Rick Halperin
2018-09-07 14:16:41 UTC
September 7
NEW HAMPSHIRE:
Former law enforcement call for N.H. death penalty repeal in new documentary
During the 5 years Phillip McLaughlin served as New Hampshire's top prosecutor,
he kept a photo of a 6-year-old rape and murder victim on his desk.
The photo of Elizabeth Knapp of Hopkinton reminded McLaughlin of the time DNA
evidence exonerated a man he had charged with murder - a man whom McLaughlin
wholeheartedly believed was responsible for taking the child's life.
"It was there to remind me that I believed something absolutely - and I was
wrong," he said Thursday during a panel discussion on the death penalty.
Under McLaughlin's lead, the department of justice had charged Richard
Buchanan, the boyfriend of Knapp's mother, with the crime. But DNA tests
cleared Buchanan and led officials to James Dale, who is serving 60 to 120
years in prison after a jury convicted him of rape and 2nd-degree murder
charges.
If the murder case against Buchanan had gone to trial, he could have been
sentenced to death.
A decade later, McLaughlin, now retired, says the case showed him the real
potential for injustice and made him seriously question the wisdom of
maintaining the state's death penalty. He is now part of a group of former
police officers, corrections officials, judges and marshals who are taking a
public stand against the death penalty and calling on lawmakers to repeal it.
On Thursday morning, the group, known as Law Enforcement Against Death
Sentencing in New Hampshire, and the New Hampshire Coalition to Abolish the
Death Penalty convened at New Hampshire Technical Institute's Concord campus to
premiere a documentary film featuring law enforcement veterans speaking out
against capital punishment.
The documentary arrived 1 week before lawmakers, once again, consider the
future of the death penalty in the state. Next week, the Senate will reconsider
Senate Bill 593, which would repeal the death penalty. The bill passed the
Senate 14-10 in March and the House 223-116 in April, but was vetoed by Gov.
Chris Sununu. The Senate will need a 2/3 majority vote to override the veto and
send the bill to the House.
Of the 10 former prosecutors, judges, law enforcement officials and others
interviewed in the documentary, many question the reasons for upholding the
state's death penalty when, historically, it has not deterred criminals across
the country from committing heinous acts.
"I'm not asking for leniency, I'm just saying we don't need to kill," said John
Breckinridge, a former Manchester police officer.
Breckinridge was with officer Michael Briggs in 2008 when he was fatally shot
by Michael Addison, the only convict on death row in the state. Addison, who is
black, is also the only defendant New Hampshire has sentenced to death in 8
decades.
Fairness, deterrence and costs associated with the death penalty are among the
topics the film explores through the lens of law enforcement. The 25-minute
film aims to challenge public perceptions that all professionals in the
criminal justice community are behind the death penalty.
When Sununu vetoed death penalty repeal in June, he did so from his office at
the State House while flanked by several uniformed officers. The setting for
the veto concerned law enforcement veterans who said at Thursday's event that
opposition to the death penalty is real throughout the ranks, but fear of
speaking out is keeping them quiet.
"When I first got into law enforcement, I was in favor of the death penalty -
absolutely," said former Marlborough Police Chief Raymond Dodge.
Then, 3 police officers were murdered in 1997, and prosecutors decided not to
seek the death penalty. In one case, the attorney general agreed to a plea
bargain after learning a detective had failed to turn over evidence that a
co-defendant had confessed to a cellmate.
Dodge, who didn't know the details at the time, said Thursday the resolution of
the case initially angered and baffled him. But after some reflection, he said
he realized he didn't actually understand the nuances of the death penalty or,
more simply, when it could be applied.
"I think either the people in law enforcement don't want to come out because
there's this brotherhood or they're simply ignorant," Dodge said.
Attendees of Thursday's event said they hoped the premiere of the documentary
would kickstart a week-long social media and calling campaign aimed at reaching
lawmakers who will cast the deciding votes next week.
The last time lawmakers sent a death penalty repeal bill to the corner office
was in 2000, when then-Gov. Jeanne Shaheen vetoed the measure.
New Hampshire is the only remaining New England state to authorize capital
punishment by law.
(source: Concord Monitor)
NORTH CAROLINA:
He spent 30 years in prison. How did jurors get it wrong?
One elderly woman sat with us in her living room, wearing a pink nightgown. "I
should have followed my conscience," she said, her hands shaking. "I hope he
can forgive me." It's unclear if she's seeking forgiveness from the innocent
man she sent to death row, or God himself.
She believed the Bible's instruction: "Thou shalt not kill." Yet, as a juror
decades earlier, she voted for a death sentence for Henry McCollum, an
intellectually disabled teenager who was accused of raping and murdering an
11-year-old girl in Robeson County.
The juror put the trial out of her mind until, four years ago this week,
McCollum was exonerated. New DNA testing proved another man guilty, and
McCollum blameless. After 30 years on death row, McCollum was free.
At the time, I was relatively new to my job at the Center for Death Penalty
Litigation, whose lawyers represented McCollum. His story showed me just how
high the stakes are in this world. North Carolina came close to executing an
innocent man.
I am still learning from his case. This spring and summer, a co-worker and I
crisscrossed Robeson and Cumberland counties, finding jurors who unwittingly
sentenced an innocent man to death. The jurors served at McCollum's original
trial in 1983, and his retrial in 1991, held in Fayetteville. Both juries voted
unanimously for death.
