Texas executes oldest member of death row, Tennessee postpones its execution

The 4th Execution of 2022

Texas executed its oldest death row inmate by lethal injection, shortly after the governor of Tennessee granted a temporary reprieve in what would have been the state's first execution since the pandemic began, reported CNN.

Carl Wayne Buntion, 78, was executed at 6:39 p.m. CT on April 21, 2022, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

Buntion, who was the first inmate in Texas to be executed this year, was put on death row after being convicted of fatally shooting 37-year-old Houston police motorcycle officer James Irby after a traffic stop in 1990, according to the Texas Department of Corrections.

In June 1990, Buntion and John Killingsworth were pulled over by Irby for a traffic violation, documents show. Buntion shot the 19-year veteran Houston officer once in the head and then shot him twice more in the back as he lay on the ground.

Buntion, a former auto mechanic, was captured inside a nearby warehouse after firing at three additional people, including two witnesses, while fleeing on foot, according to state documents. Buntion, who had an extensive criminal history, had been on parole for about six weeks when he killed Irby, the documents show.

Killingsworth was not charged in connection with the crime, according to documents.

A spiritual advisor was present at Buntion's execution, nearly two months after the US Supreme Court ruled that the death row inmate could have his spiritual adviser pray aloud and "lay hands" on him during his execution.

The ruling relates not to Buntion but to a different death row inmate, John Henry Ramirez, and establishes new guidelines that will govern similar requests in other prisons across the country. The court agreed to block the execution of Ramirez in 2021 while the justices considered his requests concerning his pastor.

At the time, policy in Texas allowed a pastor in the death chamber, but the pastor could not speak up or physically touch the inmate.

"This was the first execution in which an inmate's spiritual advisor was allowed to touch and pray during the execution, and there were no issues that took place with that," said Jason Clark, chief of staff for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

Meanwhile, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee granted a temporary reprieve in the execution of Oscar Franklin Smith due to an "oversight in preparation for lethal injection," he announced just moments before the scheduled 7 p.m. execution.

Lee said in a tweet that the execution would not move forward.

"I am granting a temporary reprieve while we address Tennessee Department of Correction protocol. Further details will be released when available," the tweet said.

Smith, 72, was scheduled to be executed for the 1989 murders of his wife and her two minor children in Nashville. He would have been the first inmate to be executed in the state since the Covid-19 pandemic began.

The state has not performed an execution since February 2020, when Nicholas Sutton was put to death by electric chair.

Earlier this week, Lee said he would not intervene and grant clemency to Smith. The state's Court of Criminal Appeals last week denied Smith's motion to reopen his case and his motion to have a DNA analysis review of the case. On Monday, the Tennessee Supreme Court denied hearing his appeal.

CNN has reached out to the governor's office, the department of corrections and Smith's attorney for more information.

The pandemic delayed executions in many states, including Tennessee, though annual execution numbers have been generally decreasing since the early 2000s, according to an analysis from the Death Penalty Information Center.

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Texas prosecutor opposed to the death penalty rescinds execution date

A Texas prosecutor has called for the execution date to be revoked for a death row prisoner who successfully petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to allow his religious adviser to put hands on him during his lethal injection, reported UPI.

John Ramirez, 37, was scheduled earlier this week to be executed Oct. 5 for the 2004 murder of Pablo Castro in Corpus Christi, Texas.

Nueces County District Attorney Mark Gonzalez asked for the execution date to be withdrawn in a court filing. He said his assistant district attorney requested the execution date without his knowledge.

In the motion, Gonzalez said he "has the firm belief that the death penalty is unethical and should not be imposed on Mr. Ramirez or any other person while" he is in office. He said the assistant district attorney was unaware of his opinion on the issue.

Seth Kretzer, Ramirez's attorney, said Gonzalez made the "correct legal judgment" not to proceed with his client's execution.

"This is welcome news on the eve of Good Friday, Easter and Passover informs my belief that the litigation of Mr. Ramirez's case this last year has touched some small part of America's soul," Kretzer said in a statement to UPI.

"I look forward to Judge [Bobby] Galvan's order withdrawing the death warrant, which was signed only two days ago. Otherwise, will immediately file a mandamus with the Court of Criminal Appeals in Austin."

