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Criminal Law

Capital Defense Weekly

Covering Capital Defense
By Karl R. Keys, Esq.

Post Frequency: 17.8/day

Last Entry: March 28, 2011 at 23:29:51

new scholarship

Posted on August 11, 2008
I vaguely recall Doug B. swearing off coverage of the death penalty. Fortunately, he hasn’t. He beat us to the send button with coverage of “Cruel and Unequal Punishment,”a new piece on SSRN from Nita Farahany. This article argues Atkins and its progeny of categorical exemptions to the death penalty create and new and as of [...

This week’s warrants

Posted on August 10, 2008
Texas is scheduled to kill two people this week: Leon Dorsey, on Tuesday, and Michael Rodriguez, a volunteer.

Texas kills

Posted on August 07, 2008
Tongiht Texas killed Heliberto Chi. The Star-Telegram notes: Heliberto Chi, the native Honduran who shot an Arlington store manager in the back during an after-hours robbery in 2001, was executed Thursday evening after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a last-ditch appeal to spare his life...

Another showdown on the right to consul

Posted on August 07, 2008
Tonight Texas is scheduled to kill Heliberto Chi. From the Chronicle: Attorneys for an illegal immigrant from Honduras say his inability to get legal help from his government following his arrest for killing a Dallas-area store manager during a robbery should keep him from a scheduled trip to the Texas death chamber...

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Site comments

Posted on August 07, 2008
We appear to have fixed the comment spam issue and are reopening comments to the use of hyperlinks and more uses colourful language. My apologies for any inconvenience. We also have attempted to speed up the loading of the site by removing all ads from the site...

live bloggin the Maryland hearings

Posted on August 07, 2008
The Maryland hearings on the death penalty are recapped here.

NC high profile acquittal

Posted on August 07, 2008
Our friends in NC note: After spending nearly seven years behind bars, Cumberland County?s Joshua Ballard has been found not guilty of a 2001 double homicide. At his first trial in 2004, Ballard was found guilty and faced the death penalty. His conviction was overturned when the Court of Appeals ruled that Ballard was denied a [...

Life: a beautiful option Arkansas

Posted on August 07, 2008
In Arkansas: In a 4-3 vote, the Arkansas Parole Board recommended that Frank Williams’ death sentence be commuted to life without parole. The Board had received petitions for clemency from 13 state, national, and international organizations and developmental disabilities experts raising the prospect that Williams suffers from mental retardation as indicated by a series of [...

Medellin on hold from the SCOTUS

Posted on August 05, 2008
The SCOTUS is holding the execution with a stay appearing more and more likely as each moment passes. The death warrant expires at 12 pm local time, or 1 am EST: he U.S. Supreme Court tonight considered the appeal of Mexican-born condemned prisoner Jose Medellin as he faced execution in Huntsville...

Medellin update

Posted on August 05, 2008
via the SCOTUSBlog In what may be the last round of legal arguments on Texas? scheduled execution at 7 p.m. Tuesday of Jose Ernest Medellin, attorneys for the Mexican National told the Supreme Court that if he is put to death, ?the world will have every reason to question? the U...

you can’t make this stuff up

Posted on August 05, 2008
File under “cuz they just can’t kill’em fast enough in Texas” MISCELLANEOUS RULE 08-101 Procedures in Death Penalty Cases Involving Requests for Stay of Execution and Related Filings in Texas State Trial Courts and the Court of Criminal Appeals 1...

Texas kills

Posted on August 05, 2008
Texas Tuesday night, after a delay in his execution, killed Jose Medellin. Texas has executed Mexican-born condemned prisoner Jose Medellin for the rape and murder of two teenage girls 15 years ago. The state carried out the execution late Tuesday night after the U...

Stay lifted - Medellin

Posted on August 05, 2008
As expected, the Court lifted the stay in Medellin 5-4.

Banning stoning

Posted on August 05, 2008
Iran has temporarily suspended execution by stoning. BODY,.aolmailheader {font-size:10pt; color:black; font-family:Arial;} a.aolmailheader:link {color:blue; text-decoration:underline; font-weight:normal;} a.aolmailheader:visited {color:magenta; text-decoration:underline; font-weight:normal;} a...

Medellin update

Posted on August 04, 2008
The latest on Medellin from the AP and other sources Mexico braces for protests. United States braces for backlash. Court litigation is ongoing. Hope for new legislation highly unlikely to pass in time.