We hoped they could shed light on how our system got it so terribly wrong. But
as I knocked on strangers' doors, I worried they would be defensive or angry.
Instead, they welcomed us into their homes.
Some seemed relieved to finally talk through the trauma of the trial, though
none would let us use their names. Many were ashamed of their role, afraid of
what their neighbors would think. Some feared God's wrath, and wondered if they
would go to hell for McCollum's wrongful conviction. Some shed tears at the
mention of his name and said the experience was too painful to revisit. They
remembered McCollum at the defense table, silent and unresponsive, like a
confused and broken child.
All were denied the information they needed to reach a fair verdict. They were
shown gruesome crime photos and McCollum's confession, written by the police.
Even McCollum's defense attorneys admitted his guilt, believing the jury would
spare him if he accepted responsibility.
No one told the jury that another, almost identical crime was committed just a
month after the girl's murder - and that the culprit was not McCollum, but a
man who lived by the field where her body was found. The jury didn't know
fingerprints were found at the scene, and that none of them were McCollum's.
They didn't know the case against McCollum started with a rumor from a teenage
girl, who later admitted she made it up.
One juror said his biggest regret is that he trusted prosecutors to tell the
truth. If McCollum was on trial, he believed, he'd probably done it.
Like everyone we talked to, his most vivid memories were the photos. At the
time, he had a daughter the same age as the victim. When the verdict was
announced in the courtroom, he looked at her father. The juror had done what
the prosecutor said was right, and he hoped it would ease another father's
pain.
"I've been trying to figure out, where did we go wrong?" he said. "I feel like
we got duped by the system."
I was in the courtroom for McCollum's exoneration 4 years ago. I will never
forget the sight of him standing in a cage - the court probably calls it a
holding cell - during a break. He stared silently at the floor, powerless
against a system that had chained and caged him for his entire adult life.
Now, there is another image that stays with me. A woman sitting in the dim
light of her living room, hardly strong enough to rise from her chair,
wondering what those 30 years were like for Henry McCollum. Wondering whether
God has heard her pleas for forgiveness. (soruce: Opinion; Kristin Collins is
the associate director of public information at the Center for Death Penalty
Litigation, a non-profit law firm that represents prisoners on death
row----newsobserver.com/)
ALABAMA:
Trial dates still unknown for 2 Madison County capital murder cases
2 very violent capital murder cases in Madison County were back before a judge
Thursday. 2 people charged and 2 trial dates still unknown.
Christopher Henderson was indicted in 2015 for killing his wife and 4 family
members, including children. He was charged with 19 counts of capital murder.
On Thursday, he was in court to decide on a trial date, however, no date was
set.
Henderson's attorney said his mental evaluation deems confidency, so he will be
mentally healthy to go forth with a trial. His attorney wants one thing though,
for the death penalty to be taken off the table.
However, the state so far has not budged on removing death as the punishment.
Another case that was heard today was for Warren Hardy. Hardy was charged a
year ago with killing a Huntsville woman, kidnapping 2 people at gunpoint, and
trying to abduct a 3rd.
According to his attorney, this case is nowhere near ready to go to trial. The
defense said they expect a trial date to be set no earlier than beginning of
next year.
On Thursday, the defense tried to motion for intense screening of jurors, to
ensure none of them are biased.
The judge decided not to rule on any of them.
Both Henderson's and Hardy's cases will be reviewed again within the next 90
days or so. The review will happen before any potential trial date would begin.
(source: WAFF news)
INDIANA:
Indiana attorney general asks high court to restore death sentence in double
slaying
Indiana's attorney general's office wants the U.S. Supreme Court to reinstate a
man's death sentence in the 2004 slayings of a woman and her 4-year-old
daughter.
The filing asks the high court to determine if the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of
Appeals in Chicago violated a death penalty law's review requirements in
rebuffing the attorney general's request that it review a 3-judge appellate
court panel's decision that set aside Fredrick Baer's sentence.
The panel ruled in January that 46-year-old Baer had ineffective legal counsel
during his double-murder trial.
In April, the full appeals court rebuffed Indiana's request for it to review
the panel's decision.
Baer had been sentenced to death for his convictions in the slayings of
26-year-old Cory Clark and her daughter, Jenna, in their rural central Indiana
home.
(source: Associated Press)
CALIFORNIA:
Gov. Brown needs to speed up the review process for death row inmate Kevin
Cooper
A San Bernardino jury sentenced Kevin Cooper to death 3 decades ago after
convicting him of murdering 2 adults and 2 children and severely wounding a 3rd
child. But the jury didn't know that the investigation into those murders was,
to say the least, problematic.
Subsequent inquiries and analyses persuasively show that investigators may have
planted a blood sample from Cooper on a T-shirt found near the crime scene;
that they failed to test - and then lost - a pair of bloody overalls worn by
another man on the day of the murders; that the prosecution withheld
exculpatory evidence from Cooper's lawyer; and that the only eyewitness - the
wounded child - initially told a hospital social worker that the attackers were
3 or 4 white men. (Cooper is black.) The victims suffered multiple slash and
stab wounds from a number of weapons, more than one could reasonably expect a
single perpetrator to inflict. Nevertheless, the child testified at trial that
the attacker was a single man.
