News - California

[Britta]

Posted: 02.10.04 @ 11:15 a.m.
Unequal Death Penalty For Blacks And Browns



By Hazel Trice Edney | SACOBSERVER.COM WIRE SERVICES

WASHINGTON (NNPA) - Although Black and Brown juveniles represent 21 percent of the 16- to 17 year-olds in America, they represent more than triple that proportion (66 percent) of all death row inmates sentenced as juveniles.


Brian Roberts, executive director of the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, says the death penalty preys on people of color.

"Why is this?" David Elliott, spokesman for the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty (NCADP), asks rhetorically. "It's because the death penalty preys upon the most vulnerable in our society."

The question of whether 16-and 17-year-olds should receive the death penalty is receiving increased scrutiny now that the U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a Missouri case - Simmons v. Roper - challenging the pending execution of a man who was 17 at the time of his crime.

If the decision is overturned later this year, it could spare the lives of 34 African-Americans (45 percent); 24 Whites (32 percent); 14 Latinos (19 percent); and 2 Asians (2 percent) currently on death row for crimes committed when they were juveniles, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, based in Washington, D. C.

The number of 16 and 17-year-old juveniles of color in the U. S. total 2.6 million, less than half of the 5.5 million Whites in same age category. Yet, the percentage of juveniles of color on death row stands at 66 percent while the percentage of White juveniles comprise less than half - 32 percent. Whites represent 43.4 percent of the 16 and 17-year-old population in the U. S.

"You already start off having a racial disparity with the people on death row (generally of all ages) being 55 percent people of color," says David Elliott, spokesman for the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. "Then, when you look at the marginalized groups - the mentally retarded, juveniles - you find increased evidence of racial bias."

Across the country, anti-death penalty organizations have been energized by the Supreme Court's decision to hear an appeal of a Missouri Supreme Court ruling. The defendant, Christopher Simmons, now 27, was 17 when he murdered a woman who recognized him when he and a 15-year-old companion burglarized her house. The Missouri Supreme Court ruled 4-3 to overturn his death sentence because of his age, noting that the executions of juveniles have become so rare that they constitute cruel and unusual punishment, a violation of the 8th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

"Individuals under the age of 18 cannot vote, cannot serve in the military without their parents' permission, cannot purchase liquor, and, in the state of Louisiana, they cannot witness an execution unless they are the one being put to death," says William F. Schulz, executive director of Amnesty International USA. "Society recognizes the diminished accountability of those under the age of 18 in (every) aspect of civil life but this one."

Society traditionally does not kill the young because the general belief is that they may not know the difference between right and wrong. In 1988, the Supreme Court ruled it illegal to execute anyone under the age of 16. In 1989, the court declined to extend the same rule to 16 and 17-year-olds, leaving that decision up to states.

The U.S. is a minority because it continues to execute juveniles. Several anti-juvenile death penalty treaties, including the "United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child," have been signed by U. S. presidents, but not ratified by the U. S. Senate. The U. N. resolution, signed in 1999 by President Clinton, prohibited the use of the death penalty for juvenile offenders.

Every nation in the world ratified the treaty, except the U.S. and Somalia. Only four other countries - Iraq, Iran, Bangladesh, and Saudi Arabia -allow the execution of juveniles.

Over the past 10 years, Pakistan, China, Yemen, and Zimbabwe have abolished the death penalty for juveniles. Many other countries have severely curtailed juvenile executions, including Saudi Arabia and Nigeria.

Amnesty International began a global campaign last month to abolish the death penalty for juvenile offenders, calling it a "heinous" practice.

Anti-death penalty activists hope that if enough states abolish the juvenile death penalty before the court's decision, that might create the same level of opposition that the court observed two years ago when it banned executions of mentally retarded people. The court said then that growing public sentiment against the execution of the mentally retarded indicated changing standards of decency.

At this time, 17 states have no death penalty for juveniles, 15 states have it but have not used it since 1976 when the death penalty moratorium was lifted.

A Supreme Court decision resulted in a national moratorium in 1972 because the court ruled that laws governing the death penalty in some states were arbitrary and capricious, therefore constituted cruel and unusual punishment. The Bureau of Justice Statistics reported that 54 percent of the nearly 4,000 death row inmates between the 1930s and 1960s were Black.

After death penalty laws were tightened at the state level, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the death penalty in 1976. Legal executions resumed the following year.

Speaking at a hearing last week during the Virginia General Assembly National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty Executive Director Brian Roberts, pleaded, "We realize that minors are not as capable as adults in making responsible decisions. So, we place restrictions on them…Yet, there is one area where we fall woefully short in the protection and nurturance of our children. That is the criminal justice system."

It was the Virginia case of convicted sniper Lee Boyd Malvo that gained national attention when Malvo was spared the death penalty. He was 17 at the age of his crimes. His adult co-conspirator, John Muhammad, was sentenced to death.