Sixth Circuit relief grant

Posted on August 04, 2008
SL&P notes: In Van Hook v. Anderson, available here, the Sixth Circuit reversed a decision by the district court and granted the habeas petition of Robert Van Hook, who was sentenced to death for a 1985 murder. The Circuit reversed the death sentence, finding ineffective assistance of counsel during the mitigation phase of Van Hook?s trial...

Criminal background checks, quickly

Posted on August 03, 2008
A new research tool is available online to do background checks. It isn’t 100%, however, it will let you quickly run a person should the need arise. Aim browser at criminalsearches.com

What’s new? Weekly edition running late

Posted on August 03, 2008
The weekly email edition will be out (hopefully) Monday night. My apologies for any inconvenience.

Equal respect & equal justice for the military

Posted on July 31, 2008
from CAAFLog A well placed source informs me that S.2052, the Equal Justice for United States Military Personnel Act of 2007, was held over today in the Senate Judiciary Committee. The bill, as discussed previously on CAAFlog here and here, co-sponsored by Senators Arlen Specter and Russ Feingold, will give the Supreme Court certiorari jurisdiction over [...

Texas kills

Posted on July 31, 2008
“Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. It is finished.” - the final words of Larry Davis Reuters notes Larry Davis, 40, was condemned to die for the murder of Michael Barrow in the Texas panhandle town of Amarillo. Barrow’s parents found his body in his home after he had been beaten and stabbed [...

More on Thomas Arthur’s stay

Posted on July 31, 2008
More on Tommy Arthur’s stay from the AP The Alabama Supreme Court postponed executing a man after an inmate claimed in an sworn statement to defense attorneys that he committed the murder that sent the condemned man to death row. Thomas Arthur received a third stay of execution in Alabama on Wednesday...

Alabama stay

Posted on July 30, 2008
The Alabama Supreme Court has stayed the execution of Thomas Arthur. more to follow.

Medellin legislative update

Posted on July 30, 2008
I’d like to join Stand Down -Texas and “urge readers to sign an online petition at this LINK to urge action by the House of Representatives. Jose Medellin is scheduled to be executed by Texas on August 5, in spite of calls from the United States Attorney General and Secretary of State, prominent Texans, and [...

costs overrun in California

Posted on July 30, 2008
The San Francisco Chronicle reports: The cost of new housing for San Quentin State Prison’s growing number of Death Row inmates will exceed estimates by nearly $40 million, and the compound could run out of space soon after it is completed, according to a state auditor’s report released Tuesday...

“DNA debacle in murder case”

Posted on July 30, 2008
from the AP: DNA from multiple people has been found on evidence in a 1990 double slaying, but it has not been tested against a man on Kentucky?s death row for the killings. A hat used as evidence in the case of Thomas Clyde Bowling had DNA from three people and a jacket had DNA from two, [...

California penalty phase relief grant

Posted on July 29, 2008
In People v. Lester Harland Wison, No. S089623 (Cal July 28, 2008), the California Supreme Court granted relief based on the removal of a juror during the penalty phase deliberations. The California Supreme Court overturned the death sentence in a Riverside County case Monday, saying a judge improperly dismissed a juror as the panel was considering [...

Military death penalty: execution approved, appeals apparently still left

Posted on July 28, 2008
President Bush today greenlighted the military to execute Army Pvt. Ronald A. Gray. For the first time in nearly half a century, a president has approved the execution of a member of the armed services. President Bush this morning approved the death penalty for a soldier from Fayetteville who was stationed at Fort Bragg...

email edition available

Posted on July 28, 2008
The email edition is now available. No favorable decisions are noted for the period this edition covers (from July 14 to July 21, 2008). One favorable development, however, is noted. Oklahoma Gov. Brad Henry commuted Kevin Young’s sentence to life Thursday...

Another exoneration brewing in NJ?

Posted on July 28, 2008
This new post at the the Innocence Project’s blop looks at a brewing murder exoneration in New Jersey. After two mistrials and a third trial that ended with a hung jury, Darrell Edwards was convicted of a 1995 Newark murder in his fourth trial...

stopping an execution for the good of the country?

Posted on July 28, 2008
Politics, and especially international politics, makes strange bedfellows. From the Dallas Morning News: [D]efense attorneys, and an unusual coalition of federal officials, including no less than the attorney general and secretary of state, say if his Aug...

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