Month: April 2014

Arthur Tyler, slated to die May 28 in controversial capital case, asks Ohio for mercy

April 18, 2014

Arthur Tyler, who has been on Ohio’s death row 3 decades for the murder of a produce vendor during a robbery in Cleveland, has asked the Ohio Parole Board to commute his sentence to life in prison with a chance of parole.
The parole board will hold a clemency hearing April 24 to hear Tyler’s pleas. The board will make a recommendation to Gov. John Kasich, who will ultimately decide Tyler’s fate.
He is scheduled to be executed May 28.
Tyler’s case has been controversial because he was 1 of 2 people convicted in the killing of Sanders Leach, but the only one sentenced to die. And there are questions as to who actually pulled the trigger.
Tyler’s co-defendant, Leroy Head, confessed almost immediately. Head admitted to police, family and friends that he shot Leach in a struggle for the gun during the March 1983 robbery attempt, according to court records.
He signed a confession, but later changed his story, telling prosecutors that Tyler fired the gun.
Tyler was convicted of aggravated murder and aggravated robbery and sentenced to die. Head pleaded guilty to the same charges and was sentenced to prison. He was released in 2008.
Tyler’s lawyers, in a brief filed with the parole board, said Tyler recognizes he shares responsibility for Leach’s death. But they urge clemency be granted, commuting his death sentence to life imprisonment with parole eligibility.
“Ideally, Arthur Tyler should be granted parole and released from prison for time served, they wrote. “As we will demonstrate, Arthur Tyler did not shoot Mr. Leach. Head falsely testified against Mr. Tyler in order to save himself from the death penalty.”
Source: Cleveland.com,

Thank you, merci, gracias

April 15, 2014

Je tiens à remercier tous les pays francophones qui suivent  mon blog, malgré que les informations soient en anglais  Je remercie les pays africains aussi, les personnes d’amérique du Sud, les émirats Arabe, je remercie le monde entier de me suivre de plus en plus nombreux, Je remercie les followers sur twitter aussi ! Merci à tous

Queria dar la gracias à todos los paises  de habla hispana de seguirme, aunque las informaciones esten en ingles, Doy las gracias a todos los paises de africa tambien, a los Emiratos Arabes, gracias al mundo entero de seguirme siempre mas numerosos. Doy las gracias a los followers de Twitter ! Gracias a todos

I want to thank all English-speaking countries who follow my blog, Thank African countries also, people of South America, the Arab Emirates, I thank the world to follow me you are each time more numerous, I thank followers on twitter too! Thank you to all

 

Anabel

 

 

 

Jury sentences man with history of mental illness to death for killing nurse as part of plot to assassinate President Barack Obama

April 15, 2014

A man with a history of mental illness has been sentenced to death by a jury for killing a South Dakota hospice nurse as part of a plot to assassinate President Barack Obama.

James McVay pleaded guilty but mentally ill to murder in 2012 in connection with the stabbing death of 75-year-old Maybelle Schein.

McVay, 43, said he killed Schein and stole her car as part of his plan to drive to Washington and kill the president.

The Sioux Falls jury chose the death penalty, though jurors could have sentenced McVay to life in prison without parole.

Authorities said McVay walked away from a minimum-security prison in July 2011 in Sioux Falls and was mixing cough syrup and alcohol when he climbed under Schein’s slightly open garage door, entered her house, killed her and drove away in her car.

After Schein’s car was reported stolen, police used a tracking service in the vehicle to find McVay on Interstate 90 near Madison, Wisconsin. He was arrested after a brief chase.

Madison Police Officer Kipp Hartman testified that he was trying to get McVay to reveal his name when McVay began saying he ‘killed a little old lady’ in South Dakota and stole her car to get to Washington, D.C., to kill the president.

Prosecutor Aaron McGowan said McVay stabbed Schein nine times, with the final blow cutting her vocal cords and carotid artery, causing her to bleed to death within 16 seconds.

But public defender Traci Smith yesterday said McVay’s characterization by the prosecution as monstrous did not square with the facts of the case or his history, the Argus Leader reported.

Smith said McVay’s mental health was not properly monitored or cared for by the prison staff. She added that McVay poses no threat when his illness is cared for.

‘The state has continually downplayed the effect of mental illness,’ Smith said.

