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News
Colorado News Archive from 2008
- Archive
of Colorado News
See all CADP News links and excerpts
from the years 2000 | 2001 | 2002
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- Capital
Punishment in Colorado
Colorado Department of Corrections Web
site. Includes capital punishment history,
current death row roster and photos, location
of death row and execution room, security,
activities, inmate uniforms, death row
tenure, incarceration costs, execution
day, other facts, and state archives.
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Death Row
CADP's information and links about prisoners
now on Colorado's death row.
- Colorado's
Death Row Appeals and Pending Capital
Cases
Information on clients, lawyers, places,
and dates.
- Colorado
General Assembly
News stories and links from the 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 |
2007 |
2008 Colorado legislative sessions.
- Sir
Mario Owens Sentenced to Death by Lethal
Injection
Sir Mario Owens was sentenced to death today for the murders of Javad Marshall-Fields
and his fiancée, Vivian Wolfe. Judge Gerald Rafferty ordered that Owens,
23, be put to death by lethal injection in March 2009, but the sentence must
be reviewed by the Colorado Supreme Court. Owens will be the second person on
the state's death row. Owens didn't speak during the court procedure, nor did
his defense team. (12/8/08, The Denver Post)
- Judges
Censured in Masters Case
The Colorado Supreme Court on Tuesday
censured two Larimer County judges for
missteps in the now-overturned 1999 murder
conviction of Tim Masters. Judges Terry
Gilmore and Jolene Blair, who were prosecutors
in the case, were both publicly admonished
for failing to turn over important evidence
to the attorneys who defended Masters ...
Gilmore and Blair violated Colorado's Rules
of Professional Conduct in Masters' prosecution
by not assuring that all evidence that
might show Masters was not guilty was
turned over to the defense, according
to the agreement and affidavit that outlined
their admission of misconduct in the
case. (9/10/08, Rocky Mountain News)
- Ruling Clears Way for Death Penalty in
Dragging Death
Jose Rubi-Nava is not mentally retarded,
according to documents released today, and
that clears the way for the death penalty
if he is convicted in the dragging death
of his girlfriend. (8/23/08, The Denver Post)
- Boulder DA Won't Seek Death in Chase
Case
The Chilean native accused of sexually
assaulting and killing a college student
in a Boulder alley more than 10 years ago
will not face the death penalty, according
to Boulder County District Attorney Mary
Lacy. ... No one in Boulder County has
ever been sentenced to death, but just
the possibility of a death sentence has
caused controversy in Diego Olmos Alcalde’s
native Chile. The country does not have
the death penalty, and Chilean media have
covered that aspect of the case extensively.
(8/22/08, The Camera)
- Robert Ray Trial Starts September 22nd
- Public Invited
Opening statements in
the Robert
Keith Ray death penalty trial
will be on September 22, 2008. The trial
will continue for approximately 10 weeks.
CADP members, and other citizens who are
against executions, are invited to attend
the trial and make known their opposition
to the death penalty. Just show up and
sit on the defendant's side of the courtroom. "It
would sure be nice if some of the membership
could show up from time to time during
the trial to watch the proceedings,"
said an attorney. "Let
the DA and the general public know, by
your presence (no overt protest during
trial, please), that there is significant
opposition to this barbaric penalty.
You will probably learn something in
the process." The trial is in Courtroom
201 of the Arapahoe County courthouse,
which is located at 7325 S. Potomac St.
in Centennial, Colorado. (7/19/08, CADP)
- Sir
Mario Owens Gets Colorado Death Penalty
Sir Mario Owens, a high school dropout
who killed an engaged couple days before
the man was scheduled to testify against
Owens, was sentenced to death today on
two counts of murder. A jury of six men
and six women deliberated about six hours
before announcing its unanimous verdict
around 4:45 p.m. Owens showed no reaction
when the verdicts were read. (6/16/08, Rocky
Mountain News)
- Colorado Voters Would Rather Spend Money
on Cold Cases than on Death Penalty
A recent
Colorado poll conducted by RBI Strategies
and Research found that 63% of citizens
believe that money spent on the death penalty
would be better used to close unsolved
murder cases. ... Forty-three percent were
strongly in favor of such a change in spending
and another 20% somewhat in favor. Only
27% opposed such a redirection of funds.
Interestingly, voters were generally against
cutting money from the law enforcement
budget to pursue cold cases, but were in
favor of cutting the money from death penalty
prosecutions. (4/14/08, DPIC Update)
- Judge
Tosses Arapahoe DA from Death Penalty
Case
A district judge has barred the office
of Arapahoe County District Attorney
Carol Chambers from prosecuting the death
penalty case against Alejandro Perez.
The order by Lincoln County District
Judge Stanley Brinkley also disqualified
the capital crimes unit of the attorney
general's office from the case. Brinkley
took the action because of conflicts
of interest on the part of prosecutors
who previously represented Perez or witnesses
in other cases before the current murder
case was filed. In his order, signed
today, the judge said the two offices
violated professional ethical rules.
