Day: April 3, 2012

Rob Will – Another Potentially Innocent Man On Death Row Faces Execution In Texas

april 2 2012  source : http://thinkprogress.org

Yet another death row inmate in Texas may in fact not be guilty of the crime that put him there. Robert Gene Will was convicted in the 2000 slaying of Deputy Sheriff Barrett Hill in Harris County, Texas. Will and another man, Michael Rosario, were caught trying to break into a car in December 2000. Both men fled, but Will says he was apprehended and placed in handcuffs by police. That’s when someone shot Deputy Sheriff Hill.

 

Will says that the shooter couldn’t have been him, on account of his hands literally being tied behind his back. And his lawyers argue that Rosario, the accomplice in the attempted car burglary, has admitted to at least five people that he was the one who pulled the trigger that morning. And now, Will’s case is attracting even more attention after a U.S District Judge voiced his own reservations about the initial conviction and the appeal that was conducted. TheHouston Chronicle reports:

“The questions raised during post-judgment factual development about Will’s actual innocence create disturbing uncertainties …,” [Judge Keith] Ellison wrote in a Jan. 17 memorandum. “On top of the considerable evidence supporting Will’s innocence and the important errors in the trial court, there must also be addressed the total absence of eyewitness testimony or strongly probative forensic evidence. With facts such as these, and only circumstantial evidence supporting Will’s conviction and death sentence, the court laments the strict limitations placed upon it.”

Judge Ellison was limited in his ability to hear new evidence before making a decision on whether to grant an appeal to Will, and despite his expressed dismay over the lower court’s verdict, was forced to deny the appeal on a technicality. But Will and his defense attorneys still have avenues open to them, including a recent Supreme Court ruling that allows for convicted criminals to, in some cases, challenge the competency of their state-assigned appeals lawyers. For Will, whose appointed attorney filed a legal brief that copied extensively from one he filed previously for a completely different case, the Supreme Court decision offers a ray of hope.

Texas has a well-earned reputation for unsympathetic governors who are undeterred at overseeing more executions than any other state in the country. Current Gov. Rick Perry presided over 235 executions during his time in office, by far the most of any governor in the modern era. This despite several questionable convictions that call into question the use of the death penalty at all.

 

my own opinion

Perry is more of a murderer than anyone who’s death warrant he has signed. Innocent isn’t  in Perry’s vocabulary, Perry loves the smell of burning flesh in the morning. What’s going wrong with him ? what’s going wrong with this state ? Maybe Perry may need psychotherapy, an event in his childhood of the trauma to become a man who happens to sleep at night knowing that he killed people and especially innocent people. I think sometimes the most dangerous people are not those caught, but those who elected to lead.

well we know  Texas-Bush-Perry .. murderers.. 

 

 

OREGON – Prosecutor agrees with OR death row inmate

april, 3 2012 source : http://www.dailytidings.com

PORTLAND, Ore. — As Oregon death row inmate Gary Haugen fights a reprieve, he has a supporter in Marion County District Attorney Walt Beglau whose office won the death penalty conviction.

Haugen wants to be executed and has asked a circuit court to rule that Gov. John Kitzhaber’s reprieve is legally ineffective because Haugen doesn’t accept it.

Beglau told The Oregonian that’s the central issue in the case. Beglau says he disagrees with Kitzhaber’s reprieve and won’t defend it. The Oregon Justice Department will.

Haugen was sentenced to die for killing another inmate in prison. The governor is opposed to capital punishment.

Michael Parrish gets death penalty in ’09 double-murder

april 02. 2012  source : http://www.poconorecord.com

A Monroe County jury has sentenced Michael Parrish to death for the 2009 double-murder of his ex-girlfriend and infant son.

Parrish was convicted last week of fatally shooting Victoria Adams and Sidney Parrish at their apartment in Effort on the night of July 6, 2009.

Sitting between his attorneys, Parrish showed no emotion to the verdict, staring straight ahead and blinking his eyes every few seconds. Though his father and a former co-worker had testified earlier on his behalf, none of Parrish’s family or friends were present for the jury’s penalty phase verdict.

Parrish remained as stoic as ever, saying nothing as sheriff’s deputies led him from the courtroom after the verdict.

“I wanted him to get death and I’m glad he got it, but it still doesn’t bring my daughter and grandson back,” a tearful Kim Adams, mother of victim Victoria Adams and grandmother of baby victim Sidney Parrish, told reporters afterward as she left the courthouse with other family members. “Nothing can ever bring them back.”