Since 1976, 22 juvenile offenders have been executed in seven states: Texas, Virginia, Georgia, Louisiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, and South Carolina. Texas alone carried out 13 executions, almost two-thirds of the total.

The National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty reports:

Of the 10 female juvenile offenders executed in the United States since 1976, eight were African-American and one was Native American. In each of those cases, the victim was White;
Southern states account for 84 percent of all death sentences imposed on juvenile offenders since 1976. Three states - Texas, Florida and Alabama - account for half of those sentences and
Over the past decade, only three states have executed any juvenile offenders: Texas, Virginia and Oklahoma. Those three states account for 18 of the 22 executions of juvenile offenders that have been carried out since 1976.
The constitutional question the court will be exploring in the Missouri case is whether the execution of juveniles has evolved into a violation of the Eighth Amendment, which states, "Excessive bail shall not be required; nor excessive fines imposed; nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted."

The court has been split over the issue of juvenile executions. In a case last fall, Stanford v. Kentucky, a dissenting Justice John Paul Stevens wrote, "The practice of executing such offenders is a relic of the past and is inconsistent with evolving standards of decency in a civilized society." He was joined by Justices David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer that juvenile executions are a "shameful practice." However, the other five justices disagreed.

Activists refuse to give up hope that a majority of the court will finally agree.

"Thankfully, momentum against this practice is building," said Roberts at the Virginia hearing. "The time has come to end the odious use of the death penalty against children…The evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society demand no less."

Hazel Trice Edney is a NNPA Washington correspondent.



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[Britta]

Students' talk with inmate blocked --Class phone chat with Death Row
inmate was to be on '60 Minutes'


San Francisco school district officials were investigating Thursday
how 25 4th-graders at John Muir Elementary came close to talking to a
death row inmate over the phone as cameras for the CBS news show "60
Minutes" rolled.

District officials learned Tuesday that the news crew was coming to
the school 2 days later to tape a segment for an upcoming show on the
life of Stanley "Tookie" Williams, the San Quentin inmate who was
convicted in 1981 of killing 4 people.

Williams -- who cofounded the Crips gang in South Central Los
Angeles - - has since written several books encouraging kids to avoid
crime and has been nominated twice for the Nobel Peace Prize. He is
the subject of a cable television movie called "Redemption,"
scheduled to air in April, starring Jamie Foxx.

The "60 Minutes" filming was supposed to include a 20-minute phone
call from Williams to the 4th-graders, which would have been
Williams' first- ever phone call from San Quentin to a public school
classroom, according to his publicist.

But when district officials got wind of the plan from the school's
principal, they immediately called off the phone conversation, saying
it was inappropriate.

"These are 4th-graders," said Lorna Ho, special assistant to
Superintendent Arlene Ackerman. "It's a fairly sensitive subject
matter. ... '60 Minutes' doesn't just roll into town. Someone was
giving them the false impression that this was OK, and that wasn't
the case."

The taping continued anyway for two hours on Thursday afternoon at
the Western Addition school, but centered on teachers talking with
their students about Williams' books. District officials wrote
scripted questions for the teachers to ask and had a district public
relations coordinator inside the classroom during the taping.

"What was taped was at the heart of the message, and that was through
the books," said Deborah Sims, assistant superintendent for
elementary schools, who is investigating the matter.

The idea for the segment sprouted from the elementary school's
partnership with the Omega Boys Club, a Potrero Hill group that
encourages kids to avoid violence and succeed in school.

Its cofounder, Joseph Marshall, began visiting Williams in jail in
November to learn more about him and his books. When Marshall learned
from Williams' publicist that "60 Minutes" was seeking a school for
filming, he suggested John Muir because Williams' books are
incorporated into its curriculum. 4th-grade teachers Debbie Ruskay
and Ingrid Jacobson agreed with the plan.

The television crew surprised everybody by saying earlier this week
it would be in town Thursday. Williams' publicist helped arrange the
phone call, and a permission slip went home to the students' parents
announcing "something wonderful and exciting is about to happen" and
describing the call.

No parents complained, but when the school's principal learned of the
plan, she phoned the district office, prompting officials to cancel
the call.

The entire episode left a sour taste in the mouths of Ruskay and
Jacobson, who said their students would have gained from hearing the
anti-crime message directly from Williams. The school's student body
is half African American and half Latino, and 80 percent qualify for
free or reduced-price lunch, according to the district Web site.

Ruskay and Jacobson, who are both white, said they can't reach their
students in the same way that Williams, who is African American,
could.

"His experience so mirrors many, many teens and adults they've seen,"
said Ruskay. "Here we are, we're completely not a fit. We don't look
like them. Our lives were never like theirs. We try to find other
ways to touch them."

Jacobson said it's clear the kids haven't made him a hero in their
minds, but instead have learned how gang violence can ruin so many
lives.

"My kids are very clear that what he did was bad," she said. "He
says, 'you don't want to end up like me' - and they get it."

