Capital punishment

OHIO – EXECUTION – DONALD PALMER 09/20/2012 10 a.m Last hours EXECUTED 10:35 a.m

“I want you to know I’ve carried you in my heart for years and years,” Palmer told six women in the room who are the widows, daughters and a niece of the men he killed. “I’m so sorry for what I took from you …I hope your pain and hurt die with me today.”

Update : Inmate calm, emotional as execution nears (9 a.m current time Ohio)

Palmer spent his last evening visiting with his son and daughter. He spent about two hours with them between 4:30 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. Wednesday.

He also visited with his ex-wife, Tammy Palmer, and his Pastor, Ernie Sanders.

A prison spokesman describes another meeting with his children at about 7:35 p.m. as “very emotional.”

For his final meal on Wednesday night, Palmer requested chipped ham, Velveeta cheese, 12 ounces of Helman’s mayonnaise, two sliced fresh tomatoes, one loaf of wheat bread, one bag of ranch Doritos, two large bags of peanut M&Ms, one quart of hazelnut ice cream, one piece of plain cheesecake and six 20 ounce bottles of Coke. He was served the meal at 8:05 p.m.

Prison officials say for the rest of the night,Palmer watched television and read, and at 11:57 p.m., he returned the two packs of M&Ms.

Palmer reportedly slept less than 30 minutes Wednesday night, spending most of his time reading, writing notes and watching television.

His last phone call was received at 4:41 a.m.

Palmer was also offered a breakfast on Thursday morning of apple juice, grits, boiled eggs, margarine, white break, milk, coffee and sugar, which he declined.

He had another visit with his kids between 6:30 a.m. and 7:30 a.m., a prison spokesperson said they read the Bible and sang together.

At 7:40 a.m. his ex-wife Tammy and Chaplain Lyle Orr began a visit. He received Communion at 7:51 a.m.

Witnesses to the 10 a.m. execution include these members of the victims families: Tiffany Nameth, the widow of Charles Sponhaltz; Tiffany Sponhaltz-Pugh, the daughter of Charles Sponhaltz; Charlene Farkas, the daughter of Charles Sponhaltz; Valerie Vargo-Jolliffe, the widow of Stephen Vargo; and Dee Roy, a friend of Valerie.

The brother of Charles Sponhaltz, Frank, was originally scheduled to witness, but will not be there. Donna Cottage, a niece of Charles Sponhaltz will attend instead.

Palmer requested that his Pastor, Ernie Sandors; his spiritual advisor, Lyle Orr; and his attorney, David Stebbins all witness the execution, as well.

september 20, 2012 http://www.news-register.net

Donald Palmer, 43, was moved from death row in Chillicothe to the single-cell death house in Lucasville for his scheduled execution by lethal injection today. His lawyer, David Stebbins of Columbus, said Wednesday he doesn’t plan to file any other appeals and expects the execution to proceed.

“He has always accepted responsibility for this and wants the families of his victims to have justice,” Stebbins, who plans to be among the witnesses, said.

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CALIFORNIA – Death penalty ban seeks to answer doubts

September 19, 2012 http://www.sfgate.com

It’s the nightmare of capital punishment, for supporters and opponents alike – an innocent person condemned to death and executed.

As Californians prepare to vote in November on Proposition 34, which would reduce all death sentences to life in prison without parole, both sides on the issue agree that the state has never executed a prisoner who was later proved to be innocent.

Still, doubts persist about the guilt of an inmate who was put to death in 1998. And five men sentenced to death under current California law were later cleared of the murder charges that put them on Death Row.

Those five cases illustrate “how easily someone who did not commit the murder could have been executed,” said John Cotsirilos, lawyer for Lee Farmer, who was freed in 1999 after 17 years in prison.

Farmer was convicted of murdering a Riverside teenager during a 1982 burglary, based largely on a description by the dying victim. His death sentence was overturned in 1989 when the state Supreme Court ruled 4-3 that the prosecutor had wrongly told jurors they could disregard their feelings about whether he should live or die, because the voters had approved the death penalty.

Acquitted at retrial

Resentenced to life without parole by another jury, he won a new trial in 1997 based on newly disclosed evidence that an accomplice had admitted killing the teenager in a separate burglary. Farmer was acquitted of the killing at his retrial.

Farmer’s case is far from unique, Cotsirilos said, because convictions are often based on human observations that may convince a jury but can’t be scientifically verified. In California and other states, he asserted, “people have been executed whose cases had as much doubt as Lee’s.”

The outcomes of questionable cases like those should lead to the conclusion that “it’s just a bridge too far for human beings to try to make that judgment” between life and death, said Charles Bonneau, lawyer for an inmate who was released after 14 years on Death Row.

Troy Lee Jones was convicted of the 1981 murder of his girlfriend in Merced County, allegedly to prevent her from implicating him in an earlier killing that was never charged. A neighbor said she had seen Jones beat the victim and heard her promise to keep quiet, but there were no eyewitnesses to the murder and, according to a court ruling, there were other possible suspects.

The state Supreme Court overturned Jones’ conviction and death sentence in 1996 because of incompetent representation by his trial lawyer, who did little preparation, hired no investigators, and asked questions that led to incriminating testimony by witnesses, including the victim’s 8-year-old daughter.

Charges dismissed

Rather than retrying Jones, prosecutors dismissed the charges. By then, Bonneau said, he and a colleague had discovered that one prosecution witness had been mentally ill, and the victim’s daughter – tracked down, after an exhaustive search, in a small town in Arkansas – had recanted her testimony.

The opposing sides in the Prop. 34 debate take different lessons from cases like these.

“We know that we make mistakes,” said Natasha Minsker, director of the Yes on 34 campaign. By eliminating the death penalty, she said, “we will prevent making the ultimate mistake.”

But Mitch Zak, spokesman for the No on 34 campaign, which is backed by prosecutors and law enforcement groups, said the five reversals reflect a legal system that has the necessary safeguards against injustice.

Death penalty supporters favor “an efficient appellate process that guarantees due process but that also guarantees justice for victims’ families and the people of California,” Zak said.