Cooper, though, has had an inordinate amount of trouble getting the courts to
give him a fair hearing. In one appeal, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals
rejected Cooper's plea for a new hearing despite a scathing, 100-page dissent
by Judge William Fletcher that dissects how the police and courts not only
failed to give Cooper a fair trial, but also apparently conspired to convict
him. "Kevin Cooper has now been on death row for nearly 1/2 his life," Fletcher
wrote. "In my opinion, he is probably innocent of the crimes for which the
state of California is about to execute him."
Cooper has asked Gov. Jerry Brown to order new, more sophisticated DNA tests on
the shirt and other items, tests that he believes will prove once and for all
that someone else committed the murders. He also wants the governor to conduct
an innocence hearing to weigh those test results and, ultimately, to pardon
him. Brown has asked the San Bernardino County district attorney's office,
which opposes reopening the case, for a response by Oct. 11 to Cooper's
allegations before deciding whether to conduct the review.
But time is running out on Brown's term, and chances are increasing that it
could end before the review process does. If so, the next governor and his
legal staff would probably have to start over, assuming they chose to address
Cooper's requests at all. That would unjustly delay yet again the search for
the truth, and the possible freeing of an innocent man.
Brown should heed Cooper's request and line up a special master for the review
and ensure that the issues are resolved with all deliberate speed. Justice
demands it.
(source: Editorial, Los Angeles Times)
USA:
Citing Trump Tweets, Accused N.Y. Attacker Seeks to Avoid Death Penalty
Lawyers for Sayfullo Saipov, the man accused of killing 8 people by driving a
truck into a New York City bike path in October, on Thursday asked a federal
judge to bar prosecutors from seeking the death penalty, saying President
Donald Trump's statements on Twitter have made a fair legal process impossible.
In a motion filed in Manhattan federal court, Saipov's lawyers said that
Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who must decide whether to pursue the death
penalty, cannot be objective because Trump has pressured him to make decisions
based on "nakedly political considerations" and has called for Saipov to be
executed.
The lawyers pointed to a Monday tweet in which the president criticized the
"Jeff Sessions Justice Department" for indicting two Republican congressmen
"just ahead" of the upcoming congressional elections.
They also cited 2 tweets following Saipov's arrest calling for him to face the
death penalty.
Together, they said, Trump's tweets make it impossible for Sessions to
"exercise independent discretion" on the matter.
They asked that if the judge declines to bar the death penalty altogether, an
independent prosecutor be appointed to make the decision in place of Sessions.
A spokesman for U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman, whose office is prosecuting
Saipov, declined to comment. The U.S. Department of Justice did not immediately
respond to a request for comment.
Saipov, a 30-year-old Uzbek national, was arrested in October immediately after
police said he plowed a truck down a bike lane on Manhattan's West Side.
Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack, which was the deadliest
assault on New York City since Sept. 11, 2001.
He was charged in an indictment with 8 counts of murder and other crimes
including attempted murder and providing material support to Islamic State. He
has pleaded not guilty.
Following the attack, Saipov told investigators he was inspired by watching
Islamic State videos and began planning the attack a year earlier, according to
a criminal complaint filed by prosecutors the day after the attack.
Saipov made a public statement at a pre-trial hearing in June, speaking of a
"war" led by Islamic State to establish sharia, or Islamic law, on earth, and
dismissing the court's judgment as "not important."
(source: Reuters)
*****************
Capital punishment and resource scarcity: the work of Professor Keelah E.G.
Williams
Keelah E.G. Williams, Assistant Professor of Psychology, originally hails from
Australia but moved to Detroit, Michigan in the second grade. She attended
Arizona State University for graduate school, where she attained both a Ph.D.
in Philosophy and a Juris Doctor.
She has always been interested in the intersection of law and psychology. Over
the summer, she published a paper in Evolution and Human Behavior entitled,
"Capital and punishment: Resource scarcity increases endorsement of the death
penalty." It discusses the correlation between resource availability in certain
areas and how the populace of those areas feel about the death penalty. The
article was the culmination of four different studies performed over the last 6
years.
In an interview, Williams noted how a lack of resource availability can
influence various behaviors among affected populations, including reproductive
timing and race-based judgments. When resources are scarce - a phenomenon that
correlates with economic instability and insecurity - people tend to feel less
confident in their future situation and choose to have children at younger
ages. Another pattern Williams noted in her research is people's tendency to be
less inclusive of others when resource scarcity occurs. For example, in a
situation of resource scarcity, white people are more likely to label an
ethnically ambiguous person as non-white. As resources become scarcer, Williams
explains, people tend to be more exclusive so as to avoid having to share few
resources among many people.
In the 1st study, Williams and her co-authors investigated the relationship
between a nation's Inequality-Adjusted Human Development Index (IHDI) and the
legality of the death penalty. The IHDI differs from Gross Domestic Product
(GDP), a similar measure, in that it takes into consideration how resources
have been distributed throughout a country. Williams and her fellow researchers
found a positive correlation between resource scarcity within a country and
legal endorsement of capital punishment, though they did not investigate
popular opinion regarding the death penalty. The 2nd study took a similar
approach and explored the relationship between GDP of a state and the legal
status of capital punishment. Again, researchers found a positive correlation
between resource scarcity and the legality of the death penalty.