Geru Mabrey, 9, said he has learned a lot from Williams' books.

"It's about staying out of trouble and out of jail and don't do drugs
or carry weapons," he said after the taping. "He was a bad guy before
he was in jail, but he's a good guy now."

Ruskay and Jacobson added that they didn't know the protocol
regarding bringing media into the classroom and were sad that
district officials rejected the phone call.

"We were so excited about the idea," Jacobson said. "You realize
we're just cogs in a big machine."

Williams' publicist, Barbara Cottman Becnel, who also runs a social
services nonprofit in Richmond, was also unhappy with the decision.

"He may not be the messenger that they want, but he has the message
those kids need," she said. "Would it be better to have a more
politically appropriate messenger who is totally ineffective?"

Omega's Marshall, for one, thought Thursday's taping turned out well
and that the district's decision was probably the right one.

"I think Tookie's great. I think his redemption is true. I think the
guy is genuine about what he's trying to do, I really do. But that
doesn't mean everybody else does," he said. "Given the range of
choices that they had, I think they were pretty prudent."

(source: San Francisco Chronicle)

[Britta]

atimes.com
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-ad ... -headlines

Death Row Often Means a Long Life
California condemns more murderers than any state but Texas, yet it accounts for only 1% of the nation's executions. Today, 640 inmates await the penalty.
By Rone Tempest
Times Staff Writer

March 6, 2005

SAN QUENTIN — When prison guards strapped nervous three-time killer Donald Beardslee to a gurney and administered a lethal injection just after midnight here on Jan. 19, it was the first California execution in more than three years.

Beardslee, who in 1981 brutally murdered two young San Francisco area women after he was paroled from a Missouri prison on another murder conviction, waited 21 years for his day of reckoning. He was 61 and had been on death row longer than the entire life span of one of his victims.

In the quarter century since Californians voted overwhelmingly to restore the death penalty, county prosecutors and juries have put more condemned murderers on death row in this state than in any other except Texas.

Despite the public's willingness to hand out death sentences, California is one of the more hesitant among the 38 capital punishment states to use the penalty, causing some to question if the enormous ongoing cost of capital punishment is worth the relatively few executions it produces.

California has 640 inmates on death row, about 20% of the nation's total. But the state has accounted for only 1% of the nation's executions — or 11 deaths — since 1978, when the death penalty was restored.

"What we are paying for at such great cost," said UC Berkeley law professor Frank Zimring, "is essentially our own ambivalence about capital punishment. We try to maintain the apparatus of state killing and another apparatus that almost guarantees that it won't happen. The public pays for both sides."

According to state and federal records obtained by The Times, maintaining the California death penalty system costs taxpayers more than $114 million a year beyond the cost of simply keeping the convicts locked up for life and not counting the millions more in court costs needed to prosecute capital cases and hold post-conviction hearings in state and federal courts.

With 11 executions spread over 27 years, on a per-execution basis, California and federal taxpayers have paid more than a quarter of a billion dollars for each life taken at state hands.

Capital punishment advocates argue that the death penalty saves money by eliminating state costs of housing the executed inmates. The rare California executions do produce some savings for the state. For example, had Beardsley lived to age 77, the average life expectancy for California males, it would have cost the state an additional $2 million to house him. But these kinds of savings make only a small dent in the overall sums needed to maintain the system.

Former California Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren, now a Republican member of Congress from Sacramento, accuses capital punishment opponents of conducting a "war of attrition" against the death penalty, jacking up the cost and greatly prolonging appeals with the intent of making the process too expensive to keep up.

"I don't think society ought to be forced to give up the death penalty just because of actions by those who have been ratcheting up the costs," said Lungren, who helped write a 1996 federal law attempting to speed up capital case appeals. "It is very difficult to calculate the human costs or even the economic costs of those who are not killed because of the deterrence of capital punishment."

Other states execute much more rapidly than California. Eleven Southern states — led by Texas (337 executions), Virginia (94) and Oklahoma (75) — account for 90% of all executions in the last 27 years. This is partly because California, similar to other non-Southern capital punishment states, dedicates much more time and money to state and federal appeals.

Another important factor is that the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, serving California and composed largely of Democratic appointees, is more likely to hear death penalty petitions than the more conservative appeals courts serving Texas (5th Circuit) and Virginia (4th Circuit).

"We don't turn them [executions] out the way a lot of Southern states do," California Chief Justice Ronald M. George said in an interview. "The virtue of our system is also its vice. We go to such lengths to minimize the possibility of error, and we've built in a lot of delay. The part I find most dysfunctional is that we have a delay of three to four years between the time of the death penalty judgment is imposed by the trial court and the time the defendant is appointed counsel."

George said that 115 death row inmates still have not been appointed lawyers for the first direct appeal to the state Supreme Court that is mandated by state law. And 149 lack lawyers for state habeas corpus and executive clemency petitions.

