Capital Case Roundup — Death Penalty Court Decisions the Week of July 202020

NEWS (7/​21 & 7/​22/​20) — Texas: Split pan­els of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit have upheld the con­vic­tions and death sen­tences imposed on Erica Sheppard (pic­tured) and Anibal Canales.

The tri­al court had reversed Sheppards death sen­tence on grounds that her lawyer had pro­vid­ed inef­fec­tive assis­tance in the penal­ty phase of tri­al, but the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals reversed, say­ing that counsel’s min­i­mal pre­sen­ta­tion of mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence had not been prej­u­di­cial. The U.S. fed­er­al dis­trict court then over­turned her death sen­tence for counsel’s inef­fec­tive­ness, but by a 2 – 1 vote, the Fifth Circuit reversed. Judges Jerry Smith and Catharina Haynes agreed that Sheppard had been pro­vid­ed defi­cient rep­re­sen­ta­tion but upheld her death sen­tence on the grounds that the Texas appeals court prej­u­dice rul­ing was not unreasonable. 

In dis­sent, Senior Judge Carolyn Dineen King not­ed that Sheppard was sen­tenced to death by a jury that did not know that she has brain dam­age and the cog­ni­tive abil­i­ty of a four­teen-year-old. And the jury heard only iso­lat­ed snip­pets of the exten­sive abuse and trau­ma that she suf­fered through­out her life. Unlike the major­i­ty,” she wrote, I can­not shrug off these impor­tant mat­ters as mere cumu­la­tive evi­dence. I there­fore agree with the state tri­al court and the dis­trict court below that Sheppard was prej­u­diced by her counsel’s defi­cient performance.”

The three judges also denied a claim that pros­e­cu­tors had dis­crim­i­na­to­ri­ly exclud­ed African-American jurors from serv­ing in Sheppard’s case.

A dif­fer­ent pan­el of the cir­cuit court divid­ed 2 – 1 on whether Anibal Canales had received inef­fec­tive rep­re­sen­ta­tion in the penal­ty phase of his cap­i­tal tri­al. Judge Haynes, joined by Judge Leslie Southwick, ruled that the aggra­vat­ing evi­dence in the case out­weighed the exten­sive mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence Canales’ lawyer failed to inves­ti­gate and present. 

Dissenting, Judge Patrick Higginbotham wrote: The State put it best: It’s an incred­i­bly sad trib­ute that when a man’s life is on the line, about the only good thing we can say about him is he’s a good artist.’ That sharp sar­casm of the prosecutor’s jury argu­ment had bite only because defense coun­sel left Andy Canales’s sto­ry untold. The jury heard only of Canales’s crimes and artis­tic abil­i­ties, not of a trag­ic child­hood rife with vio­lence, sex­u­al abuse, pover­ty, neglect, and home­less­ness, nor of a man beset by PTSD, a fail­ing heart, and the dan­gers of prison life.” Writing that “[o]ur adver­sar­i­al sys­tem works only when it is adver­sar­i­al,” Judge Higginbotham said defense coun­sel for Canales had whol­ly failed in his duty” to present a case for life.


NEWS (7/​22/​20) — South Carolina: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit has denied habeas cor­pus relief to South Carolina death-row pris­on­er Freddie Owens.

Owens had twice been uncon­sti­tu­tion­al­ly tried and sen­tenced to death. The fed­er­al appeals court ruled that Owens’ court-appoint­ed coun­sel in his third cap­i­tal sen­tenc­ing tri­al and his ini­tial state post­con­vic­tion pro­ceed­ing were not inef­fec­tive, despite fail­ing to inves­ti­gate and present evi­dence of brain dam­age, includ­ing frontal lobe abnor­mal­i­ties in his brain that habeas cor­pus coun­sel had doc­u­ment­ed through neu­roimag­ing tests.


NEWS (7/​22/​20) — Ohio: The Ohio Supreme Court upheld the con­vic­tion and death sen­tence of Lance Hundley on direct appeal.

In December 2016, a tri­al court in Youngstown deemed Hundley men­tal­ly com­pe­tent to stand tri­al. Hundley repeat­ed­ly waived his right to coun­sel at var­i­ous stages of his tri­al, includ­ing at a hear­ing over the sup­pres­sion of evi­dence and lat­er in the penal­ty phase of his tri­al. After waiv­ing coun­sel, he then pre­sent­ed no mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence. In affirm­ing his death sen­tence, the court stressed: There is noth­ing in Hundley’s back­ground that is mit­i­gat­ing, and he pre­sent­ed no mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence. … Mitigating fac­tors are nonexistent.”

Hundley may now either peti­tion the U.S. Supreme Court to review his case or begin the process of state post-con­vic­tion appeals.


Sources

Peter Hayes, Death Penalty OK Though Jury Not Told of Accused’s Brain Damage, Bloomberg Law, July 23, 2020; Jacklyn Wille, Death Row Inmate Loses Appeal Over Brain Abnormality Evidence, Bloomberg Law, July 23, 2020; Kathleen Dailey, Texas Man’s Death Sentence Upheld by Divided Fifth Circuit, Bloomberg Law, July 22, 2020; Joe Gorman, Ohio Supreme Court upholds death sen­tence for man who fatal­ly beat Youngstown woman, WKBN News, July 222020.

Read the court’s opin­ions in Sheppard v. Davis, Canales v. Davis, Owens v. Stirling, and State v. Hundley.