The family thanked the police, District Attorney’s Office and county Victim-Witness Coordinator’s Office.

A somber Wieslaw Niemoczynski, the county public defender who with attorney Jim Gregor has been representing Parrish, called the verdict “very sobering.”

“The jury has spoken,” Niemoczynski said. “We’ll see what, if any, issues should be appealed and go from there.”

The jury deliberated for about three hours Monday before returning its sentence just after 8:30 p.m. Testimony began in the morning with Parrish’s father.

Parrish’s father, Joseph A. Parrish, was an alcoholic who was violent toward his mother, according to Deborah Belknap, defense litigation specialist.

The elder Parrish said Michael was 5 when his mother filed for divorce.

Michael Parrish, a former prison guard, became exposed to Nazi Germany through a class at his mother’s college, his father said.

At age 14, he went back to live with his father, where he continued his obsession, his father said. His father said Michael believed he was reincarnated as a Nazi SS officer and would stand at the shoreline waiting for a German U-boat to come in.

Belknap testified that Parrish was under stress, trying to keep his job, his car running and having a baby with a heart transplant who was taking 12 medications.

During the afternoon, witnesses for the defense said Parrish had traumatic events in his life at a critical vulnerable age. Out of that came a need for imposing control in any way he could. Diagnosed as obsessive compulsive, experts said Parrish gets uptight if things are messy or out of place.

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Anti-death penalty group asks Okla. governor to reconsider clemency for man scheduled to die

april, 2 2012,  source : http://www.therepublic.com

OKLAHOMA CITY — An anti-death penalty group wants Gov. Mary Fallin to grant clemency to a man sentenced to die next week, and asked Monday that she give full weight to the Pardon and Parole Board’s 2005 recommendation to commute his sentence.

The Oklahoma Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty encouraged the public Monday to write letters to the governor and sign the group’s petition. Coalition members argue that Garry Thomas Allen, 56, is mentally impaired and should not be put to death.

Allen killed the mother of his children, 42-year-old Lawanna Titsworth, on Nov. 21, 1986, in Oklahoma City. He was shot in the head during a struggle with an officer.

Fallin said she and her legal team gave Allen’s case a thorough review, including interviews with family members of the victim and attorneys on both sides, and she has no plans to change her decision.

“I took quite a long time looking through his files,” Fallin said. “I watched videos of him. I’ve read the files themselves. I’ve visited with his attorneys.”

Garland Pruitt, president of the Oklahoma City chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, supported the anti-death penalty coalition at a news conference Monday at the state Capitol. The Rev. Adam Leathers and Sen. Constance Johnson also backed the group.

Leathers said executing Allen with his history of mental illness conflicts with Jesus’ promotion of life and healing. He said Allen is not a Christ figure, but talking about state-mandated execution at the close of Lent is ironic and reminds him of “barbaric crowds” that “once cried out ‘crucify him.'”

A personality test in Allen’s court file shows his “probable diagnosis is Schizophrenic Disorder, or Anxiety Disorder in a Paranoid Personality.”

Allen, who had a history of substance abuse, testified that before the day of the killing, he got drunk whenever he could.

“I can remember drinking a lot and I don’t even know if it was on that day, but I was drinking just about every day at that point,” he said.

The Pardon and Parole Board recommended 4-1 that the governor commute Allen’s sentence to life in prison without parole. But Fallin rejected the recommendation last month and ordered him to die April 12.

In 2008, jurors rejected Allen’s argument that he should not be put to death and decided he was sane enough to be executed.

Allen appealed, but the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals in December concluded there is no procedure to appeal a finding that a person facing execution is sane.

Allen shot Titsworth four days after she moved out of the home where she lived with Allen and their two sons, according to court documents. Titsworth and Allen had fought in the week before the shooting and he tried to convince her to live with him again.

On the day of the killing, she went to a day care center to pick up her sons when Allen confronted her. She left with the boys and went into the parking lot, where employees and several children were, but Allen would not let her get into her truck. He reached into his sock and shot her twice in the chest with a revolver. She was able to run toward the day care, but Allen pushed her down some steps and shot her two times in the back.

An officer in the area responded to a 911 call and found Allen in an alley. Allen grabbed his gun and they struggled, according to court documents. Allen tried to make the officer shoot himself by squeezing his finger on the trigger, but the officer got control of the gun and shot Allen in the face.