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Thread: Ralph Stevens Baze, Jr. - Kentucky Death Row

  1. #21
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    An in-depth article with opinions.

    Condemned inmates pursuing funds for clemency bids

    Two Kentucky death row inmates are hoping brain scans and mental tests will bolster their cases for a rare grant of executive clemency that would spare their lives.

    Ralph S. Baze Jr., condemned for killing a sheriff and deputy in eastern Kentucky in 1992, has asked a federal judge to grant him funding for a brain scan and testing as he prepares to ask Gov. Steve Beshear for clemency.

    Baze's request, filed Wednesday in federal court in Lexington, comes just more than two weeks after U.S. District Judge Jennifer Coffman in Louisville granted $7,500 to 66-year-old Parramore Lee Sanborn to pursue a possible claim of brain damage or abnormalities as he seeks to stave off execution for the 1983 kidnapping, rape and murder of Barbara Heilman in Henry County.

    "This information may lead to a more accurate diagnosis and would not duplicate information already available to the governor," Coffman wrote on Dec. 12.

    The tests part of a bid to get Beshear to do something that's only happened twice in the 35 years since the reinstatement of the death penalty in Kentucky — a commutation of sentence for a condemned inmate.

    Gov. Paul Patton in December 2003 commuted to life in prison the death sentence of Kevin Stanford, who was 17 at the time of 20-year-old Barbel Poore's slaying in 1981 in Louisville. Gov. Ernie Fletcher did the same for James Earl Slaughter in December 2007, finding his defense counsel so deficient that the attorney did not know his client's real name. Slaughter was convicted of killing Ester Stewart of Louisville in 1983.

    Douglas Berman, an Ohio State University law professor who blogs about sentencing and clemency issues, said "lame duck" governors are more likely to commute a death sentence because they don't face the "standard political calculations" facing someone who has another term in office or an election looming.

    "The political comfort is there," Berman said. "Those are the moments at which ... a governor recognizes they are going to have an opportunity to do something the new folks may not be able to do."

    Patton, now University of Pikeville president, told The Associated Press on Tuesday that Stanford's status as a juvenile played into the decision. A U.S. Supreme Court decision two years later barring the execution of juveniles validated his decision to allow Stanford to live, Patton said.

    "I believe that there is probably an element of immaturity in a juvenile which makes the death penalty unjustified even though the crime was heinous," Patton said.

    P.S. Ruckman Jr., a political science professor at Rock Valley College in Rockford, Ill., who blogs about clemency, said governors in many states, including Kentucky, have wide latitude when weighing whether to grant clemency.

    "The governor can consider things that can't by law be allowed as evidence," Ruckman said. "People should have access to serious consideration for clemency. There is a strong sense in many states that you just don't have that."

    Neither inmate is facing an imminent execution. Kentucky is currently barred by a judge from carrying out a lethal injection because of issues with the state's protocol. Kentucky also lacks a supply of sodium thiopental, one of three drugs used in a lethal injection.

    Kentucky Assistant Attorney General William Robert Long, though, argued against funding the tests, telling Coffman in briefs that Sanborn's funding request amounted to a "fishing expedition" and testing wasn't "reasonably necessary" since there was no question of guilt or the appropriateness of the death sentence.

    David Barron, the attorney for both Sanborn and Baze, made similar arguments in both cases — that tests have never been done and a life-long history of head injuries warrants examination.

    "With a clemency application on the horizon, it is now absolutely critical for a full neuropsychological evaluation to be conducted so the Governor of Kentucky can have a full picture before him in deciding whether to grant clemency," Barron wrote in a petition for the funds for Sanborn.

    Dudley Sharp, Death Penalty Resources Director of Justice For All, a pro-capital punishment group in Houston, said granting funds for brain tests is needed in some cases.

    "All citizens can hope for is that the judge has properly evaluated the claims ... and ordered the tests," Sharp said. "We can just hope that its justified."

    http://www.kypost.com/dpp/news/state...#ixzz1iRHrn3YL

  2. #22
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    What is bothersome about the media's account of Baze's filing is they have not stated what type of scan Baze is petitioning for funding, an MRI, CT Scan, QEED, EEG, PET, SPECT? None of which can truly diagnose brain damage without a valid competency test, associated with medical collaboration. Was Baze tweeked before conviction or has he sat in his cell for the past 2 years and beat his head against the wall?

    There are too many variables that can affect the outcome of the above mentioned tests. Medication, sleep deprivation, emotional state at the time of testing can give false results, or should I say typically abnormal results.

    Also let's take in to consideration the nature of the crime...will that weigh on a judges decision to allow brain testing? Grady Nelson, stabbed his wife 61 times in South Miami-Dade, then raped and stabbed her 11-year-old mentally disabled daughter. QEEG testing was allowed in that case and Grady received a LWOP sentence. Low and behold there MUST be something wrong with Nelson, aside from being a murdering maniac!