In recent years, both state and federal courts have increased the incentives for qualified defense attorneys to take death penalty cases. The state Supreme Court offers $125 an hour or fixed fees ranging from $135,000 to $314,000 for capital case defense representation. The federal courts recently increased their hourly rate to $150 for defense lawyers in capital cases.

But even at those rates, only a relative handful of attorneys from the 200,000 licensed to practice in California are willing to devote the years of work and vast number of filings a typical capital case can take.

Because of the long appeals process, the delay between sentencing and execution in California averages nearly 20 years. As a result, there is a general graying of the population on death row. According to Department of Corrections statistics, 180 death row inmates are older than 50; 42 are older than 60.

Prison records show that California death row inmates are far more likely to die of natural causes than they are at the hands of the executioner. Since 1978, during the same period that 11 inmates were put to death, 28 died naturally, 12 committed suicide and two were killed in incidents on the San Quentin exercise yard.

"The leading cause of death on death row," George said, "is old age."

Capital punishment California style has become a small industry. Every February, organizers with the California Attorneys for Criminal Justice and California Public Defenders Assn. host a conference on death penalty issues in Monterey, Calif.

This year's convention, titled "Executing Justice, not People" was held at a cost of $300 a head. More than 1,500 participants attended workshops on topics that included "What the Enemy Is Doing" and "Sexual Abuse of Our Clients When They Were Young."

Among the tactics routinely discussed by attendees is how to prolong appeals.

The public cost of maintaining the death penalty, meanwhile, continues to mount. The annual bill breaks down like this:

According to Corrections Department spokeswoman Margot Bach, it costs $90,000 more a year to house an inmate on death row, where each person has a private cell and extra guards, than in the general prison population. That accounts for $57.5 million annually.

Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer, whose deputies represent the counties during appeals, estimates that he devotes about 15% of his criminal division budget to capital cases, or about $11 million annually.

The California Supreme Court, which is required by law to review every death penalty case, spends $11.8 million annually for court-appointed defense counsel.

The Office of the State Public Defender, which represents some death row inmates, has an annual budget of $11.3 million. The San Francisco-based Habeas Corpus Resource Center, another state-funded office, represents inmates and trains death penalty attorneys on a budget of $11 million.

Finally, federal public defenders offices in Los Angeles and Sacramento, and private attorneys appointed by the federal court system for California cases, receive about $12 million annually.

The resulting $114-million annual cost does not include the substantial extra funds needed to try the complicated capital cases in county courts.

Research by the UC Berkeley School of Public Policy in 1993, the most recent study of its type available, showed that in Los Angeles County, a capital murder trial costs three times more to try than a noncapital murder case, $1.9 million compared to $630,000. One reason for the extra costs is that capital cases require a jury trial for sentencing after guilt has been determined in the first trial.

Typically, capital cases have four times as many pretrial motions, more investigators and expert testimony and much more exhaustive jury selection.

Other spending not included in the total are courtroom, staff and filing costs at the California Supreme Court, four federal district courts and the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

In an interview, George estimated that the state's highest court spends about 20% of its time and resources on death penalty cases alone. Federal habeas corpus appeals in death cases are so expensive that the 9th Circuit assigns a U.S. district judge just to review the budgets of each capital case.

For the present, activists both for and against the death penalty are unhappy.

"When we reinstated the death penalty, I don't think anyone believed it would look like it does today," said Dane Gillette, a senior assistant attorney general who overseas the state's death penalty cases. "The system is twisted and corrupted in ways that were not anticipated."

Michael Laurence, director of the Habeas Corpus Resource Center and one of the state's leading capital defense lawyers, sees the whole process as an enormous misuse of resources.

"We put all these resources into litigation where we end up killing one person every two or three years," said Laurence. "What if just a small portion of the money we spent on these cases went for the prevention of child abuse? From my experience, this would have done far more to prevent murders than anything we have done with capital punishment."

Possibly as a result of the high costs and bottleneck on death row, there has been a marked decline in death sentences in recent years. In 1999, juries imposed 42 death sentences. In 2004, the number dropped to nine.

But the numbers fluctuate, and new admissions to California's death row continue to exceed by many times the number of executions.

USC law professor Michael J. Brennan said he and a co-counsel, Los Angeles lawyer Phillip A. Trevino, have represented two California death row inmates on federal appeals for the last 12 years, for which Brennan estimates they have been paid $250,000.

Brennan said that when he debates the issue with death penalty supporters, he no longer bothers with the ethical and moral issues.

"I had a conversation with someone recently who admitted to being sort of a redneck on the death penalty," Brennan said recently. "But when I said, 'Let's talk about how much it costs,' I suddenly got his attention."



Copyright 2005 Los Angeles Times

[floridas]

July 1


CALIFORNIA:

Wesson's Death Sentence May Take Decades


Marcus Wesson is headed to death row, but most agree it could be decades
before he actually dies by lethal injection.

