The StandDown Texas Project

Moratorium in Ohio Extended

"Moratorium on Ohio’s executions extended until January," is by Alan Johnson for the Columbus Dispatch.

All three Ohio executions scheduled this year have been postponed by a federal judge because of the continuing controversy over lethal injection drugs.

U.S. District Judge Gregory L. Frost extended his previous moratorium on executions, which would have expired Friday. Frost’s new order, issued last Friday, pushes the moratorium until Jan. 15.

That forces the postponement of the schedule executions of Ronald Phillips of Summit County on Sept. 18, Raymond Tibbets of Hamilton County on Oct. 15, and Gregory Lott of Cuyahoga County on Nov. 19. They will all have to be rescheduled by the Ohio Supreme Court.

Frost issued the delay “in light of the continuing need for discovery and necessary preparations related to the adoption and implementation of the new execution protocol...The parties shall continue to work together to coordinate efforts so that the court can set necessary deadlines following expiration of the stay.”

"Judge extends moratorium on Ohio executions,"is the AP report, via WTAM-AM.

A federal judge has extended a months-long moratorium on executions in Ohio as debate over the state's new two-drug combination continues.

The moratorium was to end this week. the new order extends it through Jan. 15.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer reports, "Ohio's death-penalty moratorium extended until next January," by Jeremy Pelzer.

Ohio's new execution protocol calls for 50 mg each of midazolam and hydromorphone, the same dosage of the drugs employed in a nearly two-hour-long execution in Arizona last month.

Frost issued an order Friday extending the moratorium "in light of the continuing need for discovery and necessary preparations related to the adoption and implementation of the new execution protocol."

Earlier coverage of the Ohio moratorium begins a the link.

Supreme Court Roundup

The Philadelphia Inquirer reports, "Supreme Court refuses to reinstate Abu-Jamal death sentence."  It's by Joseph A. Slobodzian.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to hear a petition by the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office seeking to reinstate the death penalty against Mumia Abu-Jamal.

The ruling in the case of Abu-Jamal - convicted of murder in the 1981 shooting of Philadelphia Police Officer Daniel Faulkner - was one of more than 250 appeals summarily rejected by the high court without comment. It means that, unless the District Attorney's Office decides to conduct a new sentencing hearing, Abu-Jamal, 57, will continue serving a life sentence with no chance of parole.

Tasha Jamerson, spokeswoman for District Attorney Seth Williams, said the prosecutor's office would not comment on the ruling while its appeals unit decides what to do next.

The prosecutor's unsuccessful appeal to the nation's highest court followed a decision in April by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in Philadelphia.

The Third Circuit reaffirmed its ruling that Abu-Jamal's sentencing hearing was unfair, giving the District Attorney's Office the choice of conducting a new death-penalty hearing or letting Abu-Jamal serve life.

And:

Regardless of the district attorney's decision on a sentencing hearing, pending appeals by Abu-Jamal on other issues in federal and state appeals courts could take years to resolve.

Abu-Jamal is housed at the state prison in Greene County in Western Pennsylvania, where he has achieved the distinction of living longer on death row than any other of the state's 208 condemned men and women.

David G. Savage writes, "Supreme Court refuses to restore death penalty in Abu-Jamal case," for the Tribune Washington Bureau

The Supreme Court refused to revisit one of the nation's most controversial and racially charged death-penalty cases, leaving it to a Philadelphia prosecutor to decide whether to convene a jury and seek a new death sentence against Mumia Abu-Jamal for murdering a police officer in 1981.

Without comment, the justices turned down an appeal from Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams, who urged the high court to restore a death sentence for the former Black Panther, author and radio reporter.

The action left in place rulings that upheld Abu-Jamal's murder conviction, but set aside the death penalty. A federal judge and the U.S. court of appeals in Philadelphia had set aside the death sentence on the grounds that the instructions to his jury were flawed and unclear.

The district attorney now has a choice. He could convene a new jury to seek another death sentence for Abu-Jamal, or he could let him remain in prison for life under the terms of his murder conviction. A spokeswoman for Williams said the district attorney would take some time to make a decision.

And:

In other action Tuesday:

• The court refused to overturn a decision to throw out the confession of a man convicted of killing nine people at a Buddhist temple near Phoenix as a juvenile. Prosecutors plan to seek a retrial of Jonathan Doody, who had been convicted of the slayings of six priests, a nun and two helpers during a robbery at the temple. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals threw out the conviction, saying his Miranda warnings were inadequate.

The NAACP Legal Defense Fund, which represents Abu-Jamal issued a statement, "United States Supreme Court Rejects Appeal from Philadelphia DA’s Office.  Mumia Abu-Jamal’s Death Sentence is Unconstitutional."  Here's an excerpt:

The Court’s decision brings to an end nearly thirty years of litigation over the fairness of the sentencing hearing that resulted in Mr. Abu-Jamal’s being condemned to death.  Mr. Abu-Jamal will be automatically sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole unless the District Attorney elects to seek another death sentence from a new jury.

The NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF) and Professor Judith Ritter of Widener Law School represent Mr. Abu-Jamal in the appeal of his conviction and death sentence for the 1981 murder of a police officer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  The Supreme Court’s decision marks the fourth time that the federal courts have found that Mr. Abu-Jamal’s sentencing jury was misled about the constitutionally mandated process for considering evidence supporting a life sentence.

The AP report on the Golden Temple case is, "Retrial planned in temple killings," by Jacques Billeaud.

Prosecutors plan to seek a retrial for a man whose conviction for killing nine people at a Buddhist temple was overturned after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to reverse a decision that threw out his confession.