Gonzalez's request comes less than a month after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Ramirez's favor on a religious liberty issue. It said the state likely violated Ramirez's rights when it denied his request to have his pastor in the execution chamber, touching him and praying over him during his execution.

In 2019, the TDCJ banned chaplains from entering the state's execution chambers when the Supreme Court stayed an execution after Texas declined to allow an inmate to have a Buddhist spiritual adviser with him during the lethal injection.

The state lifted the ban in April 2021, revising its policy to allow death row prisoners to designate a corrections chaplain or other spiritual adviser of their choosing to be present inside the death chamber, but no touching or praying.

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SCOTUS opens door to executing intellectually disabled Missouri man

Last-minute court intervention was the last obstacle to the execution of Ernest Johnson, a Missouri man convicted of killing three convenience store workers during a closing-time robbery nearly 28 years ago, reported ABC News.

Johnson, 61, was scheduled to die by injection tonight at the state prison in Bonne Terre, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of St. Louis. It would be the seventh U.S. execution this year.

Johnson's attorney, Jeremy Weis, said executing Johnson would violate the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits executing intellectually disabled people. On Monday, he asked the U.S. Supreme Court for a stay of execution.

“This is not a close case — Mr. Johnson is intellectually disabled,” the court filing stated.

The Missouri Supreme Court in August, and again on Friday, refused to step in despite Johnson's history of scoring extremely low on IQ tests, dating back to childhood. Weis said Johnson also was born with fetal alcohol syndrome and lost about one-fifth of his brain tissue when a benign tumor was removed in 2008.

Republican Gov. Michael Parson on Monday declined to grant clemency despite the urging of several people, including the pope. A representative for Pope Francis wrote in a letter to Parson last week that the pope “wishes to place before you the simple fact of Mr. Johnson’s humanity and the sacredness of all human life.” Parson announced Monday he would not intervene.

It wasn't the first time a pope has sought to intervene in a Missouri execution. In 1999, during his visit to St. Louis, Pope John Paul II persuaded Democratic Gov. Mel Carnahan to grant clemency to Darrell Mease, weeks before Mease was to be put to death for a triple killing. Carnahan, who died in 2000, was a Baptist, as is Parson.

In 2018, Pope Francis Francis changed church teaching to say capital punishment can never be sanctioned because it constitutes an “attack” on human dignity. Catholic leaders have been outspoken opponents of the death penalty in many states.

Racial justice activists and two Missouri congressional members — Democratic U.S. Reps. Cori Bush of St. Louis and Emmanuel Cleaver of Kansas City —have also spoke out in support of Johnson, who is Black. Bush planned to attend a prayer vigil near the prison on Tuesday.

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Ohio legislature looks at abolishing the death penalty

Ohio’s governor continues to issue reprieves of execution for inmates on death row in the state as lawmakers reconvene in Columbus to consider banning the punishment in the future, reported ABC13 in Toledo.

Earlier this month, Gov. Mike DeWine pushed back the dates of four executions scheduled to take place in the first half of 2022. He previously issued reprieves for all executions scheduled in 2021.

No inmates have been put to death during his tenure as governor. DeWine halted the use of lethal injection, the only legal execution method in the state, due to concerns that the drugs used in the process could cause “severe pain and needless suffering.”

Lawmakers in the Senate introduced a bipartisan bill earlier this year to outlaw the practice, led by Sen. Nickie Antonio (D-Lakewood). A nearly identical bill was also introduced in the House.

State senators heard testimony in favor of banning the death penalty earlier this year. Now, back from their summer break, lawmakers in the House heard similar testimony on the bill moving through their chamber.

An aide to Sen. Antonio told 13abc that the senator believes the legislation will pass out of the Senate and move to the House, instead of the other way around, “but frankly movement in either chamber to advance the bill would be progress,” she said.

Marg Godsey, with the Ohio Innocence Project, was among those who testified Thursday in the House. He shared the story of one of his clients, Ricky Jackson.

Jackson spent nearly four decades in prison after he was sentenced to death for the 1975 murder of a businessman in Cleveland. He was 19 when he was sentenced, without physical evidence, and only the eyewitness account of a 12-year-old boy. That witness recanted his testimony in 2014, leading to the dismissal of Jackson’s case.