The jury, made up of seven men and five women, agreed last week with prosecutors that McVay’s crime met two aggravating circumstances that would allow the state to impose a death sentence.

The first deemed the offense outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible, or inhuman; the second found that the defendant committed the offense for his own benefit or the benefit of another.

Public defender Amber Eggert during the trial argued before the jury that McVay has suffered from mental illness as well as alcohol and drug issues for much of his life and his life should be spared.

She said that the night before the killing, McVay mixed alcohol with a DXM-based cough syrup, which can cause hallucinations.

McVay said he awoke briefly at 3am to find spiritual entities surrounding him and awoke again hours later to find them still there, telling him to follow through on his plan, she told jurors.

‘That was the sign he was going to get the transportation and the final stuff he needed before going to Washington, D.C.,’ Eggert told the jury.

Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, earlier this month said the death penalty is traditionally reserved for the worst of the worst, and it’s rare for a state to seek the punishment of death after finding someone guilty but mentally ill.

‘I just don’t know of any cases in which you have (such) a verdict, and then the state still seeks the death penalty,’ he said.

Dieter said the guilty but mentally ill verdict gained popularity in a dozen states as part of the public outcry over John Hinckley being found not guilty by reason of insanity in 1982 in the attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan.

The jury on Monday deliberated for a little more than five hours. After the verdict was announced, McGowan said the jury ‘made a brave decision.’

‘I think they made the correct decision,’ McGowan said.

McVay’s defense team did not speak to the media after the hearing. Some of them wept after the verdict was read, news outlets reported.

Three other individuals are on death row in South Dakota: Rodney Berget, Charles Rhines and Briley Piper.

TEXAS – Execution Jose Villegas – April 16, 6 pm- EXECUTED 7.04 PM

“I would like to remind my children once again I love them,” Villegas said when asked if he had a statement before being put to death. “Everything is OK. I love you all, and I love my children. I am at peace.”

High court refuses to stop execution in Texas

HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) — The U.S. Supreme Court has refused to halt the scheduled execution of a man convicted of killing three members of a Corpus Christi family.

The high court, on a 5-4 vote, rejected arguments from attorneys for Jose Villegas who said the 39-year-old is mentally impaired and ineligible for the death penalty.

The ruling came Wednesday about 30 minutes after a six-hour window opened for Villegas’ lethal injection for the fatal stabbings 13 years ago of his ex-girlfriend, her 3-year-old son and her mother.

Villegas’ lawyers contended testing in February showed he had an IQ of 59, below the IQ of 70 that courts have embraced as a threshold for mental impairment. State attorneys disputed the test result and called it a late attempt to delay the punishment.

 

As usual, Execution Watch will air, starting at 6pm and have an taped interview with Jose,

Execution Watch with Ray Hill
can be heard on KPFT 90.1 FM,
in Galveston at 89.5 and Livingston at 90.3,
as well as on the net here
from 6:00 PM CT to 7:00 PM CT
on any day Texas executes a prisoner.

April 16 update

Lawyers Ask Supreme Court to Stop Villegas Execution

HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) – The U.S. Supreme Court is considering whether claims of mental impairment should keep a convicted killer from execution Wednesday evening for the slayings of three members of a Corpus Christi family.

Attorneys for Jose Villegas filed a last-day appeal asking the high court to stop his lethal injection, saying testing in February showed he had an IQ of 59. They said it was “a score clearly indicating” mental impairment that could make him ineligible for the death penalty.

Villegas, 38, has been scheduled to die for the fatal stabbings 13 years ago of his ex-girlfriend, her 3-year-old son and her mother. Villegas would be the seventh prisoner executed this year in Texas, the nation’s most active death penalty state.

The Supreme Court has prohibited execution of mentally impaired people, although states have been allowed to devise procedures to make their own determinations. Courts also have embraced scientific studies that consider a 70 IQ a threshold for impairment, and the high court justices are reviewing a Florida law stipulating that number for death penalty eligibility.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state’s highest criminal court, voted 6-3 Monday to reject Villegas’ appeal as improper and wouldn’t consider the merits of the arguments.

Villegas’ lawyers argued to the Supreme Court that the Texas court “has candidly disavowed the established diagnostic criteria” and is deliberately using unscientific standards to narrow the number of prisoners who can cite mental impairment as a reason to keep them from execution.