He also cited Chambers for violating
state funding laws in billing the Department
of Corrections for staff salaries for
work in the case. (4/8/08, Rocky Mountain
News)
- David
Wymore Film Showing April 10th and
16th
Coloradans Against the Death
Penalty has joined with other progressive
groups to cosponsor "The Life
Penalty," a
feature length documentary film about
David Wymore and the Colorado Method
of Jury Selection, which just had its
world premiere at the Boulder International
Film Festival. The film is for general
audiences as well as attorneys, and for
attorneys attending 2 CLE credits have
been applied for. See
theater information and times. Limited
Seating - reservations strongly recommended.
To see a preview and order your tickets
online please visit: www.TheLifePenalty.com.
- Inmates Waitin' Around to Die
These days the only supermax inmate awaiting
execution is Nathan Dunlap, who killed
four people at an Aurora Chuck E. Cheese
in 1993. That makes Colorado's death house
just about the loneliest in the nation — tied
with New Mexico, and with one more occupant
than New Hampshire, which in theory has
a death penalty but no one sentenced to
death. But Dunlap may soon get some company,
at least in spirit. In the past two years
prosecutors have announced plans to seek
the death penalty in seven pending homicide
cases. (2/28/08, Westword)
- Arapahoe County DA Charges Death-Penalty
Fees to the State
Some prosecutors regard the pursuit of the
death penalty in the Centennial State as
an exercise in futility. ... Then there's
Carol Chambers, the maverick district attorney
of the 18th Judicial District, which includes
Arapahoe, Douglas, Elbert and Lincoln counties.
Her office is pursuing six of the seven capital
murder cases now under way in Colorado. The
crusade has drawn heat from death-penalty
opponents, but it's also attracting scrutiny
from the state legislature.
Using a 130-year-old statute that requires
the Colorado Department of Corrections to
reimburse counties for prosecuting crimes
committed inside state prisons, Chambers
has found an unusual way to pay for half
of her death-penalty cases. She's billed
the DOC hundreds of thousands of dollars
in recent months, effectively shifting the
cost of trying to execute three inmates from
her county-funded budget to Colorado coffers.
(2/28/08, Westword)
- New
Appeal Filed For Man On Death Row
The man sentenced to die for killing
four people at a Chuck E. Cheese's restaurant
in Aurora in 1993 is now asking a federal
judge in Denver to spare his life. In
a 755-page motion filed in U.S. District
Court in Denver, attorneys for Nathan
Dunlap list 41 reasons his death
sentence should be thrown out, including
that his original defense attorneys were
ineffective. The appeal comes one month
after the U.S. Supreme Court refused
to hear the case, and after the Colorado
Supreme Court upheld the conviction and
sentence for the third time. Dunlap,
now 33 and the only person on Colorado's
death row, was convicted in 1996 of first-degree
murder for the deaths of restaurant employees.
(2/21/08, Rocky Mountain News)
- ACLU: Take Death Penalty Off Table
Civil-liberties advocates are urging Boulder
County District Attorney Mary Lacy to declare
that the death penalty is "off the
table" for a man suspected of killing
University of Colorado senior Susannah
Chase. ... Judd Golden, director of the Boulder
County chapter of the American Civil Liberties
Union, said in a letter sent to Lacy on Friday
that his organization "opposes the death
penalty in all situations" and that
capital punishment is "the ultimate
denial of civil liberties." (2/9/08,
The Camera)
- Boulder DA Weighs Death Penalty in 1977
Susannah Chase Slaying
Boulder County District Attorney Mary
Lacy is researching whether she can legally
pursue the death penalty for a man arrested
Sunday on suspicion of murdering University
of Colorado senior Susannah Chase a decade
ago. Lacy said that because Diego Olmos
Alcalde, 38, must be prosecuted under the
laws that applied when Chase was killed
in 1997 -- and the death-penalty statute
in place at the time was ruled unconstitutional
in 2002 -- her office is researching whether
death is a sentencing option in the case.
(1/31/08, The Camera)
- Chileans
"Don't Like" Death Penalty in 1977 Chase
Case
News of Diego Olmos Alcalde's
arrest in the decade-old slaying of University
of Colorado student Susannah Chase has
made big headlines in his native Chile,
largely because convicted killers can be
sentenced to death in Colorado.
... "We don't have the death penalty
in Chile," Santa Maria said. "We
don't have it, and we don't like it." (1/31/08,
The Camera)
- Masters' Attorney a Master Public Defender
David Wymore made his career as a public
defender keeping his clients from paying
with their lives for the crimes of which
they were accused. So when the longtime Boulder
resident and University of Colorado law
school alumnus retired in 2004, he revived
a case involving a 15-year-old Fort Collins
boy convicted of murdering a clothes-shop
manager. That boy, Timothy Masters, was exonerated
last week and set free after being in prison
for a decade.
... Wymore said if Masters' had been
a death-penalty case, he would have been
executed by now. (1/30/08, The Camera)
- Colorado DA Urges Release
After spending almost a decade in prison
for murder, Tim Masters could be released
as soon as Tuesday after special prosecutors
who were assigned to examine his case announced
Friday that newly discovered DNA evidence
could have altered the outcome of his trial.
(1/19/08, The Denver Post)
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