These studies acted as proof of concept for the ideas behind the paper but,
because they were not experimental in nature, could not support a causative
link between the phenomena of resource scarcity and a legal death penalty. To
test their hypotheses, Williams and her co-authors conducted a two further
studies. In one, the researchers manipulated subjects' perception of resource
scarcity. Half of the participants were given articles that gave a negative
outlook on the stability of the economy, while the other half were given
articles with a more positive outlook on the economy. This study supported
their hypothesis that those who read the negative article were more likely to
approve of the death penalty, while those that read the positive article
disapproved.
In the final study, Williams and her team interrogated the possible driving
forces behind the experiment's results. They concluded that in resource-rich
situations, people are more willing to give offenders the chance to
rehabilitate. When fewer resources are available, people are less willing to
risk devoting resources to others' rehabilitation and are therefore more likely
to support the death penalty.
Professor Williams is currently working with a Hamilton student on a new
project that explores the role that contempt and anger play in people's
endorsement of policies. Although the difference between the 2 is subtle,
contempt is defined as the feeling that a given person has nothing more to
offer you, while anger is defined as disappointment, but that reparations can
be made after some punishment has been dealt.
(source: Interested readers can find more information about the subject of this
article in the upcoming episode of the podcast Discussions with DPIC, which
includes an interview with Professor Williams. It will be available via iTunes
or deathpenaltyinfo.org within the week----The (Hamilton Univ.) Spectator)
***********************
6 suspects accused in armored truck guard killing due in court
6 defendants accused of killing an armored truck guard in 2013 will be in
federal court Thursday morning.
Last week federal prosecutors signaled that they would seek capital punishment
for 3 of the people accused of killing Hector Trochez 5 years ago.
Trochez was gunned down during a robbery at The Chase Bank on Carrollton and
Claiborne in broad daylight.
Prosecutors said they want the death penalty for LilBear George, Chukwudi
Ofomata, and Curtis Johnson Junior.
In total, 6 defendants were indicted last November. Legal experts said the
death penalty is rare in federal cases.
"Really the importance of the case in terms of the death penalty is that there
are so few cases around the entire country where the death penalty is actually
approved," said Harry Rosenberg. "The death penalty act really just started
again in 1988, and so since there have only been several scores of cases from
1988 forward and in this 1 case you have 3."
Trochez's family said in a statement last week that they had hoped for the
death penalty from the beginning.
(source: WVUE)
********************
Government Joins Objection to Closed Hearing in Death Penalty Case
Federal prosecutors have filed a formal motion supporting VtDigger's objection
to the closing of the courtroom to the public during a pretrial hearing last
week in the death penalty case against accused killer Donald Fell.
Judge Geoffrey Crawford closed a hearing to the public and press last Wednesday
over concerns that potential "volatile" testimony from a prison informant could
"taint" the jury selection process, which kicked off on Tuesday and is expected
to last several weeks.
Fell is facing capital charges in the November 2000 carjacking and beating
death of Terseca King, 53, of North Clarendon, Vt., according to court records.
VtDigger filed a hand-written motion objecting to the closing of the courtroom
last week, and the U.S. Attorney's Office in Vermont, which is prosecuting
Fell, filed a motion in support of the news organization's position.
"In this case, which has played out in the courts and the press for over 17
years, the government is not convinced that the defense has shown a
'significant risk of prejudice to the defendant???s right to a fair trial' from
further coverage of the matter," First Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin Doyle
wrote in the filing. "The current order excludes, among others, family members
of victims who have steadfastly followed the court proceedings for nearly 2
decades," Doyle added. "If the Court believes it must evaluate the reliability
of witnesses prior to their taking the stand about personal interactions with
the defendant, this sort of unprecedented hearing should be open to the public.
The government continues to oppose the closure of the courtroom."
Doyle also wrote that the closing of the courtroom is not something that should
be taken lightly, and only after a "showing of a significant risk of prejudice
to the defendant's right to a fair trial or danger to persons, property or the
integrity of significant activities entitled to confidentiality."
He then added, "The defense has presented nothing more than bare assertions to
support closure at this time."
Fell's attorneys did not submit a filing in support of closing the courtroom
for the hearing and did not make any arguments in open court. Instead, they
said they were relying on arguments made earlier during a closed door meeting
in the judge's chambers prior to the hearing.
It's unclear what, if any, steps beyond the filing of a motion the federal
government will take in light of the hearing already having taken place behind
closed doors.
VtDigger is exploring the possibility of seeking the public release of the
transcripts of the hearing as well as the chamber's meeting.
Vermont does not have the death penalty. However, because King was abducted as
she arrived to work early one morning at a supermarket bakery in Rutland and
was killed in New York state, federal prosecutors took jurisdiction. Fell's
defense has been unsuccessful in multiple attempts to take the death penalty
off the table as a possible punishment.
Fell's trial in the case is expected to begin in early November.
This will be the 2nd trial for Fell. He previously had been convicted and
sentenced to death. However, due to juror misconduct that conviction and
sentence were overturned.
An alleged accomplice of Fell's, Robert Lee, was also charged with capital
offenses. But, before he could be tried, Lee died in prison.
