Post by SoulTrainOz on Jun 25, 2006 20:44:10 GMT -5
A U.S. Supreme Court ruling earlier this month that opened the door to challenging lethal injections has given renewed hope to condemned prisoners facing execution.
It remains unclear whether the opinion, written by Justice Anthony Kennedy, will play a significant role in the cases of Waco death row inmates Billie Wayne Coble and Michael Dewayne Johnson, who have execution dates set in August and October, respectively.
The Supreme Court ruled that inmates can challenge the method by which most states execute prisoners on the grounds that the chemicals used in lethal injections cause unnecessary pain and violate their Eighth Amendment rights against cruel and unusual punishment.
The court ruled that those challenges can be brought in the form of civil rights lawsuits, even after prisoners have exhausted their regular state and federal appeals.
The decision delayed the execution of Clarence Hill, a 47-year-old Florida death row inmate convicted of murdering a policeman in 1983. Hill was strapped down in the execution chamber with tubes in his arms when the Supreme Court halted his execution in January.
Although the court said the inmates can file the special appeals, Kennedy wrote that they will not always be entitled to stays of execution.
"Both the state and the victims of crime have an important interest in the timely enforcement of a sentence," Kennedy wrote in the June 12 opinion.
The ruling does not address whether the method of lethal injection violated the U.S. Constitution.
"It is a rapidly developing question of law which we are studying
carefully," said Waco attorney Greg White, who represents Michael Johnson.
Johnson is set to be executed Oct. 19 for the September 1995 shooting death of Jeff Wetterman at the Wetterman family convenience store in Lorena.
White, who is preparing to file Johnson's next appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court before a July 11 deadline, said he is "not prepared to say" how the ruling might affect Johnson's case or if he plans to challenge the constitutionality of the execution process.
Richard Ellis, an attorney from Mill Valley, Calif., who represents Coble, did not return messages left at his office during the past week. Coble was convicted of the April 1990 shooting deaths of his estranged wife's brother, Waco police Sgt. Bobby Vicha, and her parents, Robert and Zelda Vicha. His execution date is Aug. 30.
White called the opinion "somewhat significant" because it offers another avenue to challenge the death penalty that is not necessarily encumbered by the "many limitations" associated with the normal appellate process.
McLennan County District Attorney John Segrest said he expects defense attorneys and anti-death penalty forces to rally behind the Supreme Court opinion and rush to court with civil rights lawsuits.
"We recognize that people will try to use this as a way to delay their execution, and that is not necessarily going to happen," Segrest said. "Just because you file a lawsuit, that doesn't mean that you automatically get a stay of execution. You have to cross that threshold and prove that your claims have merit."
Jerry Strickland, a spokesman for the Texas Attorney General's Office, which represents the state in federal death penalty appeals, said Lamont Reese, who was executed Tuesday, filed such a claim and was denied.
"We will continue to address legal challenges that are brought before the courts," Strickland said.
Avoiding cruelty
Segrest said a death sentence does not necessarily meet the standard to prove that the punishment is cruel and unusual as defined by the Supreme Court.
"In a humane society, even a society that carries out the death penalty, you can do it in such a way as to not inflict needless pain and suffering. A civilized society says you must forfeit your life, but we are not going to do it in a way to make it cruel if we can do it otherwise," Segrest said.
Michelle Lyons, a Texas prison system spokeswoman, said there are no plans to change the execution protocol.
Prisoners are given 3 injections, and all 3 are delivered in a lethal
dose, Lyons said. The 1st chemical is a sedative called sodium thiopental. The 2nd is a muscle relaxer called pancuronium bromide, which collapses the lungs and diaphragm. The third, potassium chloride, stops the heart.
Death penalty opponents argue that the second chemical causes pain that is masked by the delivery of the 1st chemical.
"The only reference that I have personally seen to the chemicals has been inmates who have referenced that they have a particular taste in their mouth," Lyons said. "They haven't said it is good or bad, they have just said they taste it."
In the 1972 Furman v. Georgia case, Supreme Court Justice William Brennan wrote, "There are . . . 4 principles by which we may determine whether a particular punishment is 'cruel and unusual.' "
--"The "essential predicate" is "that a punishment must not by its
severity be degrading to human dignity, especially torture."
--"A severe punishment that is obviously inflicted in wholly arbitrary fashion."
--"A severe punishment that is clearly and totally rejected throughout society."
--"A severe punishment that is patently unnecessary."
