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Thread: Ernest Valencia Gonzales - Arizona Death Row

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    Ernest Valencia Gonzales - Arizona Death Row




    Summary of Offense:

    On the evening of February 20, 1990, the Wagner family returned to their town house in Phoenix from dinner where they had celebrated Darrel Wagner's recent promotion. When they entered their courtyard, Deborah Wagner noticed a light shining out their opened front door. Darrel went inside while Deborah and her seven-year-old son remained in the court yard. Inside, Darrel saw Gonzales, a parolee, standing on the landing holding their VCR tucked underneath his arm. Deborah sent her son for help. When she turned back, Gonzales had shoved her husband out the front door, stabbing him. When Gonzales ignored her pleas to stop stabbing, Deborah climbed on his back. Gonzales stabbed her twice. One cut damaged her spleen, colon and diaphragm and the other punctured her lung. Gonzales then fled.

    Darrel Wagner lived long enough to help his wife up and then began a conversation with the 911 operator while gasping for air. Gonzales had stabbed him seven times. Darrel Wagner died from stab wounds to his chest, one skewered the lower lobe of his right lung and another went into the left ventricle of his heart. Phoenix police arrested Gonzales on February 23, 1991. In addition to the murder, he was convicted of first-degree burglary, aggravated assault, armed robbery, theft, and of another residential burglary committed minutes before the murder. In addition to the death penalty, Gonzales was sentenced to three consecutive life terms.

    Gonzales was sentenced to death on April 27, 1992.

  2. #2
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Gonzales petitioned the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals for a writ of mandamus to stay his district court federal capital habeas proceedings. Granted on 10/20/10

    Now..

    Arizona seeks review of a Ninth Circuit holding allowing a death row inmate to stay his federal habeas proceeding based on his incompetency to assist his counsel. This petition is scheduled for SCOTUS conference on 03/18/11

    The issue: Does 18 U.S.C. § 3599(a)(2) – which provides that an indigent capital state inmate pursuing federal habeas relief "shall be entitled to the appointment of one or more attorneys" – entitle a death row inmate to stay the federal habeas proceedings he initiated if he is not competent to assist counsel?

    Ryan v. Gonzales

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    The Supreme Court has agreed to hear appeals from two states objecting to federal court-ordered delays for death row inmates claiming serious mental health issues.

    The justices said Monday they will take up the cases from Arizona and Ohio in the fall.

    In each case, a death row inmate won an indefinite delay from federal judges based on disputed claims of mental incompetence to understand the proceedings against him and aid in his own defense.

    Sean Carter was sentenced to death for raping and killing his adoptive grandmother in 1997. Ernest Valencia Gonzales received a death sentence for a murder in Arizona in 1990.

    The cases are Ryan v. Gonzales, 10-930, and Tibbals v. Carter, 11-218.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-w...nalty-appeals/
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    Moderator MRBAM's Avatar
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    US Supreme Court to hear case 10/9/12

    http://www.supremecourt.gov/Search.a...les/10-930.htm

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    Supreme Court to take up Arizona death-row case; competence at issue

    The Supreme Court is slated to hear Arizona's argument against a court-ordered delay in the execution of a convicted murderer.

    Ernest Gonzales killed Darrel Wagner in 1990. He was sentenced to death in April 1992. While on death row, however, Gonzales went insane, becoming unable to communicate with the lawyers handling his appeals in federal court. It's the insanity that prompted an appeals court to issue an indefinite stay of execution.

    On Tuesday, Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne will go before the Supreme Court and try to convince them to lift that stay.

    While Horne says the existing court record should be considered in the appeal, Gonzales' defense attorneys say his entitlement to effective legal counsel requires the 48-year-old to be mentally competent, which he is not.

    Gonzales was 25 and had already served time when he stabbed Wagner to death in the course of burglarizing his home. He also stabbed Wagner's wife, badly wounding her.

    According to court documents, Gonzales showed signs of mental impairment, as well as violent tendencies, while in prison the first time. In 1990, after nearly 10 years on death row, the symptoms of mental illness reportedly became more serious.

    While psychiatrists have determined that Gonzales is psychotic, he has never been declared incompetent in court.

    For years, lawyers have fought over the issue of Gonzales' competence and its relevance. While the state has insisted Gonzales' appeal is "record-based," the defense has countered that Gonzales' input is necessary considering the number of attorney involved in the case over the past 22 years.

    Even as Horne makes Arizona's argument, the justices will also hear a similar case out of Ohio.

    It's not clear when the Supreme Court might issue its ruling.

    Arizona's most recent execution was in early August. Daniel Wayne Cook was put to death for strangling two people two death in 1987. It was the state's fifth execution of 2012, just two shy of the record seven executions in 1999.

    If Arizona puts seven inmates to death this year, it could become the second-busiest death-penalty state after Texas.

    http://www.azfamily.com/news/local/S...173137971.html
    An uninformed opponent is a dangerous opponent.

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  6. #6
    Moderator MRBAM's Avatar
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    Supreme Court asks how long death penalty can be delayed in Arizona case

    WASHINGTON – Supreme Court justices quizzed both sides in an Arizona case Tuesday over how long a death penalty appeal can reasonably be delayed if a defendant is not mentally competent to assist in his defense.