The Texas Attorney General’s office disputed the IQ finding, saying previous examinations of Villegas showed no mental impairment and the number cited in his appeal was based on testing after he received an execution date and motivation to not do well on the test. State attorneys also argued his lawyers had 10 years to raise impairment claims but didn’t do so until days before his scheduled punishment.

The 11th-hour appeal was “nothing more than a calculated (albeit meritless) attempt to postpone his execution,” Assistant Attorney General Jefferson Clendenin wrote to the justices in response to the appeal.

Villegas was convicted of fatally stabbing Erida Salazar, 23, her 3-year-old son, Jacob, and Salazar’s mother, Alma Perez, 51, in January 2001. Their bodies were discovered by Salazar’s father when he returned home after being excused from jury duty. Each had been stabbed at least 19 times.

Villegas, a former cook, dishwasher and laborer, was free on bond for a sexual assault charge and was supposed to go on trial the day of the killings for an incident in which a woman said he punched her in the face.

Police spotted Villegas driving Salazar’s stolen car and he led them on a chase that ended with him on foot and urging officers to shoot him. When arresting him, police found three bags of cocaine in his baseball cap.

“What’s frustrating to me and the family is 12 years have gone by and he’s still not been executed yet,” said Mark Skurka, the Nueces County district attorney who prosecuted the case in 2002.

Following his conviction for capital murder, Villegas was convicted of two counts of indecency with a child related to the daughter of the woman he was accused of punching in the face prior to the slayings. Relatives have said Salazar’s mother had urged her daughter to break up with Villegas when she learned of the sex charges against him.

Villegas also had convictions for making terroristic threats to kill women, burglary and possessing inhalants.

Defense attorneys at his murder trial focused on trying to keep him from going to death row.

“It was the main issue in the case,” trial lawyer Grant Jones recalled.

Attorneys argued the slayings were not intentional and Villegas was mentally ill. A defense psychiatrist testified Villegas experienced “intermittent explosive disorder,” a condition that led to uncontrollable rages.

Villegas would be the third Texas inmate executed with a new stock of pentobarbital from a provider corrections officials have refused to identify, citing the possibility of threats of violence against the supplier. The Supreme Court has upheld that stance.

Execution Watch with Ray Hill
can be heard on KPFT 90.1 FM,
in Galveston at 89.5 and Livingston at 90.3,
as well as on the net here
from 6:00 PM CT to 7:00 PM CT
on any day Texas executes a prisoner.

April 15, 2014

HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) — Jose Villegas was out on bond for a sexual assault charge and was supposed to go on trial in Corpus Christi for punching a woman in the face on the same day 13 years ago that he stabbed ex-girlfriend, her son and her mother to death.

The former cook, dishwasher and laborer was arrested after a police chase and charged with capital murder for the deaths of his ex-girlfriend, Erida Salazar, her 3-year-old son, Jacob, and her mother, Alma Perez, 51.

Villegas, 38, was set for lethal injection Wednesday for the slayings. He would be the seventh Texas inmate executed this year and the fifth in as many weeks in the nation’s most active death penalty state.

His attorneys argue that the punishment should be put off so they have additional time to investigate evidence they’ve recently found that Villegas is mentally impaired and ineligible for execution. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals refused Monday to halt the punishment and lawyers for Villegas said they would take their appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Salazar’s father, returning home Jan. 22, 2001, from jury duty, found the bloody body of his wife and had a neighbor call police. He then went back inside to find his daughter, 23, and grandson also dead. Court documents show Salazar was stabbed 32 times, her son 19 times and mother 35 times. A television and car also were taken from the home.

Police spotted Salazar’s car with Villegas behind the wheel and he led them on a chase that ended when he bailed out on foot. When he was caught, officers found three bags of cocaine inside his baseball cap.

Testimony at his 2002 capital murder trial showed Villegas told police he pawned the stolen television for $75, used the money immediately to buy cocaine and hoped to commit suicide by overdosing.

“We had a confession, DNA, witnesses who saw him leaving the house afterward,” Mark Skurka, the Nueces County district attorney who prosecuted the case, said. “He killed the mom first, then his girlfriend, then the baby.”

Jurors deliberated less than 20 minutes before convicting him.

