VA DEATH ROW NEWS
Daryl Atkins’ case triggered a landmark decision by the U.S. Supreme Court last year when it ruled 6-3 that the execution of the mentally retarded was unconstitutional. Atkins remains on death row, however, as the ruling also left it up to each state to decide the standards for what constitutes mental retardation.
The Virginia Supreme Court ruled in June of this year that a new jury will be impaneled “for the sole purpose of making a determination of mental retardation,” as this was merely contested, not decided at the previous state trials. Atkins (along with William Jones) was convicted of the 1996 abduction and shooting of airman Eric Nesbitt; only Atkins received a death sentence. State law presumes that defendants are not retarded, so the burden of evidence is on Atkins. The standard does not require proof beyond all reasonable doubt, only that it is more likely than not that the defendant is retarded.
The case will no doubt highlight the inherently problematic process of determining mental retardation. Generally, people with an IQ of below 70 are considered retarded, but this is only one indication. The American Association on Mental Retardation provides the following definition: “Mental retardation is a disability characterized by significant limitations both in intellectual functioning and in adaptive behavior as expressed in conceptual, social, and practical adaptive skills. This disability originates before age 18.” This definition highlights the subjective, and therefore arbitrary, nature of defining an individual as mentally retarded.
Brandon Wayne Hedrick was scheduled for execution on April 3. Due to Hedrick’s last-minute decision to file federal
appeals, a federal judge blocked the execution and granted him a stay. He was returned to Sussex I from the death house at
Greensville Correctional Center.
Hedrick was convicted for the 1997 slaying of Lisa Crider, a young mother who was raped and shot to death in Appomattox County. Hedrick is white, and Crider was black. According to NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund, as of January 1, there had been 820 executions in the U.S. since 1976; only 12 were of whites executed for killing blacks. Hedrick would be the third white Virginian executed for killing a black victim.
In June 2003, Teresa Michelle Lewis became the first woman on Virginia’s
death row since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976.
Lewis was sentenced to death for the murder-for-hire slayings of
her husband, Julian Lewis, and stepson, Charles Lewis.
Each man was shot five times with a shotgun.
As part of an agreement that included providing testimony, the man
accused of shooting Charles Lewis faces life in prison.
The man accused of shooting Julian Lewis faces several capital murder
charges.
If she is put to death, Lewis will be the first woman executed in Virginia since 1912. Women are rare on death row. As of January 1, 2003, there were 52 women on death rows across the country - approximately 1.41 percent of the total death row population.
It is anticipated that Lewis will be held at the Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women, housed in a separate cell from other inmates. Virginia’s death row for males is at the Sussex I State Prison in Waverly.
Darick Demorris Walker was sentenced to death in September 1998 for
the murders of Stanley Roger Beale in 1996 and Clarence Threat in 1997. Walker has always maintained his innocence. Nevertheless, he received a death sentence for the
killing of more than one person within a three-year period, a capital offense
in Virginia. But Walker is mentally retarded;
to follow through with the execution would therefore be a violation of the
U.S. constitution, as decided in Atkins v. Virginia (2002).
Walker’s trial was beset by errors from the beginning. His counsel failed to make any objection to the joined trial of the two wholly unrelated murders; failed to put on an adequate defense, including a failure to challenge highly questionable scientific evidence; failed to do an adequate investigation in preparation for the sentencing phase, which included a failure to determine Walker’s mental retardation. The whole trial, including jury selection, the guilt phase, jury deliberations and sentencing, lasted only two days.
Walker has a long documented history of mental retardation. In the third grade he was placed in special education by the Norfolk public school system; by the time he should have been in sixth grade, he was reading at a third grade level. At eleven, Walker was sent by the public school system to be evaluated by an outside specialist who found his performance on a standardized test to be “similar to what would be expected of the typical six-year-old child…and individuals who are mentally retarded.” His most recent test showed him having an IQ of 61.
