Texas set to resume executions this week
Nine-month hiatus to end after Supreme Court upheld lethal injection as a proper method of capital punishment.
By Michael Graczyk
ASSOCIATED PRESS

Monday, June 02, 2008

HUNTSVILLE - The nation's busiest death chamber [Is there some handbook for anti-death penalty reporters that requires this opening phrase for any story related to the DP?] reopens this week after a nearly nine-month hiatus with the scheduled lethal injection of a former part-time car-wash worker for killing a suburban Houston woman and her son 17 years ago.


Details.

EXECUTION STAY
Texas inmate wins reprieve
Action comes 90 minutes before state set to resume capital punishment after U.S. Supreme Court-induced lull.
By Michael Graczyk
ASSOCIATED PRESS

Wednesday, June 04, 2008

HUNTSVILLE � A Texas death row inmate received a reprieve from execution about 90 minutes before he could have been put to death Tuesday after lawyers questioned whether the state's lethal injection procedures were legal.


Details.

From the Statesman:

"Sonnier was condemned for the 1991 deaths of Melody Flowers, 27, and her young son, Patrick. She was stabbed, beaten with a hammer until the tool's handle broke and strangled. Her child was stabbed eight times. Their bodies were dumped in a bathtub."

There is virtually no difference in the Kentucky and Texas methods of execution.

So help me out, I for some reason don't have the greatest of trust in the media's version of events, but is this an attack on the constitutionality based on the Texas Constitution or an attempt to relitigate the Kentucky case through Texas?

The blogger Bayou City Madman made an interesting request. He requested that the anti-death penalty faction please advise what method of execution is not cruel and unusual, adding as an aside that he bet the suggested methods would not include bludgeoning with a claw hammer.

Here's his blog and a quite well written and concise article on Sonnier, the death penalty and those who oppose it.

http://bayoucitymadman.blogspot.com/2008/06/and-were-back-on-track.html

And here's a quote from a Chronicle story about the murder Sonnier was convicted of, which puts Madman's claw hammer remark in context:

"She had been bludgeoned with a claw hammer, raped, strangled and stabbed. Her body was dumped in the partially filled bathtub of her Humble apartment. The lifeless body of her toddler, Patrick, also stabbed, lay on top of her."

AND

"The day of the murders, neighbors reported seeing Sonnier with a wounded hand wrapped in a bloody towel. When he answered his door, Sonnier's first words to police were, "I didn't hurt her."

In his apartment, where Sonnier lived with his girlfriend, police found Melody Flowers' bloody blouse and a blood-soaked towel that also belonged to her."

from http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/5800277.html

Top Texas court won't block execution this week

By MICHAEL GRACZYK Associated Press Writer
2008 The Associated Press

HUNTSVILLE, Texas - The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals on Monday cleared the way for executions to resume in the nation's most active death penalty state when it turned aside an appeal that challenged the constitutionality of lethal injection procedures.

In a ruling late Monday, the state's highest criminal court refused to stop the scheduled execution of Karl Eugene Chamberlain, set to die Wednesday for the rape-slaying of a woman in Dallas in 1991.


Details.

To read the lead opinion denying a stay, click here. The vote was essentially 6-3. Judges Johnson, Holcomb and Price would have delayed everything for a full trial to see that the Texas system is identical to the Kentucky system of execution.

[This message was edited by JB on 06-10-08 at .]

Court lifts stay of execution for Sonnier

By ROSANNA RUIZ
Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle

The Court of Criminal Appeals has lifted a stay of execution for a man who was to be the first executed in Texas this year.

Derrick Juan Sonnier, 40, was almost two hours away from entering Texas' death chamber a week ago when the state's highest criminal court issued a stay.


Details.

"If the best thing I can do for my victim is die, I'll do that," Chamberlain, 37, said recently from death row outside Livingston. [Scheduled for execution tonight.]

Karl Eugene Chamberlain, with a big smile on his face, addressed relatives of his victim, staring directly at the son, parents and brother of Felecia Prechtl as they stood just a few feet away, looking through a glass window.

"I want you all to know I love you with all my heart. I want to thank you for being here," he said. Prechtl's son was 5 when he found his mother's body in their bathroom.

"We are here to honor the life of Felecia Prechtl, a woman I didn't even know, and celebrate my death," he said. "I am so terribly sorry. I wish I could die more than once."

Chamberlain said he understood if his victim's relatives would like to hurt him, but he wanted them to know it was his memories of her and her life that contributed to his remorse.

"I love you. God have mercy on us all," he said as the drugs began taking effect. Still grinning, he blurted out: "Please do not hate anybody because ... "


Details (of last words).