According to the California Prison System it takes an average of 20 years
for an inmate to be put to death.

Many believe something needs to be done to speed up the process.

Next month, Wesson will join 15 other Fresno County Defendants awaiting
death at San Quentin Prison. But the likelihood of Wesson receiving the
jury's judgment of death by lethal injection anytime soon is doubtful.

Defense Attorney, Ernest Kinney says there aren't many qualified appellate
attorneys to handle cases like this.

"For 5 years nothing happens then you get a lawyer then you get the
transcripts that takes another 5 years then there's writs and motions
that's another 5 years and pretty soon it's 20 to 25 years," says Kinney.

Wesson is 58-years-old and Kinney doesn't believe Wesson will live long
enough to receive the ultimate punishment.

Kinney says allegations of possible juror misconduct and the fact no
African Americans were on the jury are just some of the reasons Wesson
could get a new trial.

Kinney doesn't believe California's appeals system needs to be
streamlined.

"Maybe all the appeals can be done in five years I think within 5 years
people can get that sense of justice at least closure so they can move
on," says Kinney.

Wesson is set to be sentenced next month. At that time, the judge will
rule whether he agrees with the jury's judgment.

Legal experts say it's doubtful he will overturn their decision.

(source: ABC News)

[Britta]

California Prisons Like Automatic Death Penalty

Jason L. Miller | Staff Writer | 2005-07-01



If you're convicted of a crime, better hope you're not sent to a California prison. The prison health care system is so bad that one inmate dies every week.

California Prisons Like Automatic Death Penalty
On Thursday, a federal judge said an independent authority would be selected to investigate and oversee California's penal health care system, which seems rife with neglect and maltreatment of inmate health concerns.

"We're dealing literally with life and death," said US District Judge Thelton Henderson referring to the nation's largest inmate health care system as "terribly broken."

The death rate at California prisons has led to a number of lawsuits causing more concern about impact on state revenue than convict life (or lack there of). California Youth and Adult Corrections Secretary Roderick Hickman echoed that sentiment.

"The taxpayers of this state can't afford to keep paying for repeated lawsuits that result from the same kinds of problems such as inadequate health care, poor mental health treatment and insufficient staffing," Hickman said.

Nonprofit lawyer Alison Hardy, with Prison Law Office, took a more human approach.

"The judge has clearly recognized the ongoing risk of death and harm to patients is unconstitutional and basically horrifying," said Hardy.

The most well known lawsuit was a class action against the state involving 10 inmates and their families. The plaintiffs alleged that state prison officials repeatedly violated inmate rights to medical care.

As evidence the action cited a paraplegic whose catheter remained unchanged for months at a time; an AIDS patient whose pain medication was repeatedly denied; and one prisoner who was refused surgery for degenerative disc disease.

Prison reform advocate, Cayene Bird of United for No Injustice Oppression or Neglect (UNION), didn't mince any words when speaking about the issue.

"We are all sick of the bureaucratic inertia and we are sick of an inspector general that is basically useless,'' she said. "We are hopeful now.''
http://www.webpronews.com/business/topb ... nalty.html

[Britta]

Investigator digs deep into minds of killers
KEEPING CLIENTS OFF DEATH ROW
By David L. Beck
Mercury News

Margy Erickson's work has taken her into the jungles of Puerto Rico and the slums of California's cities. But it's the jungles and slums of the mind that interest her, the tangled growth in the child that has devastating consequences in the adult.

She's an investigator for defense attorneys, and her clients are, almost without exception, killers. Her job is to humanize them for a jury trying to decide whether to execute them.

Interviewing everybody she can find who knew, taught, lived near or is related to the defendant and examining every written record she can obtain -- school, military, medical, prison, work -- she compiles a ``social history'' of the man or woman the state may decide to put to death.

Her work haunts her: ``If I don't find that one person, that one anecdote, I could fail my client,'' she said. ``My client could get the death penalty. There's 12 jurors, and one of the stories may reach one of them, and it's so hard -- everybody's doubtful of us, of the defendant.''

Juries don't always buy those stories; a few of Erickson's clients are on death row, and one was executed. Reasonable minds may differ on the definition of ``success'' in what she does.

In her first big case, the trial of ``Trailside Killer'' David Carpenter in 1984, the jury took five days before deciding on the death sentence. ``It could've gone against us in an hour or two if Margy hadn't done such a good job,'' said Larry Biggam, the lead defense attorney.

Not just criminals

Most of her clients committed the acts of which they were accused, she admits. But she argues that they're ``damaged'' -- in childhood by family members and by a system that Erickson believes has it all backward, spending millions on criminal investigations and trials rather than art and music, early childhood education and counseling.

Abuse -- physical, emotional, often sexual -- is the common thread among the murderers she's investigated, she said. Carpenter's family used to lock him in a closet for hours. Former Santa Cruz tannery worker Angel Rivera's father would tie him to a tree in the jungle at night. Sacramento landlady Dorothea Puente was molested by her brother.