Doubt after execution

California has the nation’s largest Death Row, with more than 720 inmates. Of the 13 who have been put to death since 1992, when executions resumed after a 25-year halt, little doubt was ever raised about the guilt of 12 of them. But one man, Thomas Thompson, was executed for a killing he may not have committed.

Thompson was convicted of raping and fatally stabbing Ginger Fleischli in 1981 in the Laguna Beach (Orange County) apartment he shared with Fleischli’s ex-boyfriend, David Leitch.

Both men were tried separately. The prosecutor in Thompson’s trial argued that Thompson had been alone with Fleischli and had the sole motive for killing her. Later, at Leitch’s trial, the same prosecutor argued that Leitch had been there and had ordered Thompson to kill Fleischli.

Leitch was convicted of second-degree murder. At a 1995 parole hearing, he said he had seen Thompson and Fleischli having apparently consensual sex that night. If jurors had heard that testimony and believed it, they could not have convicted Thompson of the capital charge of rape-murder, and because rape was the alleged motive for Fleischli’s murder, they might have cleared him altogether.

Jurors also weren’t told that two inmates who said Thompson had admitted the murder were informants with questionable records.

‘Haunted to this day’

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals cited those omissions in voting to overturn Thompson’s death sentence but was overruled in a 5-4 U.S. Supreme Court decision on procedural grounds – the appeals court had acted after its own deadline had expired. Thompson died by lethal injection in July 1998, declaring his innocence to the end.

His appellate lawyer, Andrew Love, said he remains “haunted to this day that my client was executed despite the possibility that he was innocent.” The case shows, he said, that innocent people may die when “a system of justice puts finality and expediency over fairness and reliability.”

Zak, of the No on 34 campaign, countered that Thompson “more than had his day in court” and also had his claims thoroughly reviewed by Gov. Pete Wilson, who denied clemency. “Justice was served,” Zak said.

Spared execution

Besides Farmer and Jones, the previously condemned prisoners who were released are:

— Patrick “Hooty” Croy, convicted of murdering a police officer during a July 1978 shootout in Siskiyou County.

The state Supreme Court overturned Croy’s conviction and death sentence in 1986, saying the jury was never asked to determine a crucial element of the capital murder charge: whether Croy had intended to take part in his friends’ robbery of a store for its ammunition, an act that led to the shootout.

His retrial was transferred to San Francisco, where a jury acquitted him of all charges in 1990 after hearing Croy, a Shasta-Karok Indian, testify about local bias against American Indians and his belief that he would be killed if he surrendered. He had been wounded twice in the gunbattle and said he fired the fatal shot in self-defense.

— Jerry Bigelow, convicted of kidnapping, robbing and murdering a man in a Merced cornfield in 1980.

The state Supreme Court overturned his convictions and death sentence in 1984, saying his trial had been a “farce” because Bigelow had been allowed to represent himself and was denied the assistance of an attorney to advise him. A jury acquitted him of murder in a 1988 retrial after hearing evidence that he had been asleep in a car while an accomplice killed the victim. He was released in 1989.

— Oscar Lee Morris, convicted of murdering a man in a Long Beach bathhouse in 1978.

The state Supreme Court overturned his death sentence in 1988, saying the prosecutor had withheld evidence of favors provided to Joe West, the witness who implicated Morris in the killing. The court upheld Morris’ conviction, but West recanted his testimony just before he died in 1997, and prosecutors later decided to drop the case. Morris was freed in 2000.

Delaware Supreme Court overturns death sentence – LESLIE SMALL

September 17, 2012 http://www.delmarvanow.com

DOVER — The Delaware Supreme Court has overturned the death sentence of a taxi driver who murdered a 78-year-old Lewes woman in her home in 2009.

Leslie Small was sentenced last year to death by lethal injection after a Sussex County jury found him guilty of stabbing June McCarson to death with a pair of scissors on the floor of her mobile home, then stealing her Social Security money to buy crack cocaine.

Small’s defense attorneys appealed the decision and argued prosecutors tainted the sentencing process by describing Small’s defenses as “excuses.”

To avoid the death sentence, Small’s lawyers presented a list of mitigating factors for jurors to weigh when deciding if his life should be spared. The factors included Small’s strained relationships with his family, his drug addiction and his HIV-positive status.

The Supreme Court ruled that the prosecution unfairly characterized them as “excuses” several times in remarks to the jury, which could have led jurors to believe the defenses stated by Small’s lawyers were not to be taken seriously.

“A penalty hearing conducted without the prosecutorial misconduct may have led to the jury’s vote being split or in favor of life imprisonment,” wrote Chief Justice Myron T. Steele in an opinion released Tuesday. “Although Delaware law would have permitted the trial judge to impose the death penalty even if the jury had voted differently, we cannot be confident that the trial judge would have done so.”

The Attorney General’s Office would not say if prosecutors will try again for a death sentence.

“Small will, at the very least, remain in prison for the rest of his natural life,” read a statement released by AG spokesman Jason Miller.

“The ultimate decision regarding further sentencing proceedings will be made after a full examination of the matter and discussion with those the closest to Ms. McCarson.”

DELAWARE – James Cooke receives death sentence on Lindsey Bonistall murder

September 18, 2012 http://www.delawareonline.com

 James Cooke                                                                                                          Lindsey Bonistall

WILMINGTON — Nearly six years ago, more than a year after she was killed, Lindsey M. Bonistall’s family watched the months-long trial and conviction of James Cooke. That was followed by years of appeals, then a second months-long trial and conviction.

On Monday, just like in 2007, a judge imposed a sentence of death by lethal injection.

Superior Court Judge Charles H. Toliver IV on Monday briefly prolonged the agony by announcing his sentences on the non-capital charges first, including burglary and rape, that added up to 127 years in prison.

Then, after a dramatic pause, Toliver told Cooke and the packed courtroom, “I must conclude, as did the jury, the aggravating factors outweighed the mitigating factors … and the defendant, as a result, must be sentenced to death.”

“The evidence presented at trial leads to the inescapable conclusion that the murder of Lindsey Bonistall was committed in an unusually cruel and depraved fashion,” wrote Toliver in his 71-page opinion released afterward.