Jerry Cobb, a spokesman for the Maricopa County Attorney's Office, said Tuesday that prosecutors will file charges in the coming days against Jonathan Doody in the 1991 killings at the Wat Promkunaram temple west of Phoenix. Cobb said it will take some time to prepare the charges.

"This is a 20-year-old case," Cobb said. "We have to get our arms around it."

The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to hear an appeal by Arizona officials who asked for a re-examination of a lower court's decision to throw out Doody's confession.

Doody was convicted of the slayings of six priests, a nun and two helpers during a robbery at the temple. The bodies were found arranged in a circle, and all had been shot in the head.

Doody, who was 17 at the time of the killings, was sentenced to 281 years in prison after he was convicted of murder, armed robbery and other charges in the slayings. He maintained that he's innocent.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found Doody's Miranda warnings were inadequate and threw out the conviction, ruling the confession was involuntary, partly because he wasn't properly read his rights by the officers interrogating him.

Earlier coverage of Mumia Abu-Jamal and the Jonathan Doody cases begins at the links.

9th Circuit Miranda Case

The Recorder, Law.com California paper, reports, "Ninth Circuit Reaffirms Habeas Relief After High Court Reversal."  It's written by Ginny LaRoe.

The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals today refused to back off its decision to grant habeas relief for a teenage mass murderer despite being told to reconsider by the Supreme Court. For the second time, a split en banc panel held that the suspect was improperly informed of his Miranda rights and that his confession was not voluntary.

Despite direction from the Supreme Court to review that holding in light of a recent Miranda-related opinion, Florida v. Powell, the majority again held that 17-year-old Johnathan Doody's advisement of rights "completely obfuscated the core precepts of Miranda," and that the "relentless overnight questioning of a sleep-deprived teenager by a tag team of officers overbore the will of that teen, rendering his confession involuntary."

Doody was convicted of taking part in the murder of nine people, including six monks, whose bodies were found face down in a circle, each with a bullet to the head, in a Buddhist temple in Arizona in 1991.

In a concurrence, Chief Judge Alex Kozinski explained that Powell doesn't change the analysis, rather it "reaffirms the standard for determining Miranda compliance that its prior cases had established." And the facts in Powell are different in that the High Court said any misleading Miranda statement was cured by a final warning that the suspect had a "right to use any of these rights at any time."

"Not so here," Kozinski wrote in Doody v. Ryan. "The Miranda warnings Doody was given were affirmatively misleading."

Enter Judge Richard Tallman and his colleagues in dissent. They began by noting the "Supreme Court has repeatedly told us to adhere to the highly deferential standard of review of the state court judgments" required under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act in federal habeas cases.

And:

In response, Judge Johnnie Rawlinson colorfully wrote for the majority in the first opinion, and left intact today: "The dissent would prefer that we simply parrot the findings made during the state court proceedings and call it a day. However, if we succumb to the temptation to abdicate our responsibility on habeas review, we might as well get ourselves a big, fat rubber stamp, pucker up, and kiss The Great Writ good-bye."

"9th Circuit rules, for third time, that Thai teen's confession in slayings was invalid," by Carol J. Williams for the Los Angeles Times.

The appeals court ruled that Maricopa County sheriff's deputies distorted their reading of Doody's Miranda rights, telling him he was entitled to an attorney only if he had committed a crime.

The 8-3 ruling by a full panel of the western appeals court was identical to one the judges issued last year, deeming Doody's confession to the killings after 13 hours of interrogation involuntary and inadmissible in any subsequent trial of the now-36-year-old defendant.

Arizona authorities had appealed the 9th Circuit's ruling last year to the Supreme Court, which sent the case back with an order to reconsider whether the confession should be judged as voluntary in light of a similar case from Florida in which the high court ruled that a suspect's confession was valid.

Wednesday's ruling said the 9th Circuit judges reviewed the high court's position in Florida vs. Powell, about a criminal defendant's right to have an attorney present during interrogation, but still concluded that Doody's rights were violated. The appeals court ordered Arizona authorities to free him or try him again for the killings without the confession.

Courthouse News Service reports, "Conviction for Temple Murders Stays Vacated."  It's written by Barbara Leonard.

A full panel of the 9th Circuit on Wednesday reaffirmed its 2010 decision to vacate the conviction of a man who confessed as a teen to participating in the 1991 murders of nine people, including six Buddhist monks, at an Arizona temple.

In 67-page decision, which prefaces a nine-page concurrence from Chief Judge Alex Kozinski and a 39-page dissent on behalf of three judges, the court notes that its original en banc panel in Seattle "held that nearly thirteen hours of relentless overnight questioning of a sleep-deprived teenager by a tag team of officers overbore the will of that teen, rendering his confession involuntary."

At 113 pages in total, Wednesday's decision just tops the 106-page ruling from the 8-3 court in February 2010.

Johnathan Doody was a 17-year-old high-school student when he confessed to participating in the 1991 murders at the Wat Promkunaram Buddhist Temple near Phoenix. The victims, including six Buddhist monks, two nuns and a novice, were found lying face-down in a circle, each shot in the head.

Doody was arrested and later convicted for all nine murders. He was sentenced to 281 years in prison. Another minor, Alessandro Garcia, testified against Doody and was also convicted as an accomplice after pleading guilty. Garcia was sentenced to 271 years.

A three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit reversed the District Court's denial of Doody's habeas petition in 2008, and the full court ruled that Doody deserved a new trial because he was prejudiced by extensive interrogation and inadequate Miranda warnings.