“The risk of convicting an innocent person is real,” Godsey said.

Ohio currently has 133 inmates on death row. Many have been there for decades.

In a report this year on capital crimes, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost called the state’s system time-consuming, costly and lethargic.

Members of Ohio’s faith community agree and testified Thursday that capital punishment is inhumane. 

“Executions only exacerbate the cycle of death, while they erode the state’s moral credibility,” said Jack Sullivan Jr., the Executive Director of the Ohio Council of Churches.

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Death row reprieve for woman in federal prison

A ruling by a federal judge to delay the execution of the only woman on federal death row could push the new date into the early days of the administration of President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr., who has said he would work to end federal capital punishment, reported the New York Times.

The woman, Lisa Montgomery, had been scheduled to be executed on Dec. 8, but that date was delayed after two of her lawyers tested positive for the coronavirus shortly after traveling to a federal prison in Texas to visit her in November.

Should Ms. Montgomery’s life be spared as a result of the series of delays caused by the infection of her lawyers, it would be a rare reprieve for a prisoner from a virus that has swept through prisons, infecting inmates crammed into shared spaces.

But if the Department of Justice appeals the decision, a higher court would most likely overturn it. Since the Supreme Court paved the way in June for federal executions to proceed after a 17-year hiatus, the court has been largely unreceptive to requests from federal inmates scheduled for execution seeking clemency.

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PA Gov. Wolf orders DOC to grant temporary reprieves to inmates due to COVID-19

Under the authority granted to him by the Pennsylvania Constitution and the Emergency Management Services Code, Governor Tom Wolf today ordered Department of Corrections officials to establish a Temporary Program to Reprieve Sentences of Incarceration to help aid the department in the transfer of qualifying individuals to community corrections facilities or home confinement amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Wolf Administration continues to take every possible action – and asks all Pennsylvanians to do the same – to help stop the spread of COVID-19. These actions, including those in the state corrections system, will save lives, help stop the spread of the virus and avoid overwhelming our already-burdened health care system.

“We can reduce our non-violent prison population and leave fewer inmates at risk for contracting COVID-19 while maintaining public safety with this program,” Gov. Wolf said. “I am pleased to direct the Department of Corrections to begin the process to release vulnerable and non-violent inmates at or nearing their release dates in an organized way that maintain supervision post-release and ensures home and health care plans are in place for all reentrants.”

The Temporary Program to Reprieve Sentences of Incarceration Program only applies to state prison inmates who have been identified as being non-violent and who otherwise would be eligible for release within the next 9 months or who are considered at high risk for complications of coronavirus and are within 12 months of their release.

“Just as everyone in the community is dealing with COVID-19, the state prison system is doing the same,” Corrections Sec. John Wetzel said. “We must reduce our inmate population to be able to manage this virus. Without this temporary program, we are risking the health, and potentially lives, of employees and inmates. We can safely release individuals to the community to reduce their vulnerability and allow the department to successfully manage COVID-19.

“Without any current legislation, we are moving forward with the understanding that future legislation could further advance these efforts.”

As of this morning, there are 11 COVID-19 cases at one prison, SCI Phoenix in Montgomery County, but concern for cases spreading to other facilities is another reason for the expedited release of eligible inmates.

Under the temporary reprieve program, approximately 1,500 to 1,800 inmates would be eligible, although given the reentry challenges of ensuring connection to the health care and behavioral health system, housing and food security, the number will likely be less than the eligible pool.

Vulnerable inmates will include inmates aged 65 or older; anyone with an autoimmune disorder; pregnant inmates; anyone with a serious, chronic medical condition such as heart disease, diabetes, chronic respiratory disease, bone marrow or organ transplantation, severe obesity, kidney disease, liver disease,[and] cancer; or another medical condition that places them at higher risk for complications of coronavirus as defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The releases could begin as early as Tuesday, April 14.

Sec. Wetzel stressed that a thorough reentry component has been developed to ensure inmates will be successful.

