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National News
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of National News
See all CADP National News links and
excerpts from the years 2000 | 2001 | 2002
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- FL: Florida Inmate Who Faced Death Penalty
at 15 to be Freed 26 Years Later
Anthony Caravello was convicted of rape and
murder for a crime he allegedly committed
in 1983 at age 15 in Florida. The prosecution
sought the death penalty. Now DNA evidence
from the crime scene points to another individual
and may result in his exoneration. The state
is not contesting his release. Caravello
has an IQ of 67 and was convicted largely
on the basis of his own statements, which
he says were obtained from him after beatings
during his interrogation. At his sentencing,
the judge commented, "I'll tell you
this, Anthony: If the jury had recommended
death, I would have had you electrocuted." Instead,
he was sentenced to life. The prosecution
is still pursuing the investigation. (9/14/09, DPIC Update) - KS: Legislature to Consider Ending Death
Penalty
Kansas will consider abolishing the death
penalty next year as death sentences are
declining across the United States. (12/19/09,
The Wichita Eagle)
- KY: Anti-Death Penalty Movement Wooing
Conservatives
LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- Roy Brown seems like a rarity - a conservative who's against
the death penalty. But to Brown, a state senator and the 2008 Republican nominee
for governor of Montana, the philosophy aligns perfectly with conservative ideology.
He's one of the more high-profile figures reaching out to other social and fiscal
conservatives, hoping to create a bipartisan movement against capital punishment. "I
believe that life is precious from the womb to a natural death," Brown said. (1/18/10,
Lexington Herald-Leader)
- OH: After 20 Years, Ohio Death Row Inmate
May Be Exonerated
The court had ruled in 2006 that state prosecutors
improperly withheld evidence about their
star witness that could have exonerated D'Ambrosio
at his 1989 trial.
(3/8/10,
CNN.com) - OH:
Ohio Proposes Lethal Injection
Change
The state filed papers in U.S. District
Court saying it has decided to switch from
a three-drug cocktail to a single injection
of thiopental sodium into a vein. A separate
two-drug muscle injection will be available
as a backup. The decision comes two months
after an Ohio death row inmate walked away
from an unsuccessful execution and subsequent
executions were put on hold. (11/16/09, DPIC Update)
- OH:
New Revelations of Inmate's Struggles
During Botched Execution Attempt
More information is being reported about
the botched execution-attempt of Romell Broom
in Ohio. According to
the Associated Press, the correctional officers
encountered so much difficulty in finding
a suitable vein for the lethal injection
that, after an hour, Broom attempted to assist
them by moving on his side, sliding the rubber
tubing up and down his arm, and flexing his
fingers. A vein was found, but it collapsed
as the technicians inserted a saline solution.
Broom’s assistance did not help, and
he turned on his back and covered his face
with both hands. He appeared to be in distress
and wiped his eyes. (9/21/09, DPIC Update)
- OH:
Botched Execution Leads to One-Week
Reprieve
Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland on Tuesday gave
a death-row inmate a one-week reprieve
after authorities tried for hours to find
a vein to administer his lethal injection.
... "It appears ... that these efforts
have been going on now for almost two hours,
and that the execution team members have
evidently now taken a 'break.' " (9/15/09,
CNN.com)
- TN: Arbitrariness Shown in Different
Outcomes in Similar Murder Cases
Gaile Owens and Mary Winkler
are two women who committed similar crimes
under similar circumstances in Tennessee.
Both women suffered from abuse from the
spouses they killed, and both were examined
by the same psychologist, twenty years
apart. The psychologist said both women
suffered from battered woman's syndrome.
... One is now free and has
custody of her children. Owens is on death
row, awaiting execution by lethal injection.
(1/4/10, DPIC Update)
- TX:
Judge Rules Death Penalty Unconstitutional
Houston District Judge Kevin Fine granted
a pretrial motion in a capital case and
declared the death penalty in Texas unconstitutional.