Killer's execution set for next month

By ROSANNA RUIZ
Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle

Condemned double-killer Derrick Juan Sonnier, who was spared from death last week by a last-minute court reprieve, has been scheduled to die by lethal injection July 23.


Details.

Police: Officer kills man who beat child to death

TURLOCK, Calif. (AP) -- Police killed a 27-year-old man as he kicked, punched and stomped a toddler to death despite other people's attempts to stop him on a dark, country road, authorities said.

[If still have any doubt that evil truly exists in this world and the DP serves to restrain evil, read details below.]

Details.

Meanwhile, Oklahoma executed its first death row inmate since August.


Details.

SC inmate who killed 2 executed by electric chair

By MEG KINNARD
Associated Press Writer

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -- A South Carolina man convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend's parents 14 years ago was executed in the state's electric chair Friday night after a last-ditch effort to halt the sentence was denied by the U.S. Supreme Court.

James Earl Reed was pronounced dead at 11:27 p.m. Friday in the state's death chamber in Columbia. He did not issue a final statement.


Details.

[Reed chose the electric chair over lethal injection.]

Texas executions appear back on pace after high court-imposed pause

Web Posted: 06/28/2008 11:54 PM CDT

By Graeme Zielinski
gzielinski
With the execution earlier this month of Karl Chamberlain, after a de facto death penalty moratorium here that lasted about nine months, the state appears ready to resume its prolific pace of putting offenders to death.

The hiatus, which came as the U.S. Supreme Court reviewed the question of whether lethal injections violated the constitutional prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment, coincided with the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals' own review of the state's protocols for injection at the Huntsville death house.

As it stands, 14 men have been assigned execution dates for this year, including Kevin Watts, a Bexar County man set to die Oct. 16 as punishment for a triple murder in 2002 at a San Antonio restaurant.

Texas executed 26 people last year, and lawyers and advocates see no reason, beyond case-by-case appeals, that executions won't continue apace. Chamberlain became the 406th person put to death since the state resumed executions in 1982.


Details.

[Can you find any actual news in this story? Same stock use of provocative language, suggesting the "State" somehow derives pleasure from executions. Same stock quotes from anti-DP people, claiming that which is not objectively true. When, in fact, the news is that prosecutors, judges, and criminal justice officials are simply enforcing a law approved by the public in overwhelming numbers.]

Judge halts Bower's execution in slayings of 4

LIVINGSTON, Texas - A state district judge has signed an order halting the date of the lethal injection execution of Texas's longest-serving death row prisoner, a Dallas television station reported.

WFAA-TV reported Wednesday Lester Bower's July 22, 2008 execution date was stayed by state District Judge Jim Fallon on Tuesday. Fallon's order grants Bower's prolonged request for a court to decide whether cigarette butts and strands of hair found at the murder scene, will undergo DNA testing, the station reported.


Details.

HUNTSVILLE, Texas � A very apologetic Carlton Turner was executed Thursday night for the slayings of his adoptive parents a decade ago at their suburban Dallas home.

"I've been sorry for the last 10 years. I wish you could accept my apology," he said to an uncle who watched impassively through a window. "I know you can't give your forgiveness. It's OK. I understand. I know I caused a lot of pain."

Turner said he hoped his family could come to terms with what he did. "I accept the responsibility. I take this penalty as a man. I am sorry."
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/hotstories/5882247.html

Killer executed for murders of Humble mom and baby
Execution has little solace for victim's relatives
By ROSANNA RUIZ
Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle

HUNTSVILLE Relatives of a slain Humble woman and her toddler hoped Derrick Sonnier would offer a hint of remorse Wednesday as he was strapped to a gurney inside Texas' death house.

Sonnier never said a word as he was executed for the 1991 murders of Melody Flowers, 27, and Patrick Flowers, 2.


Details.

A deathbed presidential endorsement?

PARCHMAN � Before he died Wednesday evening, death row inmate Dale Leo Bishop apologized to his victim's family, thanked America and urged people to vote for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

"For those who oppose the death penalty and want to see it end, our best bet is to vote for Barack Obama because his supporters have been working behind the scenes to end this practice," Bishop said.

Bishop, 34, was pronounced dead by lethal injection at 6:14 p.m. - the second inmate put to death in Mississippi in two months. Earl Wesley Berry, 49, was executed May 21.

The execution culminated a flurry of last-minute appeals that began late last month seeking to save Bishop's life.

A Lee County jury convicted Bishop in 2000 of participating in the murder of Marcus Gentry, who was beaten to death in December 1998 with a claw hammer. His body was found along a logging road near Saltillo.

http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080724/NEWS/807240387&referrer=FRONTPAGECAROUSEL

Sounds like a good reason to vote McCain if I've ever heard one...