“While we need to release inmates to protect them and to allow us space to mitigate the impact of the virus in our system, we also know that we need to prepare inmates for release,” Sec. Wetzel said. “Our reentry plans will include several days of release planning with the inmate, preparing and connecting the inmate to treatment programs in the community, release transportation and a complete medical screening to ensure that we are not releasing sick inmates. We’ll also provide them with an appropriate medication supply and connect them to medical providers in the community.”

While on temporary reprieve, individuals will be monitored similarly to parolees and will be supervised by parole agents. Upon expiration of the order, individuals would be returned to prison to complete any remaining portion of their sentences.

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PA governor has ability to remove thousands of vulnerable people from state prison

Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf most likely has the ability to remove thousands of the most vulnerable people from state prison with the stroke of his pen as COVID-19 spreads across the state, reported The Appeal. But he is not using that authority.

In an email obtained by The Appeal and sent to a spokesperson at the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections (DOC), Anne Cornick, deputy general counsel for the state Office of General Counsel, said the agency reviewed whether Wolf has the authority to issue reprieves—temporary suspensions of prison sentences. The office, which advises the governor and other executive agencies on legal matters, determined that Wolf “could probably do it,” Cornick wrote, but “it was not the preference” to use the reprieve power.

The email was part of an internal discussion about how to respond to questions from The Appeal regarding Wolf’s ability to grant reprieves. Cornick directed the DOC spokesperson to avoid discussing the option in its response. “I think we want to give an answer that doesn’t answer directly the reprieve questions,” Cornick wrote. 

Neither Cornick nor the governor’s office responded to a request for comment. The DOC did not respond to a request for comment, but lawyers for the department asserted that the emails obtained by The Appeal were covered under attorney-client privilege.

Reprieves are a form of clemency, but they do not go as far as commutations, which permanently reduce a criminal sentence, and pardons, which absolve a person of criminal wrongdoing.

Although Wolf has previously used reprieves to delay executions, Ben Notterman, a research fellow at New York University’s Center on the Administration of Criminal Law, told The Appeal that the power is much more expansive and largely unchecked in Pennsylvania. 

“I’m sure there are logistical and public health-related considerations about the manner in which we remove people, but there don’t seem to be any legal (or moral) ones,” Notterman said in an email. “And it should be done immediately, while we are still able to limit COVID-19’s spread.”

The state Constitution gives the governor the sole authority to grant reprieves, commutations, and pardons. However, the governor must receive approval from the state Board of Pardons before issuing commutations or pardons. 

This restriction is not placed on reprieves. 

“The current COVID-19 crisis illustrates precisely why reprieves—unlike pardons and commutations—are free from regulation: the governor needs a mechanism to act immediately to avoid disaster in prisons/jails, whether the disaster is putting a potentially innocent person to death or stemming a viral outbreak that could lead to many deaths,” Notterman said.

NYU law professor Rachel Barkow, an expert on clemency in the United States, agrees with Notterman’s assessment. Barkow recently called on governors across the country to use their executive authority to remove people from prisons and jails to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

A protest in Philadelphia on Monday, urging Mayor Jim Kenney and Governor Tom Wolf to reduce jail and prison populations as COVID-19 spreads.Decarcerate PA

While officials across the country have begun to release people from jails during the pandemic, they have moved more slowly to release state prisoners. Jails typically have more options to release those held in custody. In Pennsylvania, judges can usually grant early release for most people sentenced to jail time, or they can reduce or choose not to impose bail requirements.

State prisons generally have fewer mechanisms for early release. In Pennsylvania, parole must be approved by the parole board, the compassionate release program is restrictive, and there is no furlough program for people in prison.

On Monday, the DOC announced that all incarcerated people would be put under quarantine as a precaution, a day after the agency said a man being held at State Correctional Institution Phoenix in Montgomery County had tested positive for COVID-19. He is the first incarcerated person in a Pennsylvania prison to test positive for the disease.

Prisons and jails historically have been a hub for the spread of communicable diseases. A lack of access to personal hygiene supplies, an inability to isolate or socially distance, and typically substandard medical care tend to allow for the proliferation of disease. For example, the rate of tuberculosis in prisons is nearly twice that of the general population, according to a study published in the Annals of the American Thoracic Society. 

New York City’s Rikers Island jail complex has already seen rapid growth in COVID-19 infections. As of Monday, 167 people on Rikers Island had tested positive for the disease, a figure that is doubling roughly every two days. 