There were gasps, sobs and one quiet cheer of “Yes” from the side of the courtroom where Lindsey Bonistall’s family and friends were sitting.

The Bonistalls then passed around a box of tissues.

Cooke, 41, did not immediately react.

Lindsey’s mother, Kathleen Bonistall, emerged from the courtroom with her hands raised, announcing, “We did it,” to gathered family and friends. She then exchanged hugs with family and seven jurors who had voted to convict Cooke at the retrial.

Kathy Maguire, who acted as foreperson for the retrial jury, said she was satisfied with the outcome, noting it has been a long journey for the members of the jury – who continue to communicate via social media – and even longer and more difficult for the Bonistall family.

“I think we got it right,” said juror Bilal Hawkins, before correcting himself, “I know we got it right.”

Bonistall said they went in without any strong opinion about the sentence because it was a decision that was out of their control. She said for the family “there is no justice because Lindsey is not coming home with us.”

“This is an end to an arduous process,” she said in the lobby of the New Castle County Courthouse to a swarm of reporters. “We just want this process to end. It has been seven and a half years. I hope this is the end. I hope the Supreme Court will decide this is the end for this particular case.”

She said, from her point of view, the judicial system is broken in that it fails to take into account the rights of victims and their families, noting the difficulty of having to sit through a second trial and hear “lies” told about their daughter by James Cooke.

She said that the judicial process should be made “kinder and gentler” for victims, but said she did not know if that was possible.

According to testimony, early on May 1, 2005, Cooke broke into Lindsey Bonistall’s off-campus apartment near the University of Delaware, beat the 20-year-old student, bound her with an electrical cord, gagged her with a T-shirt and then sexually assaulted her before strangling her to death.

Cooke then set fire to the apartment and Bonistall’s body before fleeing.

The retrial jury voted 11-1 in favor of imposing the death sentence after convicting Cooke of rape, arson and murder.

Cooke’s previous conviction and death sentence in 2007 was tossed out by a divided Delaware Supreme Court in 2009. A majority of the justices ruled Cooke’s first set of attorneys violated Cooke’s rights by entering a plea of guilty-but-mentally-ill over Cooke’s objections.

Death will likely not come quickly for Cooke. Appeals in capital cases generally take a decade or more as they move through the state and federal courts.

More than 15 years after his 1995 conviction, ax killer Robert W. Jackson was taken to the lethal injection chamber at the James T. Vaughn Correctional Center in 2011. Killer Shannon Johnson was executed in 2012, four years after he was convicted of his crimes, but that quicker result only came after Johnson waived all his appeals in order to speed his own execution. Even then, legal fights over Johnson’s ability to waive those appeals took nearly two of those four years.

Cooke’s first appeal to the Delaware Supreme Court is automatic, according to one of his defense attorneys, Anthony Figliola, who said he will continue to represent Cooke despite the fact Cooke charged in court Monday that Figliola and co-counsel Peter Veith were guilty of “attorney malpractice” in their representation of him.

Cooke again also charged, after Toliver announced the sentence, that he was innocent and that the trial was just a set-up and corrupt. Toliver ended Cooke’s rant with a wave and guards took Cooke from the courtroom.

At the retrial, Cooke maintained on the stand that he did not kill Bonistall and that his DNA was found in her body because they had consensual sex. Prosecutors Steve Wood and Diane Coffey, however, pointed out to the jury that Bonistall was at work when Cooke alleged he was having consensual sex with her.

In his ruling, Toliver noted how Cooke’s version of events “simply lacks credibility” and that Cooke initially denied knowing Bonistall only to allege a sexual relationship after he found out about the DNA results. “Ms. Bonistall was truly an innocent victim of a violent crime,” Toliver wrote. “She had no involvement in and did not contribute to the crimes which ultimately led to her death.”

Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden was in the courtroom for the sentencing.

Biden said he was pleased that the sentence handed down “reflects the brutality” of what James Cooke inflicted on Lindsey Bonistall in 2005.

Ohio death row inmate Ronald Post says he’s too obese for execution

September 17, 2012 http://www.todaysthv.com

COLUMBUS, Ohio   – A condemned Ohio inmate who weighs at least 480 pounds wants his upcoming execution delayed, saying his weight could lead to a “torturous and lingering death.”

Ronald Post, who shot and killed a hotel clerk in northern Ohio almost 30 years ago, said his weight, vein access, scar tissue and other medical problems raise the likelihood his executioners would encounter severe problems. He’s also so big that the execution gurney might not hold him, lawyers for Post said in federal court papers filed Friday.

“Indeed, given his unique physical and medical condition there is a substantial risk that any attempt to execute him will result in serious physical and psychological pain to him, as well as an execution involving a torturous and lingering death,” the filing said.

Post, 53, is scheduled to die Jan. 16 for the 1983 shooting death of Helen Vantz in Elyria.

The prisons department was not aware of the filing and could not immediately comment.

Inmates’ weight has come up previously in death penalty cases in Ohio and elsewhere.

In 2008, federal courts rejected arguments by condemned double-killer Richard Cooey that he was too obese to die by injection. Cooey’s attorneys had argued that prison food and limited opportunities to exercise contributed to a weight problem that would make it difficult for the execution team to find a viable vein for lethal injection.

Cooey, who was 5-foot-7 and weighed 267 pounds, was executed Oct. 14, 2008.

In 2007, it took Ohio executioners about two hours to insert IVs into the veins of condemned inmate Christopher Newton, who weighed about 265 pounds. A prison spokeswoman at the time said his size was an issue.

In 1994 in Washington state, a federal judge upheld the conviction of Mitchell Rupe, but agreed with Rupe’s contention that at more than 400 pounds, he was too heavy to hang because of the risk of decapitation. Rupe argued that hanging would constitute cruel and unusual punishment.

After numerous court rulings and a third trial, Rupe was eventually sentenced to life in prison, where he died in 2006.

Ohio executes inmates with a single dose of pentobarbital, usually injected through the arms.

Medical personnel have had a hard time inserting IVs into Post’s arms, according to the court filing. Four years ago, an Ohio State University medical center nurse needed three attempts to insert an IV into Post’s left arm, the lawyers wrote.