    Let's look and Humberto Delgado...QEEG not allowed in his trial. Sentenced to death in Florida for the murder of Tampa Police Officer Mike Roberts. Justice served.

    Delgado and Grady are equally evil..maybe... Grady murdered his wife because she was going to report him for molesting the disabled girl.

    In my opinion, I can go on and on with more specifics about brain function, but I will summarize, a run of the mill brain scan is not an accurate test for brain damage without extensive testing. It will open the flood gates for judges to legislate from the bench as we have seen time and time again after Atkins v Virginia and Baze v Kentucky.

  3. #23
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    Officer murders mark 20-year anniversary

    Monday marked a somber anniversary in Powell County where 20 years ago two peace officers were killed in the line of duty.

    January 30th is a date that haunts Dennis Briscoe and his family. "Thoughts of that day and everything will keep rushing back the closer that that day comes," Briscoe said.

    20 years ago Briscoe's father, Powell County Deputy Arthur Briscoe came to a Powell County cabin to arrest Ralph Baze, who was wanted in Ohio for several charges including assaulting a police officer. Dennis Briscoe's uncle, Sheriff Steve Bennett arrived for backup. Baze killed both officers, something he has admitted over the last two decades he's lived on death row and fought to appeal his case. "I think it would not be as near as traumatic for my family to have to go back and think about it and think that he's still sitting somewhere and living," Briscoe said.

    Today Kentucky remains under a judge's order stopping all executions, and lawmakers are considering an additional year-long halt to review the findings of a two-year study the American Bar Association conducted on the state's death penalty system. Briscoe hopes as policy makers study problems and look for solutions, they'll keep the interests of victims' families, like his, in mind. "Every time something happens related to this issue of his execution, hurts every one of us all over again," Briscoe said, "It constantly hangs over my head that this hasn't happened yet, that his execution's not been carried out yet."

    Briscoe insists that he supports the appeals process, but he continues to hope his family's case is on the path to closure. "Twenty years, you know, we're at the time point now where it's been long enough, I think longer than anyone would have ever guessed it would have taken to execute Baze for killing two peace officers," Briscoe said.

    Members of Kentucky's House Judiciary Committee will likely consider the proposal to halt executions and form a task force to study the death penalty system during the current legislative session.

    http://www.wkyt.com/news/headlines/O...9.html?ref=609

  4. #24
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    ROBERT CARL FOLEY AND RALF BAZE v STEVE BESHEAR, GOVERNOR OF KENTUCKY, ET AL

    2 Kentucky death row inmates lose appeal challenging clemency system

    Two death row inmates who challenged Kentucky's clemency system lost their appeal Thursday to the state's highest court, which upheld the process by which life-and-death decisions are concentrated in the hands of the governor.

    Robert Foley and Ralph Baze are both condemned to die, convicted of multiple killings. They had claimed that the governor's absolute discretion in granting clemency without a requirement for hearings could result in arbitrary decisions that violate their constitutional rights of due process.

    The Kentucky Supreme Court, in a unanimous ruling, rejected that argument.

    In Kentucky, no recommendations or hearings are needed for the governor to decide whether someone should not be put to death. Many states require the decision maker to hold hearings and consider certain evidence before deciding on clemency.

    "Other states have different approaches, but that fact does not mean that Kentucky's governor-centered approach to clemency violates the Fourteenth Amendment's due process clause," wrote Justice Lisabeth Hughes Abramson on behalf of the unanimous court.

    She wrote that there is a presumption the governor "will abide by the mandates" of the state and federal constitutions in any clemency decision.

    Foley was convicted of six killings in 1989 and 1991. Baze was convicted in the unrelated 1992 slayings of a sheriff and deputy.

    Foley and Blaze had initially challenged the clemency system in a circuit court in Franklin County, where their lawsuit was dismissed, triggering the appeal to the Kentucky Supreme Court.

    The inmates' attorneys noted differences between Kentucky's clemency system and those of many other states in their arguments.

    But Abramson concluded it's "by no means clear" that more formal clemency proceedings in other states have enhanced a condemned prisoner's chances of being granted clemency.

    She noted that while Kentucky's governor has "unfettered discretion" as to whether to grant clemency, there must include a statement listing the reasons for the decision. Also, the clemency application and statement must be open to public review, she said.

    Abramson also wrote the inmates did not claim to have been victims of an arbitrary clemency system. "Indeed, they are not in a position to make such claims because Foley and Baze have not yet even filed clemency petitions," Abramson wrote.

    Kentucky governors have used the clemency power before.

