Today's Philadelphia Inquirer reports, "Judge in Williams bid for execution stay orders sides to make their cases." It's by Joseph A. Slobodzian.
The Philadelphia judge who is hearing condemned killer Terrance
Williams' bid to stay his Oct. 3 execution has ordered lawyers to argue
their positions Tuesday.
The decision by Common Pleas Court Judge M. Teresa Sarmina followed four
hours of testimony Monday by Marc Draper, Williams' admitted accomplice
in the 1984 murder of Amos Norwood.
Draper, who is serving a life term after pleading guilty to
second-degree murder and testifying against Williams at trial in 1986,
told Sarmina that police pressured him to say Norwood's killing happened
during a robbery and not because Williams' rage at Norwood for sexual
abuse since he was 13.
In another development Monday, the state Board of Pardons announced it
would vote Thursday on whether to reconsider Williams' plea to commute
his death sentence to life without parole.
The five-person board, chaired by Lt. Gov. Jim Cawley, is scheduled to
meet at 9 a.m. in Harrisburg. If a majority votes yes, the board will
hear the case at 2:30 p.m.
On Sept. 17, the board voted, 3-2, for clemency. A unanimous vote is
needed for the nonbinding recommendation to go to Gov. Corbett.
Monday's testimony by Draper, 46, was key to Williams' effort to
persuade Sarmina to stay what would be the state's first execution since
1999.
"Truth becomes elusive in appeal of execution," by Mensah M. Dean for the Philadelphia Daily News.
A CONFESSED murderer whose hours of testimony on Monday were intended
to help sway a judge to stop the execution of Terrance Williams had to
explain why he lied on the stand decades ago and why he has appeared to
utter several new lies.
The shaky performance by Marc Draper, 46, set the stage for closing
arguments Tuesday morning in the evidentiary hearing before Common Pleas
Judge M. Teresa Sarmina.
Draper, incarcerated for 28 years of a life sentence after pleading
guilty to his role in the 1984 murder of Amos Norwood, 56, stuck to the
story he testified to when the hearing began last week: that Williams
initiated the killing out of rage at having been in a five-year sexual
relationship with Norwood.
"Judge calls for more evidence in hearing to stay execution of Terrance "Terry" Williams," is by Donald Gilliland for the Harrisburg Patriot-News.
Monday morning two boxes of 28-year-old police investigation records
were wheeled into a Philadelphia courtroom, and instantly the plot
thickened.
The second day of an emergency stay hearing in the execution of Terrance “Terry” Williams extended to three.
Williams was convicted of the 1984 bludgeoning death of Amos Norwood,
a 56-year-old man who was likely having sex with him. Williams is
slated to be executed on Oct. 3.
The primary witness in the case recently changed his story, claiming
he told police and prosecutors that “the homosexual relationship” was
the motive of the killing, but that they told him if he wanted leniency,
he had best say the killing was motivated by robbery, which he did.
The prosecutor at the time, current U.S. Attorney Andrea Foulkes, says he’s lying.
The witness, Marc Draper, currently serving life in prison for his role in the murder, says Foulkes is lying.
Who to believe?
Astonishingly, documentary evidence surfaced last week
that lends some credence to the convict’s story - enough evidence that
Philadelphia Common Pleas Court Judge M. Teresa Sarmina ordered the
police investigation records to be hauled out of storage for inspection.
"Pardons board may take second vote in death penalty case," by Karen Langley in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
The Pennsylvania Board of Pardons plans to meet Thursday to decide
whether it will reconsider its recommendation against clemency for
Terrance Williams ahead of his Oct. 3 execution.
After hearing
arguments that Williams deserves clemency because he had been sexually
abused by the man he murdered in 1984, as well as by other men, three of
the five members of the board voted earlier this month to recommend
that Gov. Tom Corbett grant clemency. Attorneys for Williams had urged
that his death sentence be commuted to life in prison. But such a
decision requires a unanimous vote by the board, so the 3-2 vote does
not allow Mr. Corbett to act.
After a request by the federal
defenders representing Williams, the board today agreed to meet at 9
a.m. Thursday in Harrisburg to decide whether it will hold a second
hearing. If a majority approves, the board will hear the case again that
afternoon.