Post has tried losing weight, but knee and back problems have made it difficult to exercise, according to his court filing.

While at the Mansfield Correctional Institution, Post “used that prison’s exercise bike until it broke under his weight,” according to the filing.

MISSOURI – Hearing starts Monday in Mo. death row case – REGINALD CLEMONS

Update September 21, 2012 http://www.stltoday.com

ST. LOUIS • A special review of Reginald Clemons’ death sentence in the 1991 Chain of Rocks Bridge double murder case ended for the week on Thursday.

Lawyers for both sides intend to call at least one more witness each, which will be done through depositions out of the public eye.

The attorneys will then submit legal briefs by Dec. 1 to Jackson County Circuit Court Judge Michael Manners, who the Missouri Supreme Court appointed as “special master” to review the case.

After that, the parties may reconvene for final statements before the judge. Manners is expected to take several months before submitting all the evidence and a final recommendation to the high court, which would then begin its process of reviewing Clemons’ appeal.

Ultimately, the court could decide anything from upholding the conviction or vacating it, to ordering a new trial.

After the hearing Thursday, family of the victims, Robin and Julie Kerry, said they are one step closer in their more than 20-year wait for closure.

“I’m glad, for all intents and purposes, it’s over,” said Virginia Kerry, mother of the two young women. “Now I can start burying everything again. I don’t have to deal with these people who say he’s innocent.”

For Clemons’ family, it’s also been a hard journey.

Bishop Reynolds Thomas, of the New Life Worship Complex, said fighting his son’s case has plunged him into bankruptcy. But it was worth it, he said. He still firmly believes his son is innocent.

“After 20 years, we took it as far as we could,” he said. “Now we just take it one day at a time.”

Thursday’s hearing brought several state witnesses who testified they saw Clemons without any apparent injuries after the police interrogation in which he claims his confession was beaten out of him. Among those who took the stand were a fingerprint technician and a family friend.

Several lab technicians also were called to speak to the testing of biological evidence. Items tested included a rape kit taken from Julie Kerry, a used condom found on the bridge, and pants and boxers taken from Marlin Gray, one of three men convicted of the crime separately from Clemons.

The evidence was re-tested in recent years with new DNA technology.

Stacey Bolinger, of the Missouri State Highway Patrol Crime Lab, said the rape kit did not have sufficient DNA evidence to test. Julie Kerry’s body had been in the Mississippi River for three weeks and was moderately decomposed when two fisherman found it. Robin Kerry’s body was never recovered.

There was male DNA from at least two individuals on Gray’s boxers and from at least three individuals on his pants. Clemons could not be eliminated as a source of it, she said.

Also on the clothing was the same female DNA that was found on the condom. Kim Gorman, formerly of the St. Louis police crime lab, testified that DNA had “a very high likelihood” of belonging to one of the Kerry sisters.

Update September 20, 2012 http://www.news.com.au

On the second day of a special hearing before a judge in Missouri, Clemons, 41, said that when charges were read against him in 1991 a judge noticed signs he had been hit and ordered him to be examined in hospital, said Laura Moye of Amnesty International-USA.

Clemons‘ attorneys maintain that Clemons only admitted raping one of his victims under police duress. He later reversed himself.

“The only time they stopped hitting me was when I agreed to make a taped statement,” he told STLToday.com.

“When I was being beaten, I wasn’t counting.”

“His counsel interrogated him on the alleged brutality when he testified the first night,” court spokesman Matt Murphy said.

“He was cross examined by the State, then the State played a 20 minute taped confession he made that night about what happened that night.”

Clemons was found guilty in 1993 of the murder of two sisters, aged 19 and 20, who allegedly were pushed from a bridge into the Mississippi River in 1991.

The events occurred at Chain of Rocks Bridge, a popular hangout at night for youths from Saint Louis, where Clemons and three friends came into contact with the two sisters, Julie and Robin Kerry, and their cousin Thomas Cummins.

The group Clemons was with is alleged to have raped the women and robbed Cummins before pushing them off the bridge.

Amnesty International has pushed for the state to commute Clemons’ death sentence because of allegations of police coercion, prosecutorial misconduct and a “stacked” predominantly white jury.

A former lawyer for Clemons testified Monday that he had not been informed about the existence of DNA samples taken from one of the bodies recovered from the Mississippi

September 16, 2012 http://www.sacbee.com/

T. LOUIS — The effort to free Reginald Clemons from Missouri’s death row goes to a St. Louis courtroom starting Monday.

Clemons was one of four men convicted in the 1991 killings of two St. Louis-area sisters, 20-year-old Julie Kerry and 19-year-old Robin Kerry. Both girls, along with their visiting male cousin, were thrown from an abandoned Mississippi River bridge. The cousin, Thomas Cummins, survived.

Clemons confessed to the killings, but later recanted. His lawyers say the confession was beaten out of him by police interrogators.

Jackson County Circuit Judge Michael Manners will oversee the hearing. He will then issue a report to the Missouri Supreme Court, which will decide whether Clemons should get a new trial. The Supreme Court could also decide to commute Clemons’ death sentence, said Matt Murphy,spokesman for the St. Louis Circuit Court.

Murphy said it will likely be several months before the Supreme Court makes a decision.

Clemons is expected to be in the courtroom for the hearing, which will proceed much like a trial. Murphy is expected to testify Monday or Tuesday. The trial is expected to last five days.

Clemons’ case has drawn international attention. Laura Moye, director of Amnesty InternationalUSA’s Death Penalty Abolition Campaign, is expected to attend the hearing.

Amnesty International has cited what it sees as several concerns about the case, concerns that include potential police misconduct, a lack of physical evidence and inconsistent witness testimony.

Moye has also argued that racial bias may have played a role in his conviction; the victims were white and the defendants were black.

New evidence could be presented at the hearing. In 2010, the Missouri Attorney General’s office found lab reports and physical evidence, including a rape kit, taken during an exam of one of the victim’s remains. Those findings have never been released publicly, but could come up during the hearing.