(source: Valley News)
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NEW HAMPSHIRE:
Former law enforcement call for N.H. death penalty repeal in new documentary
During the 5 years Phillip McLaughlin served as New Hampshire's top prosecutor,
he kept a photo of a 6-year-old rape and murder victim on his desk.
The photo of Elizabeth Knapp of Hopkinton reminded McLaughlin of the time DNA
evidence exonerated a man he had charged with murder - a man whom McLaughlin
wholeheartedly believed was responsible for taking the child's life.
"It was there to remind me that I believed something absolutely - and I was
wrong," he said Thursday during a panel discussion on the death penalty.
Under McLaughlin's lead, the department of justice had charged Richard
Buchanan, the boyfriend of Knapp's mother, with the crime. But DNA tests
cleared Buchanan and led officials to James Dale, who is serving 60 to 120
years in prison after a jury convicted him of rape and 2nd-degree murder
charges.
If the murder case against Buchanan had gone to trial, he could have been
sentenced to death.
A decade later, McLaughlin, now retired, says the case showed him the real
potential for injustice and made him seriously question the wisdom of
maintaining the state's death penalty. He is now part of a group of former
police officers, corrections officials, judges and marshals who are taking a
public stand against the death penalty and calling on lawmakers to repeal it.
On Thursday morning, the group, known as Law Enforcement Against Death
Sentencing in New Hampshire, and the New Hampshire Coalition to Abolish the
Death Penalty convened at New Hampshire Technical Institute's Concord campus to
premiere a documentary film featuring law enforcement veterans speaking out
against capital punishment.
The documentary arrived 1 week before lawmakers, once again, consider the
future of the death penalty in the state. Next week, the Senate will reconsider
Senate Bill 593, which would repeal the death penalty. The bill passed the
Senate 14-10 in March and the House 223-116 in April, but was vetoed by Gov.
Chris Sununu. The Senate will need a 2/3 majority vote to override the veto and
send the bill to the House.
Of the 10 former prosecutors, judges, law enforcement officials and others
interviewed in the documentary, many question the reasons for upholding the
state's death penalty when, historically, it has not deterred criminals across
the country from committing heinous acts.
"I'm not asking for leniency, I'm just saying we don't need to kill," said John
Breckinridge, a former Manchester police officer.
Breckinridge was with officer Michael Briggs in 2008 when he was fatally shot
by Michael Addison, the only convict on death row in the state. Addison, who is
black, is also the only defendant New Hampshire has sentenced to death in 8
decades.
Fairness, deterrence and costs associated with the death penalty are among the
topics the film explores through the lens of law enforcement. The 25-minute
film aims to challenge public perceptions that all professionals in the
criminal justice community are behind the death penalty.
When Sununu vetoed death penalty repeal in June, he did so from his office at
the State House while flanked by several uniformed officers. The setting for
the veto concerned law enforcement veterans who said at Thursday's event that
opposition to the death penalty is real throughout the ranks, but fear of
speaking out is keeping them quiet.
"When I first got into law enforcement, I was in favor of the death penalty -
absolutely," said former Marlborough Police Chief Raymond Dodge.
Then, 3 police officers were murdered in 1997, and prosecutors decided not to
seek the death penalty. In one case, the attorney general agreed to a plea
bargain after learning a detective had failed to turn over evidence that a
co-defendant had confessed to a cellmate.
Dodge, who didn't know the details at the time, said Thursday the resolution of
the case initially angered and baffled him. But after some reflection, he said
he realized he didn't actually understand the nuances of the death penalty or,
more simply, when it could be applied.
"I think either the people in law enforcement don't want to come out because
there's this brotherhood or they're simply ignorant," Dodge said.
Attendees of Thursday's event said they hoped the premiere of the documentary
would kickstart a week-long social media and calling campaign aimed at reaching
lawmakers who will cast the deciding votes next week.
The last time lawmakers sent a death penalty repeal bill to the corner office
was in 2000, when then-Gov. Jeanne Shaheen vetoed the measure.
New Hampshire is the only remaining New England state to authorize capital
punishment by law.
(source: Concord Monitor)
NORTH CAROLINA:
He spent 30 years in prison. How did jurors get it wrong?
One elderly woman sat with us in her living room, wearing a pink nightgown. "I
should have followed my conscience," she said, her hands shaking. "I hope he
can forgive me." It's unclear if she's seeking forgiveness from the innocent
man she sent to death row, or God himself.
She believed the Bible's instruction: "Thou shalt not kill." Yet, as a juror
decades earlier, she voted for a death sentence for Henry McCollum, an
intellectually disabled teenager who was accused of raping and murdering an
11-year-old girl in Robeson County.
The juror put the trial out of her mind until, four years ago this week,
McCollum was exonerated. New DNA testing proved another man guilty, and
McCollum blameless. After 30 years on death row, McCollum was free.
At the time, I was relatively new to my job at the Center for Death Penalty
Litigation, whose lawyers represented McCollum. His story showed me just how
high the stakes are in this world. North Carolina came close to executing an
innocent man.
I am still learning from his case. This spring and summer, a co-worker and I
crisscrossed Robeson and Cumberland counties, finding jurors who unwittingly
sentenced an innocent man to death. The jurors served at McCollum's original
trial in 1983, and his retrial in 1991, held in Fayetteville. Both juries voted
unanimously for death.