Judge Fine said the state's law violates
a defendant’s right to due process
because of the risk of executing an innocent
person.
(3/8/10,
CNN.com)
- TX: Inmate Facing Execution Denied DNA
Testing
Henry Skinner is scheduled for execution
in Texas on February 24 despite the lack
of DNA testing of critical evidence from
the crime scene that could lead to his exoneration.
(2/8/10, DPIC Update)
- TX:
Texas Resists Family's Effort to Clear
Executed Man's Name
Two days before the Forensic Science Commission was to question Beyler in a public
forum, the governor replaced its chairman and two other members whose terms were
up. (11/9/09, CNN.com)
- TX:
Latest Death Row Exoneree is 139th Nationally
On October 28, 2009, Travis County, Texas,
prosecutors moved to dismiss all charges
against Michael Scott and Robert Springsteen,
who had been convicted in 2001 of the murder
of four teens in an Austin yogurt shop
in 1991. Springsteen had been sentenced
to death and Scott was sentenced to life
in prison.
... However, sophisticated DNA analysis of
evidence from the crime scene did not match
either defendant and the prosecution announced
it was not prepared to go to trial. (11/2/09, DPIC Update)
- TX: Governor Further Shakes Up Willingham
Investigation Panel
Gov. Rick Perry has further shaken up a
state panel that was set to review a report
concluding that a faulty arson investigation
led to a Texas inmate's execution.
(10/09, KrisTV.com) - TX:
No New Trial Despite Judge-Prosecutor
Affair
The highest court in Texas, the Court of
Criminal Appeal ruled September 16, 2009,
that Charles D. Hood, who is facing a death
sentence for murder, cannot have a new trial
despite a love affair between the judge and
the prosecutor during his trial. (9/21/09, DPIC Update)
- USA:
Debating the Cost of Capital Punishment
As cash-strapped states consider the high
cost of sentencing prisoners to death,
capital punishment has fallen on hard times.
In New Mexico, which voted to abolish the
death penalty last year, State Rep. Gail
Chasey (D., Albuquerque) specifically noted
the tax dollars that would be saved. “We
can put that money toward enhancing law
enforcement, public works, you name it,” she
said. In 2009, 10 other states considered
ending capital punishment. In New Jersey,
which halted executions in 2007, a commission
found that switching a single condemned
inmate’s sentence to life without
parole would save the state $1.3 million
in incarceration costs alone, because death-row
inmates receive special housing and security.
Repealing the death penalty in North Carolina,
where 169 prisoners are on death row, could
save that state $11 million a year in incarceration
costs and legal fees associated with the
extensive appeals process, according to
a study published in American Law and Economics
Review in December.
(1/31/10, Parade Magazine) - USA:
American Police Beat Reports "Death
Penalty Comes with a Hefty Price Tag"
A recent article in the American Police Beat
highlights the concerns that police chiefs
have with the costs and ineffectiveness of
capital punishment. The article notes, "The
problem, according to the police chiefs is
the fact that capital punishment is costing
states hundreds of millions of dollars for
relatively few executions and nothing in
the way of crime deterrence.