The Kerry sisters took Cummins, then 19, to the unused Chain of Rocks Bridge on the night of April 5, 1991, to show him a poem they had placed on the span. They happened upon a group of young men. The girls were raped and all three were pushed off the bridge.

Clemons and Marlin Gray were convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death. Gray was executed in 2005. Clemons was just weeks from execution in 2009 when a federal appeals court delayed it.

Another of the suspects, Antonio Richardson, had his death sentence overturned by the Missouri Supreme Court in 1993 because of procedural errors.

The fourth suspect, Daniel Winfrey, testified for the prosecution. He pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced to 30 years in prison. He has been released from prison and is on parole.

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OHIO – Palmer Says, ‘I deserve to die’ – execution scheduled september 20, 2012 at 10 a.m EXECUTED 10.35 A.m.

Update september 19, 2012 http://woub.org

A condemned Ohio man is set to be moved from the state’s death row in Chillicothe to the site of his Thursday execution in Lucasville.

State officials are expected to move Donald Palmer to death row on Wednesday, the day before he is set to be executed by lethal injection for a crime committed 23 years ago.

The 43-year-old was convicted of aggravated murder for fatally shooting two strangers along a Belmont County road on May 8, 1989.
Palmer’s attorney says he hadn’t planned on filing any other appeals and expected the execution to proceed.
Palmer also decided not to request mercy from the Ohio Parole Board, which can recommend clemency for a condemned inmate to the governor.
Including Palmer, 10 Ohio inmates are scheduled for execution through March 2014.

September 16, 2012 http://www.theintelligencer.net

CHILLICOTHE, Ohio – Donald “Duke” Palmer’s worldly possessions include a television, a radio, hot pot, a lamp and a fan.

He will spend much of this week giving those items to his fellow death row inmates. Palmer is scheduled to die by lethal injection at 10 a.m. Thursday at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville.

During a death row interview last week at Ohio’s Chillicothe Correctional Institution, Palmer, a Martins Ferry native who murdered Charles Sponhaltz and Steven Vargo along Belmont 2 near the Jefferson County line on May 8, 1989, offered regrets for the murders but said he’s ready to die.

“I killed Mr. Sponhaltz and I killed Mr. Vargo and I deserve to die for it,” Palmer, 47, said.

He talked at length during the hour-long interview about his victims and their loved ones but asked that his apologies not be published until after his death.

“I don’t want (my apologies) to be cheapened or be seen as a ploy to somehow stop what’s going to happen,” he said. “I’m not trying to forgive my way out of this. I’m not.”

Palmer said he did not ask for clemency because he does not want to spend the rest of his life in prison.

“I mean, either way is a death sentence in prison,” he said. “I don’t want to sit around and wait for forever to come down. I’m just at the end of this. I’m tired. I want it to be known that it’s OK that I am being executed.”

Palmer said he has known his execution date for 14 months.

Asked how he is dealing with knowing the exact date and time he is going to die, Palmer said, “I’ve been dealing with it since day one. I didn’t know that I had more than five years coming. Then 10 years went by. And then 15 years went by. And then 20 years. … By the time 20 years go by, I was ready to die. I’m just ready.”

While confirming that Ohio is not putting an innocent man to death, Palmer said “No” when asked if he received a fair trial.

He said he appealed for a new trial in an effort to get to the truth about what happened.

“They didn’t convict me of the truth,” he said.

“Now, like I said, I killed these two guys. So I know that I deserve to die for this. But, they didn’t convict me of the truth. They convicted me of innuendo. They convicted me of things that didn’t happen. They put on evidence of things that just weren’t true.”

Palmer’s recollection of May 8, 1989, the day of the murders, goes like this: he awoke that morning in Columbus, Ohio, with “the shakes” due to his cocaine addiction. He went to a liquor store with his co-defendant, Eddie Hill, where they purchased a bottle of whiskey. Palmer said he drank 80 to 90 percent of that bottle during the day.

The two drove to Belmont County and eventually made their way to Belmont 2, near the Jefferson County line. There, they encountered Sponhaltz when Hill’s vehicle struck the rear the Sponhaltz’s vehicle.

Hill and Sponhaltz exited their respective vehicles, followed by Palmer who had a gun in his hand. Palmer said he attempted to punch Sponhaltz when the gun went off, striking Sponhaltz in the head. He then shot Sponhaltz once more in the head, killing him.

“Everything happened in a panic and fear and in bad, bad judgment, bad decisions, drunken judgment. I’m an addict, I’m afraid and I’m drunk. And it was just, you know, anything that could have gone wrong did go wrong and I made all the wrong decisions,” Palmer recalled.

Vargo appeared a few minutes later, stopping to see if the men needed help. Palmer also shot him twice in the head.

“Vargo died because he showed up at the wrong place at the wrong time,” Palmer said.

Asked about his lifestyle at the time, Palmer said, “I was a punk, and I was an addict. I was … a broken person. I was messed up because of my divorce. … That’s why I tried to commit suicide on Feb. 6, 1989. … That was my identity. Father. Husband. I got married the week after I turned 18 at the First Christian Church in Martins Ferry. And, this was my life. …

“I didn’t put God first in my life. And I know that’s why my life didn’t work out for me. But when I got divorced it broke me. I ran around and tried to fill a hole inside of me. Everything. Drugs. Sex. Running around. Fast cars. Motorcycles. Living in Florida on the beach and sailing. You name it, I did it. I had no fear of doing anything. And I was living fast and loose and, I don’t know, God wasn’t around then. Not in my life anyway.”

Palmer said he sometimes questions why he lived while Sponhaltz and Vargo died.

“If I had died, Sponhaltz and Vargo wouldn’t have been killed just a few months later,” he said, referring to his failed suicide attempt. “So it made me question why would God do that? Why would he let me live and these two die to go all the way to this point? But I did find an answer to the question. And the answer was because I didn’t put God first in my life. … People don’t understand when I say it but I thank God for death row. For putting me here. Because if he didn’t put me here, I would have died in my sins. … But now, I know that I’m saved. I know that I’m going to be fine. Every single one of us has a date.”