We hoped they could shed light on how our system got it so terribly wrong. But
as I knocked on strangers' doors, I worried they would be defensive or angry.
Instead, they welcomed us into their homes.
Some seemed relieved to finally talk through the trauma of the trial, though
none would let us use their names. Many were ashamed of their role, afraid of
what their neighbors would think. Some feared God's wrath, and wondered if they
would go to hell for McCollum's wrongful conviction. Some shed tears at the
mention of his name and said the experience was too painful to revisit. They
remembered McCollum at the defense table, silent and unresponsive, like a
confused and broken child.
All were denied the information they needed to reach a fair verdict. They were
shown gruesome crime photos and McCollum's confession, written by the police.
Even McCollum's defense attorneys admitted his guilt, believing the jury would
spare him if he accepted responsibility.
No one told the jury that another, almost identical crime was committed just a
month after the girl's murder - and that the culprit was not McCollum, but a
man who lived by the field where her body was found. The jury didn't know
fingerprints were found at the scene, and that none of them were McCollum's.
They didn't know the case against McCollum started with a rumor from a teenage
girl, who later admitted she made it up.
One juror said his biggest regret is that he trusted prosecutors to tell the
truth. If McCollum was on trial, he believed, he'd probably done it.
Like everyone we talked to, his most vivid memories were the photos. At the
time, he had a daughter the same age as the victim. When the verdict was
announced in the courtroom, he looked at her father. The juror had done what
the prosecutor said was right, and he hoped it would ease another father's
pain.
"I've been trying to figure out, where did we go wrong?" he said. "I feel like
we got duped by the system."
I was in the courtroom for McCollum's exoneration 4 years ago. I will never
forget the sight of him standing in a cage - the court probably calls it a
holding cell - during a break. He stared silently at the floor, powerless
against a system that had chained and caged him for his entire adult life.
Now, there is another image that stays with me. A woman sitting in the dim
light of her living room, hardly strong enough to rise from her chair,
wondering what those 30 years were like for Henry McCollum. Wondering whether
God has heard her pleas for forgiveness. (soruce: Opinion; Kristin Collins is
the associate director of public information at the Center for Death Penalty
Litigation, a non-profit law firm that represents prisoners on death
row----newsobserver.com/)
ALABAMA:
Trial dates still unknown for 2 Madison County capital murder cases
2 very violent capital murder cases in Madison County were back before a judge
Thursday. 2 people charged and 2 trial dates still unknown.
Christopher Henderson was indicted in 2015 for killing his wife and 4 family
members, including children. He was charged with 19 counts of capital murder.
On Thursday, he was in court to decide on a trial date, however, no date was
set.
Henderson's attorney said his mental evaluation deems confidency, so he will be
mentally healthy to go forth with a trial. His attorney wants one thing though,
for the death penalty to be taken off the table.
However, the state so far has not budged on removing death as the punishment.
Another case that was heard today was for Warren Hardy. Hardy was charged a
year ago with killing a Huntsville woman, kidnapping 2 people at gunpoint, and
trying to abduct a 3rd.
According to his attorney, this case is nowhere near ready to go to trial. The
defense said they expect a trial date to be set no earlier than beginning of
next year.
On Thursday, the defense tried to motion for intense screening of jurors, to
ensure none of them are biased.
The judge decided not to rule on any of them.
Both Henderson's and Hardy's cases will be reviewed again within the next 90
days or so. The review will happen before any potential trial date would begin.
(source: WAFF news)
INDIANA:
Indiana attorney general asks high court to restore death sentence in double
slaying
Indiana's attorney general's office wants the U.S. Supreme Court to reinstate a
man's death sentence in the 2004 slayings of a woman and her 4-year-old
daughter.
The filing asks the high court to determine if the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of
Appeals in Chicago violated a death penalty law's review requirements in
rebuffing the attorney general's request that it review a 3-judge appellate
court panel's decision that set aside Fredrick Baer's sentence.
The panel ruled in January that 46-year-old Baer had ineffective legal counsel
during his double-murder trial.
In April, the full appeals court rebuffed Indiana's request for it to review
the panel's decision.
Baer had been sentenced to death for his convictions in the slayings of
26-year-old Cory Clark and her daughter, Jenna, in their rural central Indiana
home.
(source: Associated Press)
CALIFORNIA:
Gov. Brown needs to speed up the review process for death row inmate Kevin
Cooper
A San Bernardino jury sentenced Kevin Cooper to death 3 decades ago after
convicting him of murdering 2 adults and 2 children and severely wounding a 3rd
child. But the jury didn't know that the investigation into those murders was,
to say the least, problematic.
Subsequent inquiries and analyses persuasively show that investigators may have
planted a blood sample from Cooper on a T-shirt found near the crime scene;
that they failed to test - and then lost - a pair of bloody overalls worn by
another man on the day of the murders; that the prosecution withheld
exculpatory evidence from Cooper's lawyer; and that the only eyewitness - the
wounded child - initially told a hospital social worker that the attackers were
3 or 4 white men. (Cooper is black.) The victims suffered multiple slash and
stab wounds from a number of weapons, more than one could reasonably expect a
single perpetrator to inflict. Nevertheless, the child testified at trial that
the attacker was a single man.
