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Thread: Selwyn Davis - Texas

  1. #1
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    Selwyn Davis - Texas




    Facts of the Crime:

    On August 22, 2006, in Travis County, Davis entered the unoccupied apartment of two Hispanic females through a window. When the 15-year-old female arrived home, Davis sexually assaulted her. He then waited until the second victim, Regina Lara, 54, returned home. At that time, Davis punched her several times with a closed fist, and then stabbed her six times in the chest and back area, later causing her death.

    Davis was sentenced to death in October 2007.

  2. #2
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    October 15, 2007

    AUSTIN — A Travis County jury on Monday sentenced Selwyn P. Davis to death for the August 2006 murder of his ex-girlfriend's mother.

    Jurors deliberated about six hours before the 12-member panel returned with the death sentence, the Austin American-Statesman reported in its online edition. The same jury on Oct. 4 took four hours to find Davis, 25, guilty of capital murder in the stabbing death of Regina Lara.

    Earlier, the jury had asked that a court reporter read back testimony about Davis' incarceration in the county jail. In that testimony, Travis County corrections officer Sandra Mullins told the jury that Davis' behavior had regularly caused problems at the jail.

    To assess the death penalty, jurors had to unanimously agree that it is probable Davis would commit future criminal acts of violence and would constitute a continuing threat to society. They also had to agree that no mitigating circumstances warranted a life sentence.

    Davis' lawyers had argued Monday morning against death for their client.

    "People like Gandhi, Buddha, Christ, like Martin Luther King Jr., in response to great violence, or great wrong, their response to that was something that they thought was more powerful," defense lawyer Steve Brittain said during arguments closing the sentencing phase of Davis' trial. "It was peaceful. It was not killing."

    During the trial, Judge Julie Kocurek threatened to handcuff Davis after courtroom witnesses said he turned in his chair and made an obscene gesture with his middle finger toward the family of his 57-year-old victim.

    It wasn't clear whether any jurors saw the gesture.

    (Source: The Houston Chronicle)

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    April 9, 2008

    In a move that could trim his stay on Texas' death row from the norm of about 10 years to less than two, condemned killer Selwyn P. Davis wants to waive most of his appeals, according to his lawyer.

    Ariel Payan, Davis' appeals lawyer, declined to say why Davis doesn't want to carry out all of his appeals.

    During his October trial in Travis County, Davis' lawyers said he conceded that he fatally stabbed Regina Lara, his ex-girlfriend's mother, at her 381/2 Street apartment. But they argued that his crime was not committed in the course of a burglary and robbery, as charged, and that therefore it didn't fit Texas' definition of capital murder.

    Davis killed Lara during a two-day crime spree that began when he beat his ex-girlfriend, fracturing her eye socket, and poured rubbing alcohol over her head and threatened to set her on fire, according to testimony. During the capital murder trial, Davis stuck his middle finger up at Lara's family.

    It is uncommon for death row inmates to waive their appeals, and some defendants who initially say they don't want to appeal change their minds, according to death penalty lawyers. These include William Murray, a North Texas man condemned in 1998.

    Murray, convicted of killing an elderly woman in Kaufman, said in 1999 that he wanted his execution expedited. He is still on death row after years of appeals, including a legal fight to reinstate his appellate rights.

    Just over a year after Angel Maturino Resendiz was sentenced to death in 2000 for killing a Houston doctor, the confessed serial killer acknowledged his guilt and said he wanted to waive his appeals in the case. But his mental competency to do so was questioned, and a series of appeals was eventually filed on his behalf. He was executed in 2006.

    The average stay on Texas' death row is 10 years and three months, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. Since Texas reinstated the death penalty in the early 1980s, the inmate with the shortest stay on death row before execution was Joe Gonzales, who was executed in 1996 after eight months there. Gonzales, a roofer, was convicted in Potter County of the murder and robbery of his boss in Amarillo and waived his appeals.

    Davis, 26, was sent to death row in Livingston from Travis County on Oct. 17, 2007, two days after his death sentence was announced. On Nov. 20, he wrote the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals a letter.

    "I would like to cancel my appeals," the letter said, in part. "All of them!"

    Last month, the court entered an order stating that Texas law guarantees a review by the Court of Criminal Appeals of a death penalty conviction and sentence. Payan said Davis has agreed to cooperate in that so-called direct appeal. But Payan said that Davis wants to waive his right to file applications for writ of habeas corpus in federal and state courts, the process by which inmates can challenge the legality of their incarceration.

    That process, which takes years to run its course, can be waived.

    Once briefs are filed by Davis and the state in the direct appeal, the Court of Criminal Appeals is under no time limit to issue an order. Payan said some decisions are reached within months and others take years. He estimates the quickest Davis' case could be disposed on appeal and ready for an execution date would be in a year and a half.

    Executions in Texas have been on hold since September as the U.S. Supreme Court considers the constitutionality of lethal injection. A decision is expected this summer.

    Davis is in the Travis County Jail and will appear Friday before state District Judge Julie Kocurek, who presided over his trial. The Court of Criminal Appeals ordered Kocurek to question Davis on a series of issues related to his appeals, including whether he wants to waive any rights, and if so, whether he makes that waiver knowingly and intentionally.

    Even if he did waive his right to appeal, the court would examine the trial record in its own review of the case, said University of Texas law professor Rob Owen, co-director of the school's Capital Punishment Clinic.

    "There is a very strong public interest in ensuring that the Court of Criminal Appeals reviews every death penalty at least once to ensure conformity with basic fundamental rights," Owen said.

    Owen said that Davis' history of mental problems — his lawyers argued in trial that he had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder — coupled with the "dehumanizing conditions" on death row could have led to Davis' decision.