Palmer said he is a graduate of Martins Ferry High School. He said he worked for a time in construction in Charlotte County, Fla.

As for  Hill,Palmer filed an affidavit with the Ohio Parole Board maintaining that Hill didn’t have anything to do with the murders of Vargo and Sponhaltz. Hill currently is serving lengthy prison sentences for his role in the murders.

Hill “didn’t kill anybody. He couldn’t have stopped me from killing anybody. He didn’t know that I was going to kill anybody. He wrecked the car. He was drinking and driving and wrecked the car. That’s the only crime he committed before the murders,” Palmer said. “I shot Sponhaltz. Eddie ran and jumped down over the side of the road. Didn’t even see Vargo get shot. But, he got 30 to life on Vargo and only 15 to life on Sponhaltz. … I feel really bad that I got this man doing a life sentence.”

Aside from the possessions he will give to fellow inmates, Palmer said he has a few treasured items.

“The only things that mean anything to me are my pictures of my kids and my artwork and my Bibles. That’s it,” he said.

Palmer also said he misses his hometown of Martins Ferry, where he spent his childhood.

“I loved Martins Ferry,” he said. “I loved waking up every morning right across from Nickles Bakery and smelling that bread baking. I could see the Ohio River every morning. I’d see the northern tip of the Island. You could literally walk right down over the hill and go fishing. Every day, I’d sit there and look at Wheeling.

“I miss those things. I remember the train bridge before it was gone. I used to walk across it. Go play on it. Jump off of it. Do all kind of weird things. It’s like Tom Sawyer but not quite, you know. … But I miss that place. That is home to me.”

Palmer said executions should be more public.

“If you have a law on the books, especially when it comes to punishment, if this is what you agree to, as citizens you need to take responsibility for what’s being done in your name,” he said. “I’m not saying there should be public executions. I’m saying that it should be more open. The public should know that it’s being done in their name. They should know that their representatives are the ones who are killing. My blood is on their hands.

“I think the death penalty should be on the ballot every year because if you’re going to kill people, you need to take responsibility for what’s being done. Period. Show me where it’s a deterrent. It’s going to deter me from ever doing it again. But, how is that going to deter the 24-year-old punk that’s out there now?”

Asked what he would say to death penalty protesters who may be outside of the prison during his execution, he said, “Nothing. They’re going to have to work that out for themselves.”

Palmer said there is some irony in his execution date because his mother died on the same date in 2003.

“I’m going to be executed the same date as my mom died,” he said. “My clemency hearing (Aug. 16, 2012) was the same date my son died, Aug. 16, 2005.”

Palmer will be moved from death row in Chillicothe to Lucasville 24 hours before his scheduled execution.

He will visit with his son and daughter on the night prior to the execution but he does not want them to witness it. His attorney, pastor and a penal chaplain will serve as witnesses in his behalf.

As the interview concluded, Palmer offered these final words: “I apologize and I hope that when it comes time for them to find peace that they will seek the Lord Jesus because there is peace there.”

Study: Death Penalty Will Cost California Up To $7.7 Billion By 2050

September 14, 2012 http://thinkprogress.org

California’s prison system is severelyovercrowded and expensive, but incarceration for those sentenced to life without parole is not the state’s most costly form of punishment. With a state initiative to eliminate capital punishment on the ballot this November, an updated study by a law professor and a federal appeals court judge projects that California’s death penalty system would cost taxpayers between $5.4 and $7.7 billion more between now and 2050 than if those in death row were sentenced to life in prison without parole.

During that time, the study projects, about 740 more inmates will be added to death row and 14 executions will be carried out, while more than 500 of those prisoners will die from suicide or natural causes before the state executes them. Compared to life without parole — the state’s second-most-severe punishment — the costs of the death penalty system include higher incarceration costs due to security and other requirements, and astronomical litigation costs — both for individual appeals and for lethal injection litigation.

Ninth Circuit Senior Judge Arthur L. Alarcón and Loyola Law School Los Angeles adjunct professor Paula M. Mitchell explain in the Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review:

[T]here is absolutely no support for the contention, advanced by some pro-death-penalty organizations, that replacing the death penalty with LWOP [life without parole] will increase housing or medical care costs for the state. Death-row inmates grow old and need costly medical care, just as LWOP inmates do. Indeed, death row inmates receive the same medical care that LWOP inmates receive, but it is provided at a premium due to logistical problems and security concerns that are endemic to providing healthcare to aging inmates on San Quentin’s death row. The vast majority of death-row prisoners who have died in California have lived out the remainder of their natural lives in state prison, just as LWOP inmates do. This is because most death-row inmates die in prison of natural causes. They just do so in a much more costly manner than do LWOP inmates.

If the state were to pass the proposed SAFE California Act (Proposition 34), $30 million per year would be reallocated toward the 46 percent of homicide cases and 56 percent of rape cases that go unsolved, according to statistics from the California Attorney General’s office.

Since 1989, California has sentenced two men to death who were later exonerated and released from prison. In 2011 and 2012 alone, five California men who were wrongfully convicted of murder but received lesser sentences were exonerated and released from prison, according to the study.

The National Registry of Exonerations — a database of those who were wrongfully convicted and later exonerated since 1989 — reports that California had the second-highest number of wrongful convictions in the country at 97 (tied with Texas). The state with the highest number, Illinois, eliminated the death penalty in 2011.

PENNSYLVANIA-Terry Williams Sentenced to Execution for Killing Two Men Who Sexually Abused Him as a Child – STAYED

Update 09/18/2012 http://articles.philly.com

Lawyers for condemned Philadelphia killer Terrance “Terry” Williams Tuesday afternoon asked the state Board of Pardons to reconsider Williams’ petition for clemency, citing purportedly inaccurate information a prosecutor provided the board at the hearing on Monday.

Though the board voted 3 to 2 for clemency for Williams, 46, who is scheduled for execution on Oct. 3, a unanimous vote was needed for the nonbinding recommendation to be sent to Gov. Corbett.

In a letter to the board, Williams’ lawyers asked for reconsideration because of the way Assistant District Attorney Thomas Dolgenos answered a question from pardons board member Harris Gubernick.