Texas has carried out 367 lethal injections since it resumed the death penalty in December 1982.
(source: Waco Tribune-Herald)
It remains unclear whether the opinion, written by Justice Anthony Kennedy, will play a significant role in the cases of Waco death row inmates Billie Wayne Coble and Michael Dewayne Johnson, who have execution dates set in August and October, respectively.
The Supreme Court ruled that inmates can challenge the method by which most states execute prisoners on the grounds that the chemicals used in lethal injections cause unnecessary pain and violate their Eighth Amendment rights against cruel and unusual punishment.
The court ruled that those challenges can be brought in the form of civil rights lawsuits, even after prisoners have exhausted their regular state and federal appeals.
The decision delayed the execution of Clarence Hill, a 47-year-old Florida death row inmate convicted of murdering a policeman in 1983. Hill was strapped down in the execution chamber with tubes in his arms when the Supreme Court halted his execution in January.
Although the court said the inmates can file the special appeals, Kennedy wrote that they will not always be entitled to stays of execution.
"Both the state and the victims of crime have an important interest in the timely enforcement of a sentence," Kennedy wrote in the June 12 opinion.
The ruling does not address whether the method of lethal injection violated the U.S. Constitution.
"It is a rapidly developing question of law which we are studying
carefully," said Waco attorney Greg White, who represents Michael Johnson.
Johnson is set to be executed Oct. 19 for the September 1995 shooting death of Jeff Wetterman at the Wetterman family convenience store in Lorena.
White, who is preparing to file Johnson's next appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court before a July 11 deadline, said he is "not prepared to say" how the ruling might affect Johnson's case or if he plans to challenge the constitutionality of the execution process.
Richard Ellis, an attorney from Mill Valley, Calif., who represents Coble, did not return messages left at his office during the past week. Coble was convicted of the April 1990 shooting deaths of his estranged wife's brother, Waco police Sgt. Bobby Vicha, and her parents, Robert and Zelda Vicha. His execution date is Aug. 30.
White called the opinion "somewhat significant" because it offers another avenue to challenge the death penalty that is not necessarily encumbered by the "many limitations" associated with the normal appellate process.
McLennan County District Attorney John Segrest said he expects defense attorneys and anti-death penalty forces to rally behind the Supreme Court opinion and rush to court with civil rights lawsuits.
"We recognize that people will try to use this as a way to delay their execution, and that is not necessarily going to happen," Segrest said. "Just because you file a lawsuit, that doesn't mean that you automatically get a stay of execution. You have to cross that threshold and prove that your claims have merit."
Jerry Strickland, a spokesman for the Texas Attorney General's Office, which represents the state in federal death penalty appeals, said Lamont Reese, who was executed Tuesday, filed such a claim and was denied.
"We will continue to address legal challenges that are brought before the courts," Strickland said.
Avoiding cruelty
Segrest said a death sentence does not necessarily meet the standard to prove that the punishment is cruel and unusual as defined by the Supreme Court.
"In a humane society, even a society that carries out the death penalty, you can do it in such a way as to not inflict needless pain and suffering. A civilized society says you must forfeit your life, but we are not going to do it in a way to make it cruel if we can do it otherwise," Segrest said.
Michelle Lyons, a Texas prison system spokeswoman, said there are no plans to change the execution protocol.
Prisoners are given 3 injections, and all 3 are delivered in a lethal
dose, Lyons said. The 1st chemical is a sedative called sodium thiopental. The 2nd is a muscle relaxer called pancuronium bromide, which collapses the lungs and diaphragm. The third, potassium chloride, stops the heart.
Death penalty opponents argue that the second chemical causes pain that is masked by the delivery of the 1st chemical.
"The only reference that I have personally seen to the chemicals has been inmates who have referenced that they have a particular taste in their mouth," Lyons said. "They haven't said it is good or bad, they have just said they taste it."
In the 1972 Furman v. Georgia case, Supreme Court Justice William Brennan wrote, "There are . . . 4 principles by which we may determine whether a particular punishment is 'cruel and unusual.' "
--"The "essential predicate" is "that a punishment must not by its
severity be degrading to human dignity, especially torture."
--"A severe punishment that is obviously inflicted in wholly arbitrary fashion."
--"A severe punishment that is clearly and totally rejected throughout society."
--"A severe punishment that is patently unnecessary."
Texas has carried out 367 lethal injections since it resumed the death penalty in December 1982.
(source: Waco Tribune-Herald)