Villegas had multiple previous arrests, including burglary, making terroristic threats to kill a woman, assaults and two counts of indecency with a child for exposing himself and fondling the daughter of the woman he was accused of punching in the face. Records showed he had spent at least 200 days in jail and four years on probation.

Defense attorneys at his trial acknowledged Villegas committed the slayings but said they were not intentional and he was mentally ill. A defense psychiatrist blamed his behavior on uncontrollable rages caused by “intermittent explosive disorder.”

“Punishment was the only issue,” Grant Jones, one of Villegas’ trial lawyers, recalled this week. “I’ve been trying criminal cases over 40 years and I’d say in about 80 percent of the cases, mental health is a factor to one degree or another.”

Relatives said Salazar’s mother had urged her to leave Villegas when she learned of the sex charges against him.

Villegas would be the third Texas inmate executed with a new stock of pentobarbital from a provider corrections officials have refused to identify, citing the possibility of threats of violence against the supplier. The Supreme Court has upheld that stance.

Texas and other death penalty states have been scrambling for substitute drugs or new sources for drugs for lethal injections after major drugmakers — many based in Europe where death penalty opposition is strong — stopped selling to state corrections agencies.

Oklahoma says it has obtained secret supply of execution drugs

April 12, 2013

Oklahoma officials on Friday said the state had obtained manufactured pharmaceuticals from a secret supplier for use in the executions of two men later this month, avoiding concerns over the use of compounded drugs but leaving unanswered questions about how it obtained them.

In a letter to defence lawyers, an assistant attorney general, John Hadden, said the state “has recently acquired a manufactured source of vecuronium bromide. That means there will be no compounded drugs used in the executions of your clients. This will resolve the concerns you and your clients have expressed regarding compounded drugs.”

Despite a judge’s ruling that a state drug secrecy law violated the inmates’ constitutional rights, Hadden declined to identify the supplier of the new drugs.

“This information is irrelevant to your clients and disclosure could lead to harassment or intimidation which will have a chilling effect on the state’s ability to acquire these drugs for future executions,” Hadden wrote.

Oklahoma plans to execute Clayton Lockett on 22 April and Charles Warner on 29 April. Both were convicted of murder and rape.

The state said on Friday it would use midazolam, vecuronium bromide and potassium chloride to kill the men, with dosages untried in US executions. Florida uses the same combination of drugs, but employs a dosage of midazolam, which acts as a sedative, that is five times larger than what Oklahoma plans to use. Vecuronium bromide is a paralytic agent; potassium chloride stops the heart.

Oklahoma had planned to use a different drug – compounded pancuronium bromide – as the second drug in the method, but lawyers objected to the use of loosely regulated compounded drugs that may lack purity and cause an unconstitutionally cruel death.

Hadden said the state will now use drugs that are approved by the Food and Drug Administration.

Madeline Cohen, a lawyer for one of the men due to be executed, said the state needs to reveal details beyond that the pharmaceuticals were manufactured rather than compounded.

“If they disclosed that the drugs were manufactured by a specific company, in a particular lot, and imported with this licence, for example, we would have some ability to evaluate that,” she said.

“Without that, we don’t know if it’s actually an FDA-approved drug or if it has been imported or sold legally, or if it is what the state says it is.”

She said there is no FDA-approved midazolam that comes in the concentration specified in Oklahoma’s lethal injection protocol, and the state has not said if it will dilute the drug to make the concentration.

The state could change the concentrations in the protocol, if any numbers were incorrectly written, Hadden said in his letter.

 

(the guardian)

USA Violates International Law; Executes Mexican Citizen – Ramiro Hernandez

April 12, 2014

The United States has once again violated international law, with its execution of Mexican citizen Ramiro Hernandez, who was denied the consular attention included in a Vienna convention, the United Nations charged today.

“Mr. Hernandez did not have consular access, established in Article 36 of the Vienna Convention for Consular Affairs,” OHCHR spokesperson Rupert Colville told the press.

Colville recalled that in 2004 at the U.N. headquarters in Geneva, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued a resolution noting that the United States should review and reconsider the cases of 51 Mexicans sentenced to death, including the case of Hernandez, since they had not received the required assistance.

“Under international law, the violation of the right to consular notification affects due process, so, we are witnessing a new case of arbitrary deprivation of life by a signing country, since 1992, of the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights”, Colville highlighted.