Update 09/18/2012  Board of Pardons rejects killer’s clemency appeal

HARRISBURG — The state Board of Pardons on Monday rejected a bid for clemency from a convicted murderer who is scheduled to become the first person executed by Pennsylvania since 1999.

The case of Terrance Williams has mobilized supporters, who say a history of sexual abuse by several men — including the man whose murder resulted in the death sentence — is reason to stop the execution scheduled for Oct. 3. Separately, a Philadelphia judge has agreed to hear evidence on Thursday about the claims of sexual abuse.

Pennsylvania has not executed someone who contested a death sentence since 1962. After two hours of testimony Monday, three of the five members of the Board of Pardons, including Attorney General Linda Kelly, voted to recommend that Gov. Tom Corbett grant clemency. But a unanimous decision is needed in cases with a sentence of death or life imprisonment, so the two opposing votes, including that of Lt. Gov. Jim Cawley, meant the application was denied.

Williams, now 46, was convicted in 1986 of first-degree murder, robbery and conspiracy in the death of Amos Norwood in Philadelphia. At the hearing on Monday, Shawn Nolan, a federal public defender, said clemency is warranted because Williams had been sexually abused from a young age by several men, including for years by Norwood. Williams also was beaten by his mother and stepfather, Mr. Nolan said.

“Who is Terry Williams?” he said. “He is a man shaped by the horror of his childhood.”

Williams is now is remorseful for his crimes, Mr. Nolan said.

Mr. Nolan also asked the board to heed a statement by Norwood’s widow that she did not want Williams put to death. And he cited statements by several jurors saying they would not have chosen the death penalty had they known of the claims of sexual abuse. Some also said they chose the death penalty because they thought a person sentenced to life could be paroled.

Tom Dolgenos, chief of the federal litigation unit at the Philadelphia district attorney’s office, countered that the Norwood murder was the culmination of an escalating series of crimes by Williams. He said the board should consider that decades of litigation had failed to reverse the sentence. And he asserted that Williams has a record of lying to escape consequences, while also noting that claims of abuse were not raised until years after trial. That delay, he said, was reason to be skeptical.

“The only way to grant clemency here is to accept the truth of these allegations,” he said.

David Lisak, a clinical psychologist who spoke in support of clemency, told the board that it is typical for victims, especially men, to recount past sexual abuse in a piecemeal fashion over a period of time. Several supporters of clemency urged board members to consider the promises made to victims when former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was charged and then convicted of child sexual abuse.

“Is it only some kids who get to be believed?” Mr. Lisak said.

But Mr. Dolgenos asserted that those cases were different, in part because Williams has something to gain by making claims of abuse.

“He has every incentive now to allege them — and to make them up if they didn’t actually happen,” Mr. Dolgenos said.

Proponents of clemency for Williams point to support from former judges and prosecutors as well as child advocates and others to argue the case is unique. An online petition seeking to stop the execution has more than 350,000 signatures, and the state’s Catholic bishops had written in support of commuting the sentence to life in prison.

At the hearing Thursday in Philadelphia, attorneys for Williams will request a stay of execution based on the allegations of sexual abuse. Mr. Nolan said they will argue prosecutors had evidence of sexual abuse that they did not disclose to the defense. The judge’s decision in the request can be appealed to the state Supreme Court.

Two hundred people are on death row in Pennsylvania.

 

September 14, 2012  http://www.opposingviews.com

article image

Terrance Williams of Pennsylvania has been sentenced to death after killing two men when he was 17- and 18-years old. What the jury did not know, however, was that Williams had been brutally raped as a child by the two men he killed.  

Williams and another teen killed one man just a few months after Williams had turned 18, according to Change.org. He also admitted that he killed another man five months earlier. One man was a church leader and another was a sports booster. The men used their positions to get access to young boys.

Williams was allegedly sexually abused for years by these men, but he was also abused by other older individuals throughout his life. His mother had abused him frequently and his father was absent from the home. His first experience with sexual assault was when he was just six years old, and the abuse continued steadily for the next 12 years of his life.  

He did not receive treatment or help from anyone for the duration of his suffering. 

How do we know these abuse accusations are true — and not just Williams making a calculated attempt at saving his life?

According to The Nation, “It was not until this past winter that another witness would come forward, a former pastor named Charles Pointdexter, who knew Norwood for thirty years. He admitted having known that he had sexually abused teen boys.

“Amos seemed to have lots of close relationships with young men…” he stated in an affidavit signed February 9, 2012, saying that he began to suspect that they were “inappropriate” in nature. A few years before Amos’s death, one of the parishioners, the mother of a 15-year-old boy, told him that he had “touched her son’s genitals” during a car ride and that “Amos had inappropriately touched a number of boys at the church.” Pointdexter kept the knowledge to himself.

Because Williams was embarrassed and ashamed by the abuse, he says he did not present his experiences as evidence for trial. His lawyer also failed to conduct a thorough investigation of Williams’ motivations for killing the men, and ignored obvious signs of sexual abuse.

Many notable people have come forward to state that they would like his sentence to be reduced to life without parole. Among those objecting to his sentencing include the wife of one victim, five jurors from the trial, judges, child advocates, former prosecutors, faith leaders, mental health professionals, and law professors.

Jurors from the trial now say they would not have voted for execution had they known about his experiences with sexual abuse as a child.

A widow of one victim said that she has forgiven Williams and does not want any more deaths to come of the incident. She expressed hope that Governor Tom Corbett, the Board of Pardons, and District Attorney Williams will reduce his sentence to life without parole.

Courts have agreed that Williams’ lawyer failed to give him a fair trial, but they also have stated that evidence of sexual abuse would not have made a difference in the sentencing.

Jurors, however, have signed sworn affidavits saying they would not have voted for death if they had known about his past.

Several jurors have also said that they voted for him to be executed because they believed that, if they had not, Williams would be eligible for release on parole.

However, a life sentence in Pennsylvania means the convicted will never be eligible for parole. Pennsylvania is the only state in the U.S. that does not require judges to explain to the jury that a life sentence means there is no possibility of parole.

No explanation of life sentencing was given at Williams’ trial.