Bret Grote, legal director for the Abolitionist Law Center, said the U.S. needs to begin releasing people in prison to halt the spread of the disease. More than 20,000 people are already released from Pennsylvania prisons every year, he said, “and if political will is to be commensurate to the magnitude of the looming crisis, at least 10,000 can be safely released in an expedited fashion to relieve the burden on the system and limit transmission of COVID-19 inside the prison and among the broader community.”

There are currently more than 45,000 people held in state prisons in Pennsylvania. As of last week, the DOC had only four ventilators to serve that entire population.

As of the end of 2018, more than 10,000 people being held in a state prison were 50 years old or older. According to the University of Oxford, people over 50 are at least four times more likely to die if they test positive for COVID-19 than people under 50. 

“Political cowardice must not allow our people behind the walls to become a sacrifice population,” Grote said

 To read more CLICK HERE

California governor imposes moratorium on execution

California Governor Gavin Newsom signed an executive order putting a moratorium on executions in the state, reported Jurist.

In a statement, Newsom explained the decision:

The death penalty has been an abject failure. It discriminates based on the color of your skin or how much money you make. It’s ineffective, irreversible, and immoral. It goes against the very values that we stand for.

This month, Ohio's governor put a halt to all executions due to problems with lethal injection.

The executive order calls for immediate withdrawal of California’s lethal injection protocols and closure of the state’s unused execution chamber.

While the order does not release any current inmates, the governor hopes to commute death sentences and ultimately repeal capital punishment in the future.

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Oklahoma grants reprieve hours before execution

An Oklahoma appellate court granted a two-week stay of execution for Richard Glossip just hours before he was scheduled to die within hours, meaning that a man whose lawyers say is innocent has at least a temporary reprieve, reported CNN.

The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals issued the order about three hours before Glossip's scheduled afternoon execution for the 1977 death of motel owner Barry Van Treese.

Only months ago, Glossip's challenge to lethal injection was rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The move came amid concerns, expressed by Glossip's supporters and attorneys, about his trial and the way the state planned to execute him. The appellate court said it needed time to consider several motions that Glossip's attorneys made less than 24 hours before the scheduled execution, including one asking for an evidentiary hearing.

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Terry Williams responds to DA's King's Bench suit against PA governor

The Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office filed a King's Bench action before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court  against Governor Tom Wolf for imposing a moratorium on executions by vowing to exercise his constitutional authority to grant reprieves.

 

District Attorney Seth Williams argued that Governor Wolf’s reprieve for Terry Williams was inconsistent with the historical use of the constitutional power because the reprieve did not have a specific end date and was not issued to permit Mr. Williams to pursue relief in a court proceeding. 

 

According to a press release, Terry Williams' attorneys filed a brief this week, urging the Supreme Court to “decline the invitation to judicial activism”  stating that “[i]n this Court’s nearly 300-year existence, it has never interfered with a reprieve. And the historical use of reprieves reflects a unilateral, discretionary executive power.” 

 

Attorneys for Terry Williams suggest, “Pennsylvania law and history are clear regarding the power of reprieves by a Governor: reprieves are unilateral, made at the Governor’s discretion, and are limited in no way. They don’t require a time limit, a stated reason or the input of any other branches of government.” 

 

The brief filed presents a detailed account of numerous reprieves issued since 1718, including:

• Governor Corbett issued an indefinite reprieve in 2014 due to the nationwide unavailability of lethal injection drugs;

• Governor Lawrence announced in 1961 that he would issue reprieves to establish a moratorium on executions while a legislative committee studied capital punishment;

• Governor Porter issued a reprieve in 1841 to postpone an execution while the legislature considered abolishing the death penalty;

• Numerous examples where Pennsylvania governors have invoked their unilateral reprieve power to postpone executions – without providing a reason and without setting an end-date – between 1718 and the 20th century;

• Numerous examples where governors in other states have used their reprieve power to establish moratoria on executions or to permit problems with the death penalty system to be studied.  

Reprieves dating back hundreds of years are documented, including an indefinite reprieve to Daniel

Hoffman issued in 1787 when Benjamin Franklin was the President of Pennsylvania.

 

To read the brief CLICK HERE