``I see victims everywhere in my cases.''

In California, where death-penalty cases are divided into a guilt phase and a penalty phase, Erickson or someone like her often is hired at the beginning of a case to prepare for the penalty phase, so that ``even if we don't know the outcome, we're ready.''

In the case of Carpenter, a San Francisco man who was suspected of at least 10 slayings on Northern California hiking trails and convicted of seven of them in two separate trials, Biggam recalls her interviewing ``everyone from birth to the present -- which included schoolteachers who remembered seeing injuries on David,'' as well as his buddies from a South San Francisco bowling alley.

It takes time, money, persistence and fearlessness. ``I can't guarantee that my husband won't shoot you,'' the sister of Dorothea Puente told her, ``but if you can find me, I'll talk to you.'' She found her.

Puente killed her elderly tenants for their Social Security checks; she is serving a life sentence. Rivera shot three of his tenants to death in the driveway 13 years ago; he recently agreed to a life sentence to avoid a death penalty trial. Carpenter, now 75, has been on death row at San Quentin since 1984.

Getting inside

Then there's Murray Lodge, an Erickson client with a bulldog tattooed on his chest who is serving a life sentence for two drug-related murders near San Jose; another man convicted in that case, Glen Nickerson, was freed two years ago after Lodge admitted having framed him.

Lodge was tried three times before being convicted and sentenced in 1994. He spent more than 10 years in Santa Clara County jail, where he was legendary, Erickson said, for attacking other inmates -- something he did about 35 times, as she recalls. He went through three sets of attorneys. He had to be shackled hand, foot and waist before he could even be interviewed.

No problem for Erickson. ``You know,'' she told Lodge's last attorney, Gerald Schwartzbach, ``he's a really nice guy.''

She found out Lodge had once won a vocal contest at the Saddle Rack, a country-Western nightclub. Schwartzbach persuaded the judge to let him sing a medley of Elvis hits during the penalty phase of his trial. ``It just humanized him completely'' for the jury, Erickson said.

A 49-year-old Santa Cruz mother of three, Erickson said she never feels threatened doing her job. ``I'm there to help people and somehow people just know that. I've never been assaulted.''

The daughter of a priest who later became a psychologist, she grew up in the rectory of St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Upland.

She was in the American studies program at the University of California-Santa Cruz when she interned in the late 1970s with Biggam and his partner, Jerry Christensen, who held (and still hold) the public defender contract with Santa Cruz County. She turned pro with the Carpenter case, when she says Biggam talked her out of going to law school and into becoming an investigator.

Erickson believes ``everybody is born a good person -- I really do.'' But is there nobody she thinks is deserving of execution?

``One of the things you have to consider -- and I have -- is how would I feel if one of my children were killed by someone who was so damaged. I don't know how I would react,'' Erickson said.

``But from what I've seen over the years, families who are victimized, the ones who are wanting revenge, who want the death penalty -- sometimes that becomes the focus of their lives. And it's a very negative focus.''
Contact David L. Beck at dbeck@mercurynews.com or at (831) 423-0960.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercuryn ... 099423.htm

[Britta]

Death Row juror alleged to have secret vendetta

Motives of gay rights activist questioned 14 years after trial

- Jaxon Van Derbeken, Chronicle Staff Writer
Sunday, July 17, 2005

Clifford Bolden is the only convicted murderer from San Francisco on California's Death Row. Now, through a set of odd circumstances, he has a chance at life.

That chance rests on trying to destroy the credibility of an 81-year-old juror, who 14 years ago wanted and still wants nothing more than to see Bolden die for the killing of a gay man.

The juror in question, Jose Sarria, was an unlikely choice to sit in judgment in such a volatile case. Sarria was a pioneer in the local gay rights movement and is believed to be the first openly gay candidate to have run for public office in the United States. For years he performed as a female impersonator in San Francisco as the "Widow Norton," after the fictional wife of the 19th century San Francisco character Emperor Norton.

Sarria sat on the panel that in 1991 recommended that Bolden be sentenced to death for the 1986 robbery and stabbing of Henry Michael Pedersen, a model and escort Bolden met at the Pendulum, a Castro neighborhood bar. Pedersen had apparently taken Bolden home after a night of heavy drinking.

Since his sentencing, Bolden, 49, has made several legal arguments to the state Supreme Court in two separate challenges. As is common in capital cases, the high court rejected most of them.

Court review ordered

Then, earlier this year, the court ordered a lower court to explore Sarria's role on the jury.

Bolden's appeals team maintains that Sarria told a fellow juror that he had ties to both the defendant and the victim, but never disclosed them in court.

The defense also contends that Sarria refused to deliberate with other jurors, in an apparent effort to avenge the victim and make "a point about being gay."

"Jose Sarria pushed his fellow jurors for a verdict of death with a display of immovable will and inside information,'' Jeanne Keevan-Lynch, Bolden's appeal attorney, argued to the state high court.