The York Daily Record posts the AP filing, "Death row inmate Terrance Williams' stay of execution hearing to continue."
A Philadelphia judge
will hear summary arguments Tuesday on whether to halt the scheduled
execution of a man who killed two people in his teens.
The arguments follow testimony Monday from an accomplice who says he
lied at Terrance Williams' 1984 trial about the motive for the second
killing.
"Testimony wraps up in stay of execution hearing for convicted killer," at CNN.
Attorneys for a convicted killer will focus on a former prosecutor's
notes when they argue Tuesday their client should not die by lethal
injection in nine days.
No one disputes that Terrance Williams beat Amos Norwood to death with a tire iron in 1984 or that he should be in prison.
But the defense team says
information that Norwood had allegedly sexually abused Williams was
withheld from the trial, and his life should be spent in a cell.
"One of the strongest
pieces of our case it that, as we heard in court on Thursday for the
first time ever, that in the prosecutor's own file, in her own
handwriting, there was evidence that Mr. Norwood had been previously
accused of touching boys," attorney Shawn Nolan told CNN. "The
prosecutors have known about that evidence throughout the whole history
of this litigation."
The judge overseeing the
stay of execution hearing, M. Teresa Sarmina, referred last week to the
notes of Andrea Foulkes, who was the prosecutor in Williams' 1986 trial,
which showed Foulkes had heard about possible incidents of Norwood
abusing boys. The notes also referred to Norwood as a "john" for
Williams.
Williams' accomplice,
Marc Draper, continued his testimony Monday and prosecutors tried to
portray Williams as male prostitute rather than a victim of sexual
abuse.
"Williams appeal continues into second day," by Emma Jacobs for WHYY-FM NewsWorks.
Asked by the judge why he stood by statements for 26 years that he
now says are false, Draper said: "Looking back now it's almost
laughable. Going through the interrogation room, I was a sheep for
whatever they wanted me to do. I regret that. I'm almost ashamed to say
that right now, because I was so gullible."
Williams's lawyers won't speak to the press during the ongoing
hearing. Mark Bookman, Executive Director of the Atlantic Center for
Capital Representation says Williams does not deserve to die for the
crime he committed as a teen.
"You've got an 18 year, 3-month-old who was by virtually all accounts
at this point, sexually abused almost his entire life. To think that
he's the worst of the worst is absurd."
Testifying last week, the prosecutor in the original case said she
had no proof of a sexual relationship between Williams and the murder
victim.
"I never told him [Draper] to lie about anything. I never told any witness to lie about anything."
Pages of her case notes produced last week show she heard reports that the older man had sexually abused other boys.
Democracy Now posts, "New Evidence Emerges in Pennsylvania Death Row Case," earlier this morning. There is video at the link.
In a new evidentiary hearing, Andrea Foulkes, the prosecutor who oversaw
the case against Williams three decades ago, was confronted with her
own notes showing the mother of another of Norwood’s abuse victims had
told her that Norwood molested her son. For years, Foulkes has rejected
the argument that Williams had a motive of seeking revenge against
Norwood for sexual abuse.
"Terry Williams Death Penalty Case Rocked By New Evidence Days Before Planned Execution," is John Rudolf's Huffington Post report.
The prosecutor sat in the witness box, as the judge told her to
review a document from a murder case decided nearly 30 years ago.
"It looks like notes about an interview," said Andrea Foulkes, a
former Philadelphia assistant district attorney and now a federal
prosecutor. "That is my handwriting."
The interview, in late 1984, was with a mother whose 16-year-old son
belonged to a church youth group led by Amos Norwood, a 56-year-old
chemist recently found stabbed and beaten to death in a cemetery.
"Touched on privates," Foulkes said, reading from her notes. "Brought
boy home and told him not to say anything. Heard from others about
possible incidents."
Foulkes' notes, introduced as evidence for the first time in
Pennsylvania state court on Friday, represent an explosive new twist in
the case of Terry Williams, sentenced to death in 1984 for killing
Norwood in what the jury believed was merely a robbery gone wrong.
Earlier coverage of Terry Williams' case begins at the link; commentary on the case, in the next post.
Advocates for Terry Williams have posted an online petition calling for clemency.