    Then-Gov. Paul Patton in December 2003 commuted to life in prison the death sentence of Kevin Stanford, who was 17 at the time of the slaying that led to his conviction. Patton cited Stanford's age at the time of the crime. Then-Gov. Ernie Fletcher did the same for James Earl Slaughter in December 2007, finding his defense counsel so deficient that the attorney didn't know his client's real name.

    http://www.startribune.com/kentucky-...tem/307006981/
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  5. #25
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    25 Years Later, Families Still Waiting For Justice In Shooting

    Monday marked the 25th anniversary of the day a Powell County sheriff and his chief deputy were gunned down in the line of duty.

    On January 30, 1992, Powell County Sheriff Steve Bennett and his brother-in-law, Deputy Arthur Briscoe were both shot and killed while trying to serve a warrant on Ralph Baze.

    Stanton Police Officer Robert Mathews said that two months before the shooting, he had arrested Baze, but a paperwork mix-up out of Ohio forced him to release Baze.

    Baze was charged with capital murder and is still on death row.

    “I have told my wife and kids that if anybody every kills me shoots me on duty, if I ever get killed on duty, don't let the person responsible get the death penalty,” said Mathews.

    Mathews said he doesn’t want his family to live with false hope, or the disappointment and pain the Bennett and Briscoe families have dealt with for so long when Baze is granted a stay.

    Baze was supposed to be executed in 2007 but was granted a stay.

    There is still no execution date set for the future.

    http://www.lex18.com/story/34381110/...ce-in-shooting
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  6. #26
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    WKYT Investigates | Justice: Delivered, delayed or denied?

    Family members of two officers killed in the line of duty 31 years ago are frustrated that Kentucky’s death penalty has been on hold for years. What’s next?

    By Garrett Wymer
    WKYT

    STANTON, Ky. - A blue light and a flag inside the Powell County Sheriff’s Office honor the brotherhood and sisterhood of those who serve and protect their communities.

    A calendar from 1992 and another framed photo along the same wall serve as somber reminders of two lives taken from them in the line of duty.

    And beyond that still lingers the reality of loved ones’ lives forever changed because of it.

    “This didn’t have to happen,” Steven Bennett said, tears beginning to fall as he sat inside a conference room just a few doors down from the sheriff’s office. “It just didn’t have to happen.”

    It has been 31 years since Sheriff Steve Lynn Bennett and Deputy Arthur Clay Briscoe died in the line of duty on January 30, 1992.

    Today, their surviving loved ones say they are frustrated that the man convicted of killing them - Ralph Stevens Baze Jr. - is still alive and being held in prison despite being sentenced to death in 1994.

    Baze, who has been at the center of multiple efforts to challenge Kentucky’s death penalty protocols, may be more likely to die on death row than in the execution chamber.

    Public opinion and more states are turning against the death penalty.

    Right now it is still on the books in Kentucky, but executions have been on hold in the commonwealth for more than a decade, and a bipartisan bill filed in Frankfort could end it for good.

    With 26 inmates currently sitting on death row, opinions differ as to whether justice is being delivered, delayed or denied.

    Steven Bennett carries his father’s name, as well as the psychological weight of such a substantial loss - he has battled depression, he says, but has dedicated his life to his late father - yet, sadly, there is not much that he remembers beyond others’ stories of him.

    “Oh, Steve Bennett was a cornerstone,” Steven Bennett said. “He was a patriarch. He was a pillar. He was the gold standard of law enforcement.”

    Bennett wasn’t even four years old when his father - Powell County Sheriff Steve Bennett - was gunned down in 1992 while trying to serve a warrant alongside Deputy Arthur Briscoe.

    “He didn’t know that when he left the house that morning that he wasn’t going to come home to me and my mother,” Bennett said.

    Now more than three decades later, this community in many ways is still haunted by what happened on that January day to Sheriff Bennett and Deputy Briscoe.

    “I’ve spent a lot of time wondering what was going through his mind,” said Ed Drake.

    Drake was a close friend of Briscoe’s. They knew each other from the time they were kids. As adults, the two would often meet a couple of times a week to golf together.

    “I can tell you that during the past 30 years I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about not necessarily ‘Deputy’ Briscoe, but my friend Arthur Briscoe,” he said, “hunkered down behind his police cruiser, shooting for his life until he ran out of ammunition.”

    Ralph Baze was arrested January 30, 1992, surrendering to police at a home in Estill County after an eight-hour manhunt through the woods. He shot Sheriff Bennett and Deputy Briscoe when they showed up at his home in rural Powell County to serve out-of-state warrants.

    Baze has admitted to shooting the two lawmen, but claimed self-defense. He was charged with two counts of murder, and in 1994 was tried in Rowan County, convicted and sentenced to die.

    Years passed as Baze filed appeals and other challenges to his case.

    An execution date was scheduled for September 25, 2007 - but it was stayed due to a challenge of Kentucky’s lethal injection protocols, which the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear.