Cooper, though, has had an inordinate amount of trouble getting the courts to
give him a fair hearing. In one appeal, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals
rejected Cooper's plea for a new hearing despite a scathing, 100-page dissent
by Judge William Fletcher that dissects how the police and courts not only
failed to give Cooper a fair trial, but also apparently conspired to convict
him. "Kevin Cooper has now been on death row for nearly 1/2 his life," Fletcher
wrote. "In my opinion, he is probably innocent of the crimes for which the
state of California is about to execute him."
Cooper has asked Gov. Jerry Brown to order new, more sophisticated DNA tests on
the shirt and other items, tests that he believes will prove once and for all
that someone else committed the murders. He also wants the governor to conduct
an innocence hearing to weigh those test results and, ultimately, to pardon
him. Brown has asked the San Bernardino County district attorney's office,
which opposes reopening the case, for a response by Oct. 11 to Cooper's
allegations before deciding whether to conduct the review.
But time is running out on Brown's term, and chances are increasing that it
could end before the review process does. If so, the next governor and his
legal staff would probably have to start over, assuming they chose to address
Cooper's requests at all. That would unjustly delay yet again the search for
the truth, and the possible freeing of an innocent man.
Brown should heed Cooper's request and line up a special master for the review
and ensure that the issues are resolved with all deliberate speed. Justice
demands it.
(source: Editorial, Los Angeles Times)
USA:
Citing Trump Tweets, Accused N.Y. Attacker Seeks to Avoid Death Penalty
Lawyers for Sayfullo Saipov, the man accused of killing 8 people by driving a
truck into a New York City bike path in October, on Thursday asked a federal
judge to bar prosecutors from seeking the death penalty, saying President
Donald Trump's statements on Twitter have made a fair legal process impossible.
In a motion filed in Manhattan federal court, Saipov's lawyers said that
Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who must decide whether to pursue the death
penalty, cannot be objective because Trump has pressured him to make decisions
based on "nakedly political considerations" and has called for Saipov to be
executed.
The lawyers pointed to a Monday tweet in which the president criticized the
"Jeff Sessions Justice Department" for indicting two Republican congressmen
"just ahead" of the upcoming congressional elections.
They also cited 2 tweets following Saipov's arrest calling for him to face the
death penalty.
Together, they said, Trump's tweets make it impossible for Sessions to
"exercise independent discretion" on the matter.
They asked that if the judge declines to bar the death penalty altogether, an
independent prosecutor be appointed to make the decision in place of Sessions.
A spokesman for U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman, whose office is prosecuting
Saipov, declined to comment. The U.S. Department of Justice did not immediately
respond to a request for comment.
Saipov, a 30-year-old Uzbek national, was arrested in October immediately after
police said he plowed a truck down a bike lane on Manhattan's West Side.
Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack, which was the deadliest
assault on New York City since Sept. 11, 2001.
He was charged in an indictment with 8 counts of murder and other crimes
including attempted murder and providing material support to Islamic State. He
has pleaded not guilty.
Following the attack, Saipov told investigators he was inspired by watching
Islamic State videos and began planning the attack a year earlier, according to
a criminal complaint filed by prosecutors the day after the attack.
Saipov made a public statement at a pre-trial hearing in June, speaking of a
"war" led by Islamic State to establish sharia, or Islamic law, on earth, and
dismissing the court's judgment as "not important."
(source: Reuters)
*****************
Capital punishment and resource scarcity: the work of Professor Keelah E.G.
Williams
Keelah E.G. Williams, Assistant Professor of Psychology, originally hails from
Australia but moved to Detroit, Michigan in the second grade. She attended
Arizona State University for graduate school, where she attained both a Ph.D.
in Philosophy and a Juris Doctor.
She has always been interested in the intersection of law and psychology. Over
the summer, she published a paper in Evolution and Human Behavior entitled,
"Capital and punishment: Resource scarcity increases endorsement of the death
penalty." It discusses the correlation between resource availability in certain
areas and how the populace of those areas feel about the death penalty. The
article was the culmination of four different studies performed over the last 6
years.
In an interview, Williams noted how a lack of resource availability can
influence various behaviors among affected populations, including reproductive
timing and race-based judgments. When resources are scarce - a phenomenon that
correlates with economic instability and insecurity - people tend to feel less
confident in their future situation and choose to have children at younger
ages. Another pattern Williams noted in her research is people's tendency to be
less inclusive of others when resource scarcity occurs. For example, in a
situation of resource scarcity, white people are more likely to label an
ethnically ambiguous person as non-white. As resources become scarcer, Williams
explains, people tend to be more exclusive so as to avoid having to share few
resources among many people.
In the 1st study, Williams and her co-authors investigated the relationship
between a nation's Inequality-Adjusted Human Development Index (IHDI) and the
legality of the death penalty. The IHDI differs from Gross Domestic Product
(GDP), a similar measure, in that it takes into consideration how resources
have been distributed throughout a country. Williams and her fellow researchers
found a positive correlation between resource scarcity within a country and
legal endorsement of capital punishment, though they did not investigate
popular opinion regarding the death penalty. The 2nd study took a similar
approach and explored the relationship between GDP of a state and the legal
status of capital punishment. Again, researchers found a positive correlation
between resource scarcity and the legality of the death penalty.
