Death Penalty News and Developments for the Week of September 9 — September 15, 2019

NEWS — September 10: Texas’ exe­cu­tion of Mark Soliz was the 1505^th exe­cu­tion in the U.S. since the rein­state­ment of the death penal­ty in the 1970s. Texas has car­ried out 37.5% of all exe­cu­tions dur­ing that peri­od. It was the 15^th exe­cu­tion in the U.S. in 2019, and the 6^th in Texas. Nine of the 17 pend­ing exe­cu­tions sched­uled in the U.S. in the rest of 2019 are in Texas.

NEWS — September 12: The U.S Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit has grant­ed a new tri­al to death-row pris­on­er William Leroy Barnes based on mis­con­duct by one of the jurors in his case. The court ruled that a juror had
​“improp­er­ly con­sult­ed with her pas­tor about whether she could vote to impose the death penal­ty with­out run­ning afoul of her reli­gious beliefs” and, when he said she could do so, she taint­ed the entire jury pan­el by pass­ing on his reli­gious guid­ance dur­ing their deliberations.

NEWS — September 11: The California Supreme Court has declined to review peti­tions filed by defen­dants in two unre­lat­ed Los Angeles County cap­i­tal cas­es seek­ing to halt their death-penal­ty pros­e­cu­tions while the statewide mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions is in effect. In orders unac­com­pa­nied by explana­to­ry opin­ions, the court per­mit­ted the pros­e­cu­tions of Jade Douglas Harris and Cleamon Demone Johnson (pic­tured) to go for­ward as capital trials.

NEWS — September 11: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit has denied habeas cor­pus relief to Arkansas death-row pris­on­er Justin Anderson. Judge Jonathan Kobes dis­sent­ed from the denial of penal­ty relief, writ­ing that he would have found penal­ty-phase coun­sel inef­fec­tive for fail­ing to inves­ti­gate and present evi­dence of Anderson’s men­tal and emo­tion­al impair­ments aris­ing out of fetal alcohol exposure.