The state attorney general's office says the defense claims about Sarria are groundless and that the hearing on his conduct -- which has yet to be scheduled -- will put the matter to rest.

"These are disputed facts that require resolution,'' said Ron Matthias, supervising deputy attorney general. "We think the court has done the right thing here.''

Appeal to Kamala Harris

Bolden's defense is also appealing to the political sensibilities of San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris, who like her predecessor, Terence Hallinan, opposes capital punishment and refuses to seek the death penalty.

It's been more than 10 years since a San Francisco jury was asked to sentence a defendant to death, and Bolden is the only one of the 644 condemned inmates in California whose crime was committed in the city.

For his part, Sarria says he's tired of the legal maneuvering.

"He has been sitting on Death Row all this time -- it's unbelievable," Sarria said in a phone interview from his home in Cathedral City near San Diego. "Our justice system needs to be overhauled.''

The crime

Pedersen, 46, an unemployed accountant, was found stabbed to death in the bathtub of his Twin Peaks apartment Sept. 9, 1986. His blood alcohol was measured at 0.36 percent, well over the legal definition of drunkenness. Authorities think Bolden stabbed him in the back, then carved an "L"-shaped wound on his chest after he died.

Bolden's fingerprints were lifted from a glass and bottle in the apartment and his palm print was found on a bathtub wall. Police found some of Pedersen's property at Bolden's apartment, including an identification bracelet, a camera, a camera case and binoculars.

Bolden had been paroled from San Quentin State Prison earlier in 1986 after serving about seven years for two manslaughter convictions, one from San Francisco and one from San Jose.

When Bolden went to trial in 1990, Sarria was impaneled as an alternate juror. He became one of the 12 voting members during the penalty phase after another panelist was excused.

Sarria would seem to have been less than an ideal juror from the defense's perspective. In addition to his career as a female impersonator, he became the first openly gay political candidate in the nation in 1961 when he ran for the Board of Supervisors in San Francisco.

Defense attorneys lodged no objections to Sarria at the time, but Bolden's appellate lawyers came to focus on him as they fought to save their client from the death chamber.

Another juror talks

The defense argued to the state Supreme Court that Sarria had confided to another juror, who has since died, that he knew Pedersen and had helped him get a job at the old Emporium Capwell department store. In a sworn statement in 1996, juror Charlia Verna Sessions said Sarria had talked with her regularly when they rode the bus home from court. One time, she said, Sarria told her that the victim "was a good man.''

In the recent interview, Sarria acknowledged that he did ride the bus for 10 months with Sessions and talked with her. But he denied that he had known Pedersen or had helped him find a job.

"He was a bar person. I was not a bar person,'' Sarria said. "I did not know him. Where they got that notion, I don't know.''

The defense also has argued that Sarria had ties to the defendant, Bolden, that he never disclosed during the trial.

Sessions said in her declaration that Sarria had told her that he knew the man with whom Bolden was having an affair at the time of the killing.

Sarria had helped the man, Andre Montgomery, get a job as an impersonator at the North Beach club Finocchio's, where Sarria performed as the Widow Norton.

After the sentencing, Sarria told a defense investigator that Montgomery had walked into the club one day and announced he had a new "romance of the year" -- who turned out to be Bolden.

Witnesses testified that Montgomery and Bolden had been walking together when police arrested Bolden, and authorities said the two had been sharing an apartment.

"I have the transcripts of the trial. I know how often Montgomery's name came up,'' said Bolden's attorney, Keevan-Lynch. Montgomery was ill with HIV at the time of the trial and died soon after.

Keevan-Lynch contends that Sarria did not tell the court that he knew Montgomery for a reason. "No reasonable explanation, other than desire to avoid removal (from the jury), is apparent,'' she argued to the state Supreme Court.

Sarria said in the interview that he had known Montgomery, but that he hadn't learned that Montgomery and Bolden were lovers until after the trial.

"Andre kept Mr. Bolden a secret,'' he said.

The defense has also used jurors' statements to suggest that Sarria refused to deliberate during the sentencing phase because he had an agenda.

In her declaration, Sessions recalled wondering whether Sarria was fit to serve on the jury. "He was determined to decide the case so as to make some sort of a point about being gay,'' she said.

Another juror, Thomas Shepherd, said in a 1998 sworn declaration that Sarria had announced he stood for death soon after deliberations started and would not change his mind.

"The room was silent for several moments afterwards,'' Shepherd said. "I recalled the judge telling us that we were supposed to deliberate and not take a stand right away. I thought this juror should be removed, but I did not say anything.''

Sarria's demeanor "said we were going to be stuck in this situation until we bent to his will,'' Shepherd said.

Eventually, jurors who favored sparing Bolden's life changed their votes to death.

"I voted accordingly, seeing no hope of getting out without doing what Mr. Sarria wanted, or behaving as he did,'' Shepherd said.

Sarria's response

Sarria denies he made up his mind ahead of time.

"I listened to everything," he said. "My mind was made up when we considered all the evidence.''

When the time came, Sarria said, he was a strong advocate for sentencing Bolden to death and sometimes grew frustrated with other jurors.

One woman suggested that Bolden might be rehabilitated, he said.

"When she said that, I nearly put my hand through the table," Sarria said. "I had to convince her that he had all the chances in the world, he wasn't going to be rehabilitated.''

Keevan-Lynch has written a letter to District Attorney Harris, asking her to review the record and, rather than defend the case, petition the high court to modify Bolden's sentence to life without parole.

Chief Assistant District Attorney Russ Giuntini said the office is limited to carrying out what the state Supreme Court has asked it to do.

"We couldn't go in and say, 'We don't want the death penalty on this,' " Giuntini said. "The hearings are very specifically directed. We couldn't parade into court and say, 'We don't want the death penalty,' even if we wanted to. Our hands are tied.''

Keevan-Lynch insists that Harris "has a choice. I think she has the option, and I have told her this. Kamala Harris is saying she doesn't have a choice, but what is she basing that on?''

Matthias, the deputy attorney general, said he doesn't see how Harris could do what Keevan-Lynch is asking.

"The case is final," he said. "What is she talking about?''

E-mail Jaxon Van Derbeken at jvanderbeken@sfchronicle.com.

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©2005 San Francisco Chronicle

[janneke]

AP: Calif. Death Penalty Varies by Area
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By DAVID KRAVETS, Associated Press Writer

SAN FRANCISCO - California now has 638 inmates awaiting death, some of them for more than one murder. But some of the state's counties have condemned many more inmates than others of similar size, according to an Associated Press review of Corrections Department data.


The disparities between some counties are so pronounced that legal experts say capital punishment is being unfairly applied in California.


The reasons are complex — for one, crimes happen more frequently in some places than others. But prosecutorial zeal and the attitudes of jurors also are factors. The bottom line, according to the data, is that the death penalty sometimes depends on where the crime was committed.


"Capital punishment should not depend on an accident of geography," said defense attorney Robert Sanger, who prepared a lengthy analysis of California's death penalty system in the current issue of Santa Clara Law Review.


Similar geographical disparities are apparent nationwide, and not just at the county level. Texas, for example, has executed 317 people since the U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites) allowed executions to resume in 1976, while California has put just 10 to death.


The death penalty is getting renewed scrutiny in California, where Tuesday's scheduled lethal injection of Kevin Cooper, who was sentenced for hacking four people to death, will be the state's first execution in two years.


Often, the debate focuses on questions about race, the reliability of evidence and arguments about cruel and unusual punishment — all issues raised by Cooper's defenders. And like other states, California's death row is disproportionately black.


Statewide, about 39 percent of inmates awaiting execution are white, 35 percent black and 18 percent Hispanic. About 47 percent of the California's population is white; 6 percent black and 33 percent Hispanic.


But geography plays a role — if the death penalty were applied evenly, there would be one death sentence for every 54,700 people in each county. That ratio was calculated by dividing California's 35.3 million population by 645, which is the number of death sentences handed out to the 638 men and women now awaiting execution.


_ San Francisco and Kern counties each have roughly 700,000 people, but liberal San Francisco has just one person now on death row, 13 fewer than the per capita ratio. Kern, where conservatives hold sway, has applied 23 death sentences, 10 more than the norm.


_ Riverside County, with 54 people on death row, had the most death verdicts beyond its statistically proportionate number, which would be 30. "Death penalty laws were implemented to use," said Grover Trask III, Riverside County's district attorney, noting his community's conservative bent.


_ Los Angeles is the only county with more condemned inmates, but it also has the state's highest population. It has sentenced people to death 193 times, 11 more than the ratio.


_ San Mateo County, now hosting Scott Peterson (news - web sites)'s double-murder trial, has issued 16 death sentences, three more than the ratio. Stanislaus County, where the trial was moved from, has 9 current death row residents, equal to the ratio.


Prosecutors aren't likely to push for a capital trial to be moved to San Francisco, where the newly elected District Attorney Kamala Harris declared last month that she "will never charge the death penalty." Her speech was partly an acknowledgment that jurors are unlikely to vote for death in the state's most liberal county.


San Diego County, where Cooper's trial was moved in 1983, is generally conservative and has a heavy military presence, but its 32 death sentences were 25 fewer than what it would have seen had the death penalty been applied evenly. That's the biggest disparity in the state.


Sanger said he believes a statewide committee of prosecutors should review capital cases to ensure uniform standards, and the governor should commute any death sentences obtained without the committee's approval.


Lance Lindsay, executive director of Death Penalty Focus in San Francisco, which lobbies against capital punishment, said the statistics support what he already believes: "Anybody with a little common sense knows that local politics on the ground drives the death penalty."

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