Death Penalty News and Developments for December 9 — December 22, 2019

NEWS — December 20: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit has ruled against Ohio death-row pris­on­ers in their chal­lenge to the state’s lethal injec­tion process. The rul­ing came in con­nec­tion with an appeal by Warren Keith Henness of an Ohio dis­trict court’s deci­sion deny­ing his request for an injunc­tion and for a stay of execution.

NEWS — December 20: Ohio Governor Mike DeWine has grant­ed a reprieve to has grant­ed a reprieve to Melvin Bonnell, resched­ul­ing Bonnell’s Feb. 12, 2020 exe­cu­tion date to March 18, 2021. The Governor’s office indi­cat­ed in a state­ment that he issued the reprieve because of ​“ongo­ing prob­lems” in obtain­ing exe­cu­tion drugs ​“with­out endan­ger­ing oth­er Ohioans.” Pharmaceutical com­pa­nies have indi­cat­ed that they will stop sell­ing med­i­cines to the state alto­geth­er if Ohio takes drugs that were intend­ed for med­ical pur­pos­es and diverts them to the state prison sys­tem for use in executions.

NEWS — December 19: On direct appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit has affirmed the fed­er­al death sen­tence imposed on Charles Michael Hall in the Western District of Missouri. Hall’s lawyers did not appeal any guilt-stage issues in his case. Hall and his co-defen­dant Wesley Coonce were con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death for the mur­der of anoth­er pris­on­er in a fed­er­al pen­i­ten­tiary in Missouri. The appeals court upheld Coonce’s con­vic­tion and death sen­tence on July 25, 2019. Both men still have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to seek fed­er­al habeas cor­pus review of their con­vic­tions and death sentences. 

NEWS — December 18: A divid­ed U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has denied Arizona’s motion for en banc review of the pan­el deci­sion over­turn­ing the death sen­tence imposed on George Kayer. A pan­el of the cir­cuit had pre­vi­ous­ly ruled on May 13, 2019 that Kayer’s tri­al lawyers, who did vir­tu­al­ly no work to pre­pare for the penal­ty phase, had pro­vid­ed inef­fec­tive assis­tance by fail­ing to inves­ti­gate and present avail­able iti­gat­ing evi­dence that could have spared Kayer’s life.

NEWS — December 18: The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has vot­ed unan­i­mous­ly to over­turn the death sen­tence imposed on Cesar Fierro in 1979. The court re-opened an appeal Fierro had filed in 2003 in which it denied his claim that the jury instruc­tions pro­vid­ed by the tri­al court pre­vent­ed the jury from con­sid­er­ing and giv­ing effect to mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence Fierro had pre­sent­ed as grounds to spare his life. The court acknowl­edged that sub­se­quent U.S. Supreme Court deci­sions made clear that its pri­or deci­sion in the case had been incor­rect and it grant­ed Fierro a new sentencing hearing.

NEWS — December 18: The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has denied post-con­vic­tion relief to Juan Balderas, uphold­ing his con­vic­tion and death sen­tence. Balderas, who has main­tained his inno­cence, has argued that pros­e­cu­tors pre­sent­ed false tes­ti­mo­ny against him and with­held excul­pa­to­ry evi­dence from the defense and that the pho­to array at which a wit­ness iden­ti­fied him was unconstitutionally suggestive.