death penalty

Dan Kane writes a good, clear story today about what's at stake as the NC Supreme Court hears arguments about the role of doctors in killing criminals.

The state's highest court will hear legal arguments today that could break the two-year stalemate on executions in North Carolina -- or extend the de facto moratorium. The N.C. Medical Board has effectively shut down the executions, which are done by lethal injection, by prohibiting doctors from taking part. The board contends such participation violates the profession's mission to preserve life.

Howdy, BlueNC. DW is again asking for your help in expanding a recent blog post. DW is looking for information about where the major party candidates for president and vice president stand on capital punishment. What we have so far is below.

DW appreciates all links, videos, blogs, leads, ideas, and irate ramblings.

North Carolina death row exoneree Glen Edward Chapman is profiled in this month's Details magazine. The article is amazing; I have nothing to add, I just wanted everyone at BlueNC to have the chance to read it. Also, there are stunning photographs which do not appear in the online version of the article, so I encourage people to pick up a print copy at their local newsstand.

From the North Carolina Coalition for a Moratorium:

Partners,

We are in a final push to have a vote on the NC Racial Justice Act in the North Carolina Senate. Here's how you can help:

1. Follow the link to write a personal email to each Democratic Senator in the legislature. Tell them the people of North Carolina deserve a vote on this critical legislation. Click here.
2. Forward this email to all your friends.

**YOU MUST ACT NOW AS THE LEGISLATIVE SESSION WILL END ON THURSDAY.**

North Carolina death row inmate Guy Tobias LeGrande has been found incompetent to be executed under both state law and the 8th Amendment of the United States Constitution.

After the jump, read a May 2007 post from my blog with more about Mr. LeGrande's mental state.

In a rare move, the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals (which handles cases from North and South Carolina, as well as Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia) granted relief to death row inmate Dr. William Gray[FN] earlier this week. The Court said that Gray, who was sentenced to die for the 1992 murder of his wife in Lenoir County, should receive a new sentencing hearing because his lawyers failed to investigate and present considerable evidence that Gray was severely mentally ill.

Dr. Gray had been exhibiting bizarre behavior for months before he shot his wife. After he was arrested, he was kept in the state mental hospital for five weeks. Once Dr. Gray returned to the jail, he had to be kept in the juvenile cell block for his own safety. Everyone around him in the months before and after the murder noticed that Gray had made a precipitous decline into mental illness, but his attorneys – neither of whom had tried a capital case before - presented no such evidence to the jury. Now William Gray has a second chance.

The NC Governor's race is crucial to criminal justice politics in
> North Carolina since the elected Governor has the power to issue
> clemency when an execution is scheduled, grant a pardon to a
> wrongfully convicted exoneree and he/she can ultimately declare an
> official moratorium on executions. Regardless of who wins the NC
> Governor's races tomorrow in either party, please call each winner
> and say the following:

Levon "Bo" Jones, recently released after serving over a decade for a murder he did not commit, held a press conference yesterday in Raleigh. Jones' attorneys spoke first. Ernest "Buddy" Conner told those gathered how the police failed to dust for fingerprints at the scene and eventually lost what little physical evidence they gathered. He also spoke of the State's star witness, Lovely Lorden, who unbeknownst to Jones' trial attorneys was a paid, professional snitch who changed her story several times before trial. Conner noted that this injustice could have been corrected years earlier had North Carolina state courts bothered to consider Jones' appeals.

For the second time in two months, an innocent man is being released from North Carolina's death row. Levon "Bo" Jones spent 13 years on death row after being convicted of the 1987 murder of Leamon Grady. Federal judge Terrence Boyle vacated Jones' conviction and death sentence in 2006 after finding that Jones' trial attorneys "utterly failed" to investigate the crime. (Read the Order here.) Duplin County District Attorney Dewey Hudson, who tried Jones in 1993, vowed to retry the case. This week Hudson was forced to admit that he has no evidence against Jones, and is expected to ask the court to release Jones today.

Help me out, BlueNC, font of information that you are.

I'm looking to expand my most recent blog post.

I know that Richard Moore "believe[s] that there is Biblical evil that lives among us, and for some crimes you give up the right to be here on Earth with the rest of us," (source) and that Beverly Perdue "support[s] capital punishment as an option, but...also favor[s] the current moratorium [then] in place while constitutional issues are being studied." (source)

How do your (least) favorite candidates feel about the death penalty?

A bittersweet story today in the News and Observer is guaranteed to ratchet up debate in the gubernatorial race. Here's my take on where things stand.

McCrory: No moratorium.
In his continuing lurch toward the extremist right wing base of Jack Hawke's shrinking Republican Party in North Carolina, Myers Park Pat McCrory insists that there be no moratorium on the death penalty. Despite mountains of evidence that capital punishment is pretty much a stacked deck against poor people and blacks, McCrory stands with a straight face in front of his white Republican donors and says he will oppose ANY moratorium on the death penalty. It's all part of his plan for "safety and security," unless you happen to be a poor, black man like Glen Chapman.

Richard Moore: No moratorium.
His reasons may be different, but Richard Moore comes down in the same place as McCrory. Moore cites his time as a federal prosecutor, saying that he believes it is necessary for some crimes.

"I do believe in capital punishment," he said. "I do believe that there is biblical evil that lives among us and for some crimes you give up the right to be here on the Earth with the rest of us."

In the summer of 1990, Minh and Linda Rogers were shot to death while working at their family-owned grocery in rural Gates County, North Carolina. Some money was taken. Sixteen year-old Linda was raped. The next year, Jerry Wayne Conner was tried and sentenced to death for the murders. His sentence was overturned on appeal, but after a re-sentencing hearing in 1995, Mr. Conner was again sentenced to die. In May of 2006, Conner came within 36 hours of execution before the North Carolina Supreme Court intervened. The Court didn't want Jerry Conner to be killed until he had the chance to apply modern DNA technology to the semen found on Linda Rogers' body. Unfortunately, the semen sample was too degraded to produce conclusive results.

What's going on here?

As discussed in a prior post, Floyd Brown, an innocent mentally retarded man, has been locked up for 14 years without a trial. He has been held at the state mental hospital since 1993 in connection with the murder of an Anson County woman. Until the Supreme Court banned the execution of the mentally retarded, he was facing a death sentence. Two days ago, his attorneys filed a petition that could finally win him his freedom. Here's how you can help.