The spokesperson said Wednesday’s execution, which took place in Texas was regrettable.

This is the 16th time the United States has applied the death penalty this year; the 6th in Texas. The U.N. opposes this punishment under any circumstance, but even more so in the recent case due to the aforementioned violations, Colville stressed.

 

(source: plenglish.com)

Skinner transcripts received by attorneys

April 11, 2014

Defense attorneys requesting extension to 21-day deadline.

Attorneys with the state Attorney General’s Office and convicted murderer Hank Skinner’s defense team say they have received copies of the court transcripts from Skinner’s evidentiary hearing in Gray County on Feb. 3 and 4.

Receipt of the transcripts triggers a 21-day period for attorneys to file their findings from the witness testimony back to the 31st District Court.

Lauren Been, a spokeswoman for the AG’s Office, said both sides are required to respond.

Skinner, who is on death row for the brutal murders of Pampa resident Twila Busby and her two adult sons on New Year’s Day 1993, is being represented by attorneys Douglas Robinson and Robert Owen. If District Judge Steven Emmert rules favorably for Skinner, his attorneys could seek an appeal.

Emmert does not have a deadline to file his decision, but his bailiff, Wayne Carter, said the judge wants to move along quickly with the case.

A spokeswoman from Robinson and Owen’s office in Washington D.C. said Thursday they are waiting for a few exhibits from the court and are requesting the court to extend the filing deadline to May 30.

Skinner was not at the hearing in which both sides presented evidence from a series of recent DNA tests.

FLORIDA – Gonzalez death sentence upheld in Billings murders

April 11, 2014

The Florida Supreme Court unanimously upheld the conviction and death sentence for the man authorities said masterminded the robbery and killings of Byrd and Melanie Billings nearly five years ago.

Leonard Patrick Gonzalez Jr., 40, was convicted in 2010 of two counts of first-degree murder and one count of home invasion robbery with a firearm.

Gonzalez led a group of men who forced their way into the Billings home in Beulah in July 2009 and gunned down the couple during an attempted robbery. The Billingses had 17 children, 13 of them adopted. Nine of the children were home at the time of the killing.

On Feb. 17, 2011, Circuit Judge Nicholas Geeker followed a jury recommendation and sentenced Gonzalez to death.

In imposing the death sentence, Geeker found as aggravating factors that Gonzalez had a conviction for a prior violent felony, that the murder was committed during the course of a robbery, and his crimes were heinous, atrocious and cruel.

In upholding the conviction, the state Supreme Court found that the convictions were supported by competent, substantial evidence, according to the State Attorney’s Office.

“We’re very pleased with the decision and the court’s opinion on the sentence and use of the death penalty,” said Assistant State Attorney John Molchan, who prosecuted Gonzalez along with State Attorney Bill Eddins.

Although Gonzalez’s direct appeal was denied, he still can attempt to have his conviction or sentence overturned.

Gonzalez has the option to seek post-conviction relief, a review of whether deficiencies in his attorney’s performance led to Gonzalez’s conviction. He also can file a petition for a U.S. District Court to review the case, which could overturn the conviction or overturn his sentence.

TENNESSEE -Senate authorizes electric chair for executions

April 10, 2014

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) – The Senate has voted to allow the state to electrocute death row inmates if lethal injection drugs cannot be obtained.

The measure sponsored by Sen. Ken Yager passed on a 23-3 vote on Wednesday.

The Harriman Republican said current law allows the state to use its alternate execution method only when lethal injection drugs are not legally available. But Yager said there was no provision for what do if there was a shortage of those drugs.

The state’s lethal injection protocol uses a sedative commonly used to euthanize animals, but states are exhausting supplies.

The state’s last electrocution was in 2007. The companion bill is awaiting a House floor vote.

Previous story

A plan to bring back the electric chair is making its way through the Tennessee legislature, though some lawmakers have voiced uneasiness about returning to an execution method the state largely had abandoned.

A House committee approved a bill Tuesday morning that would make electrocution the state’s method for killing inmates sentenced to death if lethal injection were declared unconstitutional or the drugs needed to carry it out were unavailable. But a handful of members said they have reservations about the electric chair, which the state has used only once since 1960.

(www.wbir.com)

“It seems barbaric to me,” said state Rep. Darren Jernigan, D-Nashville. “I’d rather go with the gas chamber, myself. … The electric chair bothers me.”