    Owen said that Kocurek will need to learn whether Davis' "decision or this desire was a product of a rational thought process or an unfettered will" before allowing him to waive any rights.

    (Source: The Houston Chronicle)

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    April 18, 2008

    Austin killer wants quick execution----Selwyn Davis tells judge he's 'certain' of his decision to skip appeals


    Sentenced to die for the 2006 killing of his girlfriend's mother, Selwyn P. Davis told a judge in Travis County on Friday that he wants to waive most of his appeals because he is guilty and he doesn't want to spend his life in prison.

    "I'm certain of what I want," Davis told state District Judge Julie Kocurek. "The quality of life is not, basically, to my standards, you know what I am saying? Basically, jail sucks."

    Davis wrote to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals after his October capital murder conviction in Travis County saying that he wanted to waive his appeals. His lawyer, Ariel Payan, advised him that he would get an automatic appeal to Texas' highest criminal court, but could waive further appeals challenging the constitutionality of his confinement.

    The Court of Criminal Appeals ordered Kocurek to determine whether Davis really wants to waive any rights, and whether he does so knowingly and intelligently. She said she would send her findings to the court next week.

    Through a series of questions by his lawyers, prosecutors and Kocurek, Davis said he was aware of what he was requesting and would cooperate on the direct appeal, but didn't want further efforts. That could shorten the time he spends on death row before execution from the average of just more than ten years to as few as two, Payan has said.

    Davis, 26, was convicted of fatally stabbing Regina Lara, 57, in her 38½ Street apartment Aug. 22, 2006. Lara worked at an East Austin day care and was a mother of three and grandmother of eight. Prosecutors said that Davis was angry that she didn't want him to be with her daughter, Linda Martinez.

    The killing capped a two-day crime binge that started when Davis accused Martinez of cheating on him. The day before the killing, Davis beat Martinez at the apartment they once shared off East Riverside Drive, fracturing her eye socket and jaw, slicing her leg, pouring rubbing alcohol over her head and threatening to set her on fire, according to testimony.

    He went to his uncle's South Austin house later that night, sliced him with a knife and took his aunt's car and purse, according to testimony. Davis then went on a drug binge before going to Lara's apartment, and sexually assaulting a teenage girl in the home, according to testimony.

    Davis' aunt, Latreese Cooke of Bastrop, said after Friday's hearing that Davis was dehumanized at his trial and only acted so brutally because of the influence of drugs. She said she thinks he decided to waive his appeals because he is haunted by his crimes.

    At the opening of Friday's hearing, a court-appointed mental health expert testified that Davis has no mental disease or defect that would cloud his decision-making. Then Davis took the witness stand, shackled at his hands and feet.

    He talked about death row in Huntsville: He is confined 23 hours a day to a tiny cell, can't watch television and hasn't had any visitors since he arrived last year. He said a life of listening to the radio, writing poetry, reading and corresponding with a few pen pals does not appeal to him.

    Davis said that since he's been back in Travis County, he read in the newspaper about a death row inmate who was executed though some think he may have been innocent.

    "I'm guilty of my crime," he said. "They did not let him go; why would they let me go?"

    (Source: The Houston Chronicle)

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    On June 16, 2010, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed Davis' conviction and sentence on direct appeal.

    Opinion is here:

    http://www.cca.courts.state.tx.us/OP...PINIONID=19778

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    In today's United States Supreme Court orders, Davis' petition for a writ of certiorari and motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis DENIED.

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    Austin killer on death row dies, officials say

    Selwyn P. Davis, sentenced to death by a Travis County jury for the 2006 Austin murder of his girlfriend’s mother, was found dead in his cell on Texas’ death row last week, according to a spokesman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

    Corrections officers conducting routine security checks found Davis, 30, unresponsive on the floor of his cell about 9 p.m. Friday, spokesman Jason Clark wrote in an email.

    “Staff began life saving measures, called 911, and took the offender to the unit infirmary,” Clark wrote. “An ambulance then transported Davis to Livingston Memorial Hospital where he was pronounced deceased by an attending physician at 10:04 pm.”

    Clark said the cause of death is unknown and that the department’s Office of Inspector General will investigate the death, which is routine.

    Davis stabbed Regina Lara to death in her 38 1/2 Street apartment on Aug. 22, 2006.

    According to testimony at his trial, the killing occurred during a two-day crime spree that began the day before, when he brutally beat his ex-girlfriend in their Southeast Austin apartment, fracturing her eye socket and jaw, slicing her leg, pouring rubbing alcohol over her head and threatening to set her on fire.

    Later that night, he went to his uncle’s South Austin house and sliced him with a knife, according to testimony. He left after taking his aunt’s car and purse and went on an overnight drug binge, according to testimony.

    The next day he went to Lara’s apartment and attacked her when she came home from work. Davis also sexually assaulted a teenage girl at the house, according to testimony.

    In seeking the death penalty, prosecutors revealed Davis’ long criminal history, which included assaults on police officers and unprovoked attacks — on a teacher and another student — at Lanier High School, and robberies of immigrant workers in the East Riverside Drive area.

    When he was 16, Davis attacked a 13-year-old girl by punching her in the face and kicking her in the stomach after her mother told Davis the girl was pregnant, according to testimony. Information from the Texas Department of Criminal Justice has been added to this story since it was originally filed.

    http://www.statesman.com/blogs/conte...found_dea.html
    An uninformed opponent is a dangerous opponent.

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  8. #8
    Jan
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    Today, the TCCA dismissed Davis' habeas corpus petition because Davis is dead.

    http://www.cca.courts.state.tx.us/OP...PINIONID=25195

  9. #9
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    Was it a unanimous decision?

  10. #10
    Jan
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    I think so but maybe there was a discussion, I mean they needed 1.5 years to dismiss it.

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