These studies acted as proof of concept for the ideas behind the paper but,
because they were not experimental in nature, could not support a causative
link between the phenomena of resource scarcity and a legal death penalty. To
test their hypotheses, Williams and her co-authors conducted a two further
studies. In one, the researchers manipulated subjects' perception of resource
scarcity. Half of the participants were given articles that gave a negative
outlook on the stability of the economy, while the other half were given
articles with a more positive outlook on the economy. This study supported
their hypothesis that those who read the negative article were more likely to
approve of the death penalty, while those that read the positive article
disapproved.
In the final study, Williams and her team interrogated the possible driving
forces behind the experiment's results. They concluded that in resource-rich
situations, people are more willing to give offenders the chance to
rehabilitate. When fewer resources are available, people are less willing to
risk devoting resources to others' rehabilitation and are therefore more likely
to support the death penalty.
Professor Williams is currently working with a Hamilton student on a new
project that explores the role that contempt and anger play in people's
endorsement of policies. Although the difference between the 2 is subtle,
contempt is defined as the feeling that a given person has nothing more to
offer you, while anger is defined as disappointment, but that reparations can
be made after some punishment has been dealt.
(source: Interested readers can find more information about the subject of this
article in the upcoming episode of the podcast Discussions with DPIC, which
includes an interview with Professor Williams. It will be available via iTunes
or deathpenaltyinfo.org within the week----The (Hamilton Univ.) Spectator)
***********************
6 suspects accused in armored truck guard killing due in court
6 defendants accused of killing an armored truck guard in 2013 will be in
federal court Thursday morning.
Last week federal prosecutors signaled that they would seek capital punishment
for 3 of the people accused of killing Hector Trochez 5 years ago.
Trochez was gunned down during a robbery at The Chase Bank on Carrollton and
Claiborne in broad daylight.
Prosecutors said they want the death penalty for LilBear George, Chukwudi
Ofomata, and Curtis Johnson Junior.
In total, 6 defendants were indicted last November. Legal experts said the
death penalty is rare in federal cases.
"Really the importance of the case in terms of the death penalty is that there
are so few cases around the entire country where the death penalty is actually
approved," said Harry Rosenberg. "The death penalty act really just started
again in 1988, and so since there have only been several scores of cases from
1988 forward and in this 1 case you have 3."
Trochez's family said in a statement last week that they had hoped for the
death penalty from the beginning.
(source: WVUE)
********************
Government Joins Objection to Closed Hearing in Death Penalty Case
Federal prosecutors have filed a formal motion supporting VtDigger's objection
to the closing of the courtroom to the public during a pretrial hearing last
week in the death penalty case against accused killer Donald Fell.
Judge Geoffrey Crawford closed a hearing to the public and press last Wednesday
over concerns that potential "volatile" testimony from a prison informant could
"taint" the jury selection process, which kicked off on Tuesday and is expected
to last several weeks.
Fell is facing capital charges in the November 2000 carjacking and beating
death of Terseca King, 53, of North Clarendon, Vt., according to court records.
VtDigger filed a hand-written motion objecting to the closing of the courtroom
last week, and the U.S. Attorney's Office in Vermont, which is prosecuting
Fell, filed a motion in support of the news organization's position.
"In this case, which has played out in the courts and the press for over 17
years, the government is not convinced that the defense has shown a
'significant risk of prejudice to the defendant???s right to a fair trial' from
further coverage of the matter," First Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin Doyle
wrote in the filing. "The current order excludes, among others, family members
of victims who have steadfastly followed the court proceedings for nearly 2
decades," Doyle added. "If the Court believes it must evaluate the reliability
of witnesses prior to their taking the stand about personal interactions with
the defendant, this sort of unprecedented hearing should be open to the public.
The government continues to oppose the closure of the courtroom."
Doyle also wrote that the closing of the courtroom is not something that should
be taken lightly, and only after a "showing of a significant risk of prejudice
to the defendant's right to a fair trial or danger to persons, property or the
integrity of significant activities entitled to confidentiality."
He then added, "The defense has presented nothing more than bare assertions to
support closure at this time."
Fell's attorneys did not submit a filing in support of closing the courtroom
for the hearing and did not make any arguments in open court. Instead, they
said they were relying on arguments made earlier during a closed door meeting
in the judge's chambers prior to the hearing.
It's unclear what, if any, steps beyond the filing of a motion the federal
government will take in light of the hearing already having taken place behind
closed doors.
VtDigger is exploring the possibility of seeking the public release of the
transcripts of the hearing as well as the chamber's meeting.
Vermont does not have the death penalty. However, because King was abducted as
she arrived to work early one morning at a supermarket bakery in Rutland and
was killed in New York state, federal prosecutors took jurisdiction. Fell's
defense has been unsuccessful in multiple attempts to take the death penalty
off the table as a possible punishment.
Fell's trial in the case is expected to begin in early November.
This will be the 2nd trial for Fell. He previously had been convicted and
sentenced to death. However, due to juror misconduct that conviction and
sentence were overturned.
An alleged accomplice of Fell's, Robert Lee, was also charged with capital
offenses. But, before he could be tried, Lee died in prison.
(source: Valley News)
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