Terry Williams’ death warrant for October 3 was signed by Gov. Corbett last week. Corbett is a Catholic Republican.

Related articles

GEORGIA – WARREN HILL awaits appeals decisions to stave off scheduled today at 7:00 p.m STAYED – New update july 4

Update : july 4. 2012

Georgia has set an execution date of July 15 for Warren Hill, despite his pending petition before the U.S. Supreme Court demonstrating that all of the physicians who have examined Hill agree he is intellectually disabled. People suffering from intellectual disability (mental retardation) are constitutionally barred from execution. (Atlanta Journal Constitution, July 3, 2013). This is the exceptional and rare case where there is clear proof an inmate is ineligible for the death penalty and the U.S. Supreme Court is the only avenue for relief.

 

Murderer Warren Hill will die Monday evening unless his attorneys can find a court that believes his mental capacity is diminished enough that it would be unconstitutional to execute him, or if a judge finds fault with the state’s new method of execution.

If he is executed as planned, Hill will be the first in Georgia to be put to death using only one drug — the powerful barbiturate pentobarbital — instead the three that the state has been using in combination since 2008.

Hill still has appeals based on the mental retardation issue pending in the Georgia and U.S. Supreme Courts. And on Monday a Fulton County Superior Court judge is scheduled to hear the issue of the Department of Corrections’ sudden change in its lethal injection protocol from three drugs to one drug. Last Tuesday, the day before Hill was initially scheduled to die, the prison system announced it was abandoning the three-drug cocktail — a sedative followed by the paralytic pancuronium bromide and then potassium chloride, which stops the heart. It was replaced with a single drug process, pentobarbital, the same as in six other states [a seventh uses a different sedative].

Later, on Monday evening, there will be vigils held in 11 Georgia cites to express outrage that the state is executing a mentally retarded man.

“In other states, Hill would not face the ultimate punishment due to his disability,” said Suzanne Nossel, executive director of Amnesty International USA.”Unless the Supreme Court steps in to prevent this execution, the state of Georgia will have committed a terrible injustice.”

Hill was condemned for using a nail-studded 2-by-6 board in 1990 to beat to death fellow prisoner Joseph Handspike. At that time Hill was already incarcerated for murdering his 18-year-old girlfriend.

The judge presiding over the 1991 trial for Handspike’s murder found Hill, with an IQ of 70, was more likely than not to be mentally disabled. But the judge also determined that the lawyer representing Hill at the time had not proven his mental disability beyond a reasonable doubt, the standard set in 1988 when Georgia became the first state to prohibit executing the mentally

If he is executed as planned, Hill will be the first in Georgia to be put to death using only one drug — the powerful barbiturate pentobarbital — instead the three that the state has been using in combination since 2008.

Hill still has appeals based on the mental retardation issue pending in the Georgia and U.S. Supreme Courts. And on Monday a Fulton County Superior Court judge is scheduled to hear the issue of the Department of Corrections’ sudden change in its lethal injection protocol from three drugs to one drug. Last Tuesday, the day before Hill was initially scheduled to die, the prison system announced it was abandoning the three-drug cocktail — a sedative followed by the paralytic pancuronium bromide and then potassium chloride, which stops the heart. It was replaced with a single drug process, pentobarbital, the same as in six other states [a seventh uses a different sedative].

Later, on Monday evening, there will be vigils held in 11 Georgia cites to express outrage that the state is executing a mentally retarded man.

“In other states, Hill would not face the ultimate punishment due to his disability,” said Suzanne Nossel, executive director of Amnesty International USA.”Unless the Supreme Court steps in to prevent this execution, the state of Georgia will have committed a terrible injustice.”

Hill was condemned for using a nail-studded 2-by-6 board in 1990 to beat to death fellow prisoner Joseph Handspike. At that time Hill was already incarcerated for murdering his 18-year-old girlfriend.

The judge presiding over the 1991 trial for Handspike’s murder found Hill, with an IQ of 70, was more likely than not to be mentally disabled. But the judge also determined that the lawyer representing Hill at the time had not proven his mental disability beyond a reasonable doubt, the standard set in 1988 when Georgia became the first state to prohibit executing the mentally disabled.

Since then, the U.S. Supreme Court said it has said it is unconstitutional to to execute the mentally retarded who are at “special risk of wrongful execution.” But also in that 2002 decision, the justices left it up to the states to determine what was required to show mental retardation; Georgia has the strictest standard.

“Mildly mentally retarded individuals like Warren Hill frequently defy the stereotypical image we often have of persons with the disability in part because they tend to make efforts to hide the symptoms,” wrote Hill’s attorney, Brian Kammer. He said if a defendant can prove retardation beyond a reasonable doubt, then he is likely so severely retarded that if he went to trial the death penalty would not be an option. “He may even be found incompetent to stand trial. This leaves the majority of mentally retarded persons in the criminal justice system, who are mildly mentally retarded, in the lurch, because it is the mildly mentally retarded whose symptoms can mislead … about the significance or even the existence of the disability.”

Docket from  Supreme court

No. 12A57
Title:
Warren Lee Hill, Jr., Applicant
v.
Carl Humphrey, Warden
Docketed:
Linked with 11-10109, 11-10109
Lower Ct: United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
  Case Nos.: (08-15444)
~~~Date~~~ ~~~~~~~Proceedings  and  Orders~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jul 16 2012 Application (12A57) for a stay of execution of sentence of death, submitted to Justice Thomas.
~~Name~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~Address~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~Phone~~~
Attorneys for Petitioner:
James W. Ellis 1117 Stanford Drive, NE (505) 277-2146
Albuquerque, NM  87131
Party name: Warren Lee Hill, Jr.
Attorneys for Respondent:
Beth A. Burton Senior Assistant Attorney General (404) 656-3499
    Counsel of Record Office of the Attorney General
40 Capitol Square, S.W.
Atlanta, GA  30334-1300
Party name: Carl Humphrey, Warden
Other:
Sheri Lynn Johnson Professor of Law (607) 255-6478
Cornell Law School
108 Myron Taylor Hall
Ithaca, NY  14853