(1/11/10, DPIC Update)
- USA: Group Gives Up Death Penalty
Work
Last fall, the American Law Institute, which
created the intellectual framework for the
modern capital justice system almost 50 years
ago, pronounced its project a failure and
walked away from it. There were other important
death penalty developments last year: the
number of death sentences continued to fall,
Ohio switched to a single chemical for lethal
injections and New Mexico repealed its death
penalty entirely. But not one of them was
as significant as the institute’s move,
which represents a tectonic shift in legal
theory. (1/4/10, New York Times)
- USA:
More Innocence Network Exonerations in
2009
Twenty-seven people were exonerated and
released from prison this year, including
some who had been on death row, according
to a new report from The Innocence Project,
a national litigation and public policy
organization dedicated to exonerating wrongfully
convicted people. The 27 exonerees served
a combined 421 years in prison for crimes
they did not commit. (1/4/10, DPIC Update)
- USA:
Report Says Death Penalty Use Declining
Nationwide
Use of capital punishment by states
continues its steady decline, with fewer
death sentences handed down in 2009 than
any year since the death penalty was
reinstated by the Supreme Court in 1976. Year-end
report figures released Friday by
the Death Penalty Information Center
(DPIC) show 11 states are now considering
abolishing executions, with many legislators
citing high costs associated with incarcerating
and handling often decades-long appeals
by death row inmates. (12/18/09, CNN.com)
- USA: Bill to Protect Innocent Americans
from Execution
WASHINGTON – Distinguished legislators
today introduced the Effective Death Penalty
Appeals Act (H.R. 3986), which would ensure
that death row inmates have the opportunity
to present newly discovered evidence of
innocence. Under current law, an inmate
on death row can be stranded with no procedural
options to appeal a conviction, even if
there is compelling new evidence that he
or she is innocent.
(11/3/09, Rep. Hank Johnson)
- USA:
Leading Law Group Withdraws Model Death
Penalty Laws Because System is Unfixable
The Council of the American Law Institute
(ALI) recently voted to withdraw a section
of its Model Penal Code concerned with capital
punishment because of the "current intractable
institutional and structural obstacles to
ensuring a minimally adequate system for
administering capital punishment."
(11/2/09, DPIC Update)
- USA:
American Law Institute Withdraws Support
of Capital Punishment
The Institute withdraws Section 210.6 of the Model Penal Code in light of the
current intractable institutional and structural obstacles to ensuring a minimally
adequate system for administering capital punishment. (10/23/09, ALI)
- USA: Study Says States Can't Afford
Death Penalty
This is according to a new report that
concludes that states are wasting millions
on an inefficient death penalty system,
diverting scarce funds from other anti-crime
and law enforcement programs. ... A privately
conducted poll of 500 police chiefs released
with the report found the death penalty
ranked last among their priorities for
reducing violent crime. Only 1 percent
found it to the best way to achieve that
goal. Adding police officers ranked first.
... The Death Penalty Information Center
study found that death penalty costs can
average $10 million more per year per state
than life sentences. Increased costs include
higher security needs and guaranteed access
to an often lengthy pardon and appellate
process. ... Eleven state legislatures
have considered repealing the death penalty
this year. New Mexico has banned it, and
Maryland has narrowed the criteria under
which it can be used. Read the executive
summary or the full
report. (10/20/09, CNN.com)
- USA: Gallup Poll: Support for Death Penalty
Remains Near 25-Year Low
The latest Gallup Poll on the death penalty
shows 65% of Americans support the death
penalty, significantly lower than the 80%
support recorded in 1994 and near the lowest
support of 64% in the past 25 years recorded
last year. Only 57% believe the death penalty
is fairly applied, and 59% of Americans believe
that an innocent person has been executed
in the last five years. Gallup reported that
support for the death penalty is lower if
Americans are offered an explicit alternative,
such as life imprisonment with absolutely
no possibility of parole.
(10/19/09, DPIC Update)
- USA: Vietnam Vet on Death Row Receives
His Medals and Waits for Execution
He suffers from mental illness and post-traumatic
stress disorder. Through the intervention
of a therapist who also served in Vietnam,
it was learned that Davis was entitled to
a Purple Heart and other medals earned during
his service. The army agreed to award him
the medals and the prison eventually agreed
to let him receive them.
(9/14/09, DPIC Update)
- VA:
Anatomy of an Execution
A new book authored by Todd Peppers and
Laura Trevvett Anderson, "Anatomy
of An Execution," follows the story
of Douglas Christopher Thomas, a juvenile
offender who was executed in Virginia in
2000. ... The authors explore a variety
of death penalty issues surrounding the
case, including the quality of court-appointed
counsel, conditions on death row, and the
reasons for excluding the execution of
juveniles. (1/11/10, DPIC Update)
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