    Two weeks before his scheduled execution in 2007, Baze spoke with WKYT from inside Kentucky State Penitentiary in Eddyville, vowing to fight to stay alive until he takes his last breath.

    “It just comes back down to: They have held me illegally. They convicted me illegally. And they’re trying to murder me illegally,” he said at the time.

    Kentucky is one of 27 states that still has the death penalty, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, a national non-profit organization focused on analysis and information on issues concerning capital punishment.

    Fifteen of those states, however, have not carried out an execution in at least 10 years. The last time Kentucky carried one out was 2008, with the execution of Marco Allen Chapman.

    In that time, support for the death penalty has continued to decline across the country. Public support for it peaked in 1994, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. Two different national polls published in the fall found that support remains near a 50-year low, despite the perception that crime has increased.

    Two states recently paused executions in efforts to try to address problems. Last month, Arizona’s attorney general put them on hold after the governor ordered a review of the state’s protocols. In November, Alabama’s governor ordered a “top-to-bottom” review after a third failed lethal injection.

    Last year, a statistical study of the death penalty in Kentucky found racial and geographic disparities in its application, among other flaws.

    Today, executions in Kentucky remain on hold because of court orders. In 2010 Franklin Circuit Court Judge Philip Shepherd ordered a stay of executions, and in 2019 a circuit court order from Judge Shepherd struck down the state’s protocols after challenges from Baze and other death row inmates.

    The court over the years has identified issues with the drugs Kentucky has used for lethal injection and the protocols for ensuring those with intellectual disabilities are not put to death.

    As part of a 2020 settlement agreement from the most recent litigation, the Department of Corrections formed a work group to review and amend the administrative regulations regarding the death penalty, a D.O.C. spokesperson told WKYT’s Garrett Wymer.

    The Department of Corrections follows all statutes, regulations and court orders. In 2010 a judge ordered a stay of executions in Kentucky. Pursuant to the settlement agreement entered on July 2, 2020 in the most recent litigation, DOC has formed a work group to review and amend the administrative regulations regarding the death penalty. Any regulatory changes will be filed with LRC for final action by the General Assembly.

    For the state to resume carrying out death sentences, legal officials say, the ruling that has halted state executions would have to be lifted either by Judge Shepherd or by an appellate court. Litigation will not resume until the regulations are amended.

    It is unclear when the process of amending those regulations could be completed.

    A spokesperson for Gov. Andy Beshear did not respond to a request for comment by WKYT Investigates, asking if the governor has had any contact with the D.O.C. about their amending the regulations, if he believes D.O.C. is working in a timely manner to amend the regulations, or if he has outlined a timetable for when he believes the process should be completed.

    Last year, in response to questions about the status of the death penalty, Gov. Beshear mentioned the court order currently putting it on hold.

    “There’s currently an injunction from a circuit court that prevents it from being used,” Gov. Andy Beshear said at the time, as reported by LINK nky. “Certainly, both the Attorney General’s Office and the Justice cabinet are part of that case trying to work through the concerns that the judge has, but right now, based on a federal order, executions cannot occur in Kentucky.”

    In 2016, then-Attorney General Andy Beshear told WDRB in Louisville that he is a “strong proponent of the death penalty.”

    A spokesperson for Attorney General Daniel Cameron said this week that their office is not aware of any attempt by the D.O.C. to contact them regarding amending the death penalty regulations.

    Our General Assembly has decided that the death penalty is appropriate for Kentucky’s most violent criminals. Since taking office, Attorney General Cameron has vigorously defended lawfully imposed death sentences for Kentucky’s notorious criminals in many cases, including in the U.S. Supreme Court. Our office is not aware of an attempt by the Department of Corrections to contact the Attorney General’s Office regarding amending the death penalty regulations.
    Krista Buckel | Communications director, Office of Attorney General Daniel Cameron

    During a committee meeting last fall, Sen. Schickel asked the D.O.C. for an update on where the state’s protocols stand. He says he still has not received one.

    While Sen. Schickel, a retired law enforcement officer, supports the death penalty, he said he knows public opinion is changing. However, he believes this debate should be different than the debate over whether or not the death penalty is appropriate.

    “This really isn’t about polling. This really isn’t about future laws,” he said. “This is about enforcing the laws that are currently on the books that every public official is sworn to uphold.”

    Meanwhile, a bipartisan bill filed in Frankfort would abolish the death penalty altogether.

    Senate Bill 45 is sponsored by Sen. Stephen Meredith, R-Leitchfield, Sen. Gerald Neal, D-Louisville, and Sen. Julie Raque Adams, R-Louisville.

    “I think it’s worth a societal discussion at the very least,” Sen. Neal, the Minority Floor Leader, told WKYT’s Garrett Wymer.

    Sen. Neal said he understands how victims’ families can feel what they feel, but he believes there are systemic and societal issues with the death penalty: its practicality; its finality, with the possibility of errors and arbