabral would have alerted someone 
after being in several public places with his would-be killers before his 
death.

"He could've stopped, dropped and rolled, you know - the old fire trick? He 
could've started talking in tongues or doing something to let someone know 
'Hey, I'm in trouble here,'" Skier said of the victim.

Skier, who represents Joseph along with defense attorneys Robert Gershman and 
Shaun Rosenberg, said that there was no eyewitness to the shooting, no murder 
weapon and the prosecutors' star witness was co-defendant Ben Shimon, a woman 
Skier referred to several times in his opening statements as "the prostitute."

Joseph's crime, Skier told jurors, was being a young drug dealer, not a 
murderer. Skier said Joseph was only there to procure drugs for Cabral at 
Cabral's own request, and Skier denied Joseph had anything to do with the man's 
death.

"For him, it's the ultimate wrong place, wrong time," Skier said.

After opening statements Friday, testimony in the case began with several law 
enforcement officers who helped with the initial investigation after witnesses 
heard a gunshot near the then-abandoned house at 5973 Ithaca Circle West in the 
Indian Pines development. Palm Beach Coounty Sheriff's Department deputies 
captured Joseph immediately after they arrived in the area, but Christophe ran 
and was caught in a residence nearly a mile from the crime scene.

A witness later told investigators that Christophe said he was on the run 
because he'd just shot someone. Later, both he and Joseph would tell police 
that the other had gone inside the abandoned building alone with Cabral and 
emerged without him a short time afterward.

Circuit Judge John Kastrenakes sent jurors home Friday and asked them to return 
for more testimony in the case Monday. The trial is expected to last through 
the end of next week.

Although prosecutors are seeking the death sentence against Joseph on the 
murder charge, he also faces charges of robbery, kidnapping and grand theft of 
a motor vehicle.

(source: Palm Beach Post)








ALABAMA----impending execution

Lawyer: Condemned Alabama inmate doesn't remember crime



Lawyers for an Alabama inmate scheduled to be executed next week said multiple 
strokes and dementia have left him unable to remember his crime or understand 
his looming execution.

Vernon Madison's attorneys, in a Friday petition, asked the U.S. Supreme Court 
to review his case and whether executing him Thursday would violate the 
constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

"Vernon Madison suffers from vascular dementia and as a result of bodily and 
cognitive decline, has no memory of the commission of the offense for which the 
state seeks to execute him on January 25, 2018," attorney Bryan Stevenson, of 
the Equal Justice Initiative, wrote in the petition.

Madison, 67, is scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection at a south 
Alabama prison.

Madison was convicted in the 1985 killing of Mobile police Officer Julius 
Schulte, who had responded to a domestic call involving Madison. Prosecutors 
said Madison crept up and shot Schulte in the back of the head as he sat in his 
police car.

The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled Madison incompetent and in May 
2016 halted Madison's execution 7 hours before he was scheduled to die by 
lethal injection.

The Supreme Court in November ruled the execution could proceed. The Supreme 
Court said then in an unsigned opinion that testimony shows Madison "recognizes 
that he will be put to death as punishment for the murder he was found to have 
committed."

Madison's attorneys wrote that Madison has slurred speech, is legally blind, 
can no longer walk independently and has urinary incontinence as a consequence 
of damage to his brain.

(source: therepublic.com)

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

Urgent Action: Execution Set For Crime Man Cannot Remember (USA: UA 11.18)

Vernon Madison is scheduled to be executed in Alabama on 25 January. His 
lawyers maintain that he lacks a rational understanding of the reason for his 
execution as a result of severe strokes which have left him with dementia and 
unable to remember the crime.

TAKE ACTION

Write a letter, send an email, call, fax or tweet:

Calling on the governor to commute Vernon Madison's death sentence, pointing to 
the compelling evidence that he is incompetent for execution because he lacks a 
rational understanding of his punishment as a result of stroke-related dementia 
and amnesia, as 3 federal judges concluded.

Contact below official by 25 January, 2018:

Governor Kay Ivey

Alabama State Capitol

600 Dexter Avenue

Montgomery, Alabama 36130

USA

Fax: +1 334 353 0004

Email: http://governor.alabama.gov/contact (use US detail)

Salutation: Dear Governor

(source: Amnesty International USA)