Evidence of a low IQ and inability to adapt socially form the bulk of the American Association on Mental Retardation’s (AAMR) definition of mental retardation. The AAMR also states that evidence of the disability arises before the age of 18, which is clearly established by Walker’s school records. Walker’s claim of mental retardation is currently pending in the Federal Court. The federal judge only recently blocked the Commonwealth from setting an execution date of August 20 - highlighting how, even after the Atkins decision, the Commonwealth is acting recklessly in regards to executing the mentally retarded.
The compelling evidence regarding Walker’s mental retardation,
and also the ineffectiveness of his counsel, should at least lead to a commutation
to a life sentence. And, if justice is to be truly served, a re-trial.
Granted
A Stay
Percy Lavar Walton was granted a temporary stay of execution on May 27. He was sentenced to death in 1997 for the murders of an elderly white couple, Elizabeth Hendrick, aged 81, and Jesse Hendrick, aged 80, and a 33-year-old black man, Archie Moore, in Danville in November 1996. He has been on death row since October 31, 1997.
Walton was 18 years old at the time of his crime. There is evidence that he has suffered from schizophrenia, a serious mental illness, since the age of 16. Prison doctors describe him as being totally disoriented and floridly psychotic. They report that Walton “appears to be severely mentally retarded.”
Walton was sentenced to death by the Circuit Court for the City of Danville based on the "future dangerousness" and "vileness" factors that allow imposition of the death penalty. The Supreme Court of Virginia affirmed Walton's death sentence in 1998. In affirming the sentence, the Court noted that part of the evidence proving that Walton would be a future danger was testimony from a cellmate of Walton's while he awaited trial. The cellmate had a well-known reputation as a jailhouse informant, often testifying in other cases with hope of reward for his testimony. Despite this reputation, the cellmate's testimony was relied on by the Supreme Court as proof of future dangerousness.
Walton was scheduled to be executed on May 28, 2003. On May 27, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the stay of execution for Percy Walton. Although the Commonwealth’s mental health experts who were sent to observe Percy Walton reported that he “appears to be severely mentally retarded,” and measured Walton’s IQ at 66, the Attorney General spent the Memorial Day weekend trying to convince the courts to allow Walton’s execution anyway. If the Attorney General has his way in the courts, Virginia will execute Walton, despite the fact that the Commonwealth’s own experts have raised substantial doubt that Walton is even eligible for the death sentence due to his profound mental illness and limited intellectual capacity. Shamefully, the Attorney General can only get his way in the courts by disparaging the observations of the Commonwealth’s very own experts.
The death penalty was recommended for Roy Douglas Inge by a jury in February of this year for the murder of Pittsylvania County Sheriff Deputy Frankie Betterton. He was subsequently sentenced to life without parole by the County Circuit Judge, William Alexander II. The judge’s decision to overrule the jury came in April; Inge spent the time between those decisions on death row.
It took the jury just over an hour to convict Inge, 24 at the time of the crime, and another hour the following day to decide that he should pay with his life. Throughout the trial, Inge, an African American, maintained his innocence for the shooting of Betterton, who was white, but the case had caused great public anger, which probably factored in the swiftness of the decision. The judge’s decision to overrule the jury’s recommendation was also met with great anger in the Danville area, where the crime occurred. An on-line poll in the Danville Register & Bee reported that 77% of those responding felt that death would have been the appropriate penalty, and the same percentage also felt that justice was not served with the life sentence.
Even though Inge’s sentence was commuted, the case still
highlights how public sentiment surrounding a murder can dictate whether
a defendant will receive the death penalty.
Jeffrey Thomas is now serving a life sentence without parole for the
murder of Tara Munsey. Thomas was given a new
trial because his trial lawyers failed to seek a change of venue; because
the case was so highly publicized, it was determined that he couldn’t have
had a fair trial the first time. At the new trial,
Thomas pleaded no contest and was given the new sentence.
He is now at Wallens Ridge State Prison.