    The questions came in the case of Ernest Valencia Gonzales, an Arizona death-row inmate whose appeal was put on hold in 2010 by a federal court that said he was not competent.

    Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne argued to the high court that the ruling would open the door to an indefinite delay in the imposition of the death sentence in capital cases.

    Horne said the Supreme Court should create a standard that would let lower courts issue stays in such cases of “six to nine months” – but no more than a year. He said that number came from the American Psychiatric Association, which filed a brief with the court.

    That appeared to carry little weight with the justices.

    “They’re not lawyers, right? They’re psychiatrists,” said Justice Antonin Scalia.

    Gonzales’ attorney, Arizona Assistant Federal Public Defender Leticia Marquez, argued that federal courts should be allowed discretion to grant stays for as long as necessary in capital cases.

    Marquez said Gonzales’ mental condition has deteriorated since his 1991 trial to the point where does not speak to her. But she needs to speak with Gonzales about his alleged antagonistic relationship with his trial judge, a situation she said she needs to understand in order to argue his appeal.

    Horne disagreed, saying the appeal can continue without Gonzales’ input because of the large amount of evidence already in the record.

    “It appears to us highly unlikely that he has information he didn’t disclose earlier” when he was deemed competent, Horne said.

    The justices pressed Horne’s point with Marquez, noting that what she needed could probably be proven through court transcripts.

    But Marquez said she has not had access to Gonzales and does not have a current release to review his medical records.

    Gonzales was convicted in 1991 of first-degree murder in the 1990 stabbing death of Darrel Wagner.

    Wagner, his wife, Deborah and their son, then 7, came home one evening to find lights in their townhouse and Gonzales inside, with the family’s VCR under one arm.

    Gonzales stabbed Darrel Wagner repeatedly. Deborah Wagner, who sent their son to get help, jumped on Gonzales’ back and was stabbed twice.

    Darrel Wagner died later that night, and Deborah Wagner was in intensive care for five days.

    Gonzales was sentenced to death for that murder and given three concurrent life sentences for other counts. His sentence was upheld by the Arizona Supreme Court in 1995, and Gonzales began his federal appeals.

    In 2008, a federal district judge rejected Gonzales’ request for a stay based on a defense claim he was incompetent. But the 9th U.S. Court of Appeals intervened in October 2010 and granted the stay, leading to Tuesday’s appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

    Outside the courtroom, Marquez said she does not think time limits are practical, and she hopes the Supreme Court will “reiterate a district’s court discretion to issue stays in these types of cases.”

    She said the fear that this would open the floodgates to indefinite stalling by death-row inmates is unlikely. Very few cases have been granted such stays in federal courts, she said.

    But Horne said outside the court that it takes about 18 years from verdict to execution in the 9th Circuit and that’s too long.

    “It doesn’t do any good to pass laws if you can’t enforce them,” Horne said.

    He said he was optimistic after Tuesday’s arguments that “the court seems to be going in our direction.”

    http://cronkitenewsonline.com/2012/1...-arizona-case/

  7. #7
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Ryan v Gonzales - Oral Argument

    Link to Supreme Court oral argument held on October 9, 2012.

    Question

    Is a capital state inmate pursuing federal habeas relief entitled to a stay of the federal habeas proceedings he initiated if the inmate is not competent to rationally communicate with the inmate's attorney?
    An uninformed opponent is a dangerous opponent.

    "Y'all be makin shit up" ~ Markeith Loyd

  8. #8
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    Court: Judges cannot indefinitely delay appeals

    The Supreme Court says federal judges cannot indefinitely delay a death row inmate's federal appeals to see if the convict can become mentally competent enough to help his lawyer.

    The high court unanimously ruled Tuesday against Arizona death row inmate Ernest Gonzales and Ohio death row inmate Sean Carter.

    Inmates appealing state death sentences to federal court have a right to a lawyer. But the courts never said whether the inmates have to be mentally competent enough to help their lawyers with their federal appeals. Gonzales and Carter wanted the high court to say that federal judges have discretion to hold up proceedings indefinitely until the inmates are ready.

    Justice Clarence Thomas says "at some point, the state must be allowed to defend its judgment of conviction."

    http://www.myfoxdc.com/story/2053176...#axzz2HOn7dWRz
    Last edited by Jan; 01-08-2013 at 10:52 AM.

  9. #9
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Here is the opinion

    Ryan v. Valencia Gonzales

    In the audio of the oral argument before the Supreme Court, the justices kept referring to a specific time frame for the stay of execution to establish competency. I didn't read in the ruling where the justices have imposed a time frame on either the issue of the length of stay, or a time frame of when the district, and circuit courts should rule on the appeal.
    An uninformed opponent is a dangerous opponent.

    "Y'all be makin shit up" ~ Markeith Loyd

  10. #10
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    The US Supreme Court has reversed on Gonzales, while reversing and remanding on Carter. Does Gonzales' reversal without a remand mean that the Arizona Attorney General can now request an execution date?

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