Tennessee switched to lethal injection when it brought back the death penalty in the 1990s, but lawmakers gave inmates the option of choosing the electric chair for crimes committed before Jan. 1, 1999. One inmate, Daryl Keith Holton, was electrocuted in 2007.

In recent years, lethal injection has come under scrutiny. Death penalty opponents have pressed manufacturers to stop making available the drugs used in lethal injections, and courts have begun to weigh whether the method really produces the painless death that supporters claim. That has led state officials to reconsider electrocution, which the attorney general said last month never has been found unconstitutional.

State officials nonetheless expect House Bill 2476 would be challenged in court if it were to pass. Jernigan, sighing heavily, spelled out why, describing the damage electrocution does to the body. But state Rep. Dennis Powers, the Jacksboro Republican who filed the bill, stood by the measure.

“What seems barbaric is someone that’s been on death row 29 years,” he said. “This is really not about the death penalty. The death penalty is already the law in Tennessee. This is about how we do it.”

Jernigan responded by noting that some states allow death by firing squad. State Rep. Kent Williams, I-Elizabethton, said that method did not phase him either.

“That’d be the easiest way to go,” he said, adding, “I don’t know why we got away from hanging.”

“We’re wanting to make sure that these people on death row go ahead and get the just sentence that they deserve,” Powers replied. But some members still weren’t convinced.

“I just kind of feel that some kind of injection is a more humane way … than it is, I think, to just fry somebody,” said state Rep. Johnny Shaw, D-Bolivar.

“Our job is not to judge. Our job is to arrange the meeting between the (defendant) and the creator, for him to judge,” Powers said.

HB 2476 now heads to the House Finance Committee and could be voted on by the full House of Representatives by the end of the legislative session. The state Senate is scheduled to vote on companion legislation, Senate Bill 2580, on Wednesday.

Jodi Arias Trial Update: New York Man Accused of Harassing TV Anchors Covering Murder Case Gets New Court Date

April 10, 2014

A New York man who threatened two television hosts covering Jodi Arias’ murder case will stand trial on May 8.48-year-old David Lee Simpson was originally scheduled to face a Maricopa County judge on April 1, but officials have pushed back his court date, the Associated Press reported this week.

Investigators allege the Bath, N.Y. resident sent threatening tweets to TV personalities Jane Velez-Mitchell and Nancy Grace during their extensive coverage of Jodi Arias’ proceedings.

Simpson also reportedly tried to scare an unidentified Arizona woman on Twitter concerning Arias, who was convicted of first-degree murder for killing former lover Travis Alexander in his Mesa home.

Simpson now faces five felony counts for the Twitter threats, which he reportedly directed at both of the HLN Network analysts while they reported on the Jodi Arias trial in 2013. Simpson has pleaded not guilty to each charge against him.

Although the 48-year-old was in the state of New York when he posted the tweets, Arizona officials said the threats were sent to Grace and Velez-Mitchell while they were covering a case happening in Maricopa County. Simpson’s trial, therefore, will take place in the south-central Arizona county.

33-year-old Arias was indicted for the June 2008 death of Alexander on May 8, 2013. But a jury couldn’t come to a unanimous decision for her sentencing at the time. The prosecution was pushing for the death penalty while Arias’ defense team tried for life in prison. After multiple pushbacks, Arias’ final sentencing date has been scheduled for September of this year. A jury will decide at that time whether Arias should be put to death, or if she’ll be sentenced to natural life in prison with no parole option.

If jurors can’t reach a decision at that time, the death penalty will automatically be taken off the table. In that instance, Arias would theoretically be sentenced to life in prison.

Attorney Mark O’Mara, who represented George Zimmerman in his murder case, recently weighed in on Jodi Arias’ odds of escaping the death sentence. O’Mara told HLN-TV that Arias’ chances are stacked against her, since it appeared as though she prepared to kill Alexander before carrying out the murder.

“There’s really a lot against her, the fact that she tried to ingratiate herself to the jury and that didn’t work is really going to hurt,” O’Mara said. “On the other hand, the defense has to focus on this lady being out of touch with reality, some mental health mitigation, which is what we call in the business trying to get away from the death penalty by showing that there’s things about Jodi Arias that you should sort of forgive her for.”