Sidebar With an Expert Capital Litigator
Virginia executes more people in this country than any other state than Texas, so the statistics seem to sway us toward a prediction that Governor Tim Kaine will allow the upcoming execution of John Muhammad, the DC Sniper.
And Kaine is the only barrier betweeen John Muhammad and death.
That’s because the United States Supreme…
Monday, the Supreme Court heard argument in the Bies case (see 04/27/09 post), and the very next day issued its opinion in Cone v. Bell, 555 U.S. ___ (2009), both capital punishment cases where the defendant argued a diminished capacity of some sort. In today’s case, there was an intentional hiding of the ball by the State and a definite due process problem.
Gary Cone was a known drug addict who murdered two people.
It is undisputed that Gary Cone was a Vietnam veteran who returned home to Memphis, Tennessee, and failed to cope well with civilian life. One Saturday morning in 1980, Gary Cone robbed a jewelry store – obviously, not very well – and was promptly pursued by local police in what turned into a high speed chase.
Veering into a residential neighborhood, Cone abandoned his car and shot both a police officer and a Good Samaritan who tried to stop him as Cone fled on foot. On the hunt for another getaway car, Cone tried to carjack someone and when they refused to give them the keys, he tried to shoot them, too, only to find he was out of bullets. By this time, helicopters were flying overhead and the scene was escalating to a frantic pace. (You’ve seen the reality TV shows like COPS, you can visualize these events.)
Somehow that Saturday afternoon, Cone got away. No one could find him. However, early the next morning, Gary Cone was still in the neighborhood – knocking on the door of an elderly couple, Shipley and Cleopatra Todd. He asked to use their phone; Cleo Todd refused and slammed the door on Cone. Cleo called the cops, and still Cone could not be found.
The tragedy occurred later that same day. Cone returned to the Todd home, forced himself into their house, and beat the two senior citizens to death before tearing their house apart. He shaved there, got himself to the Memphis airport, and was busted while robbing a drug store in Pompano Beach, Florida a couple of days later.
Vietnam Vet Cone Asserted an Insanity Defense – He Didn’t Contest His Actions
Vietnam vet Gary Cone was arrested, tried, and convicted of the Todds’ murder. He never challenged evidence that showed he committed these horrific acts. What he asserted as his defense was his mental illness: Cone’s defense team brought forth evidence to show that Cone suffered from chronic amphetamine psychosis, a mental disorder caused by excessive drug abuse.
Experts testified that the drug use began while Cone was serving in Vietnam, where he was using “horrific” quantities of drugs while dealing with the bodies of dead soldiers. The mental illness caused by this drug use created a level of paranoia and a disorder including hallucinations that would keep Cone from understanding or being able to conform to everyday life and the boundaries imposed by Tennessee law.
In sum, the entirety of Cone’s defense was mental illness. He was legally insane when the crimes were committed.
Continue Reading US Supreme Court Finds Prosecution Intentionally Violated Due Process in 20 Yr Old Death Penalty Case
This month, the United States Supreme Court declined to hear a well-watched Florida case, Thompson v. McNeil (08-7369), where William Lee Thompson, sentenced to death in a Florida court back in 1976, requested their consideration of the question: does extended delay of the sentence of death amount to cruel (if not unusual) punishment and therefore violate the 8th Amendment?
Well, the High Court did fail to grant writ (opinion), but that doesn’t mean we don’t have a lot to consider from the opinion that did spring forth. Let’s ponder the following:
Justice John Paul Stevens’ Statement
First, I’ve read that Justice John Paul Stevens issued a dissent in this case; however, technically it was not a dissent but a statement. And, a statement that conforms to his longstanding position that the the death penalty is wrong. (Stevens already called for an end to the death penalty.)
In it, Stevens wrote, “[o]ur experience during the past three decades has demonstrated that delays in state-sponsored killings are inescapable and that executing defendants after such is unacceptably cruel,” to which Justice Stephen Breyer gave his support in a formal dissent from the denial of certiorari.
Justice Stephen Breyer’s Dissent
In his dissent, Breyer went into the appellate pathways that the Williamson case has taken over the past 30+ years, including such considerations as the fact that Williamson’s spent over half his life on Death Row while the appeals have taken a life all their own, and the reality that Williamson’s accomplice – who might have been more culpable than Williamson in the underlying crime – was not sentenced to death. Interesting point.
Justice Clarence Thomas’ Concurrence
Justice Clarence Thomas, meanwhile, wrote his own concurrence to the Court’s denial of certiorari. In it, Thomas opined “”[i]t is the crime and not the punishment imposed by the jury or the delay in execution that was ‘unacceptably cruel, …” and thereafter provided extensive details on the underlying crime for which Thompson was convicted to support his position. (It is not disputed that the crime for which Thompson was convicted was shocking.)
Why Isn’t This Cruel – If Not Unusual? Oh, and What About the Budget?
Continue Reading U.S. Supreme Court nixes hearing Thompson v. McNeil (08-7369) – but does 32 years in a Death Row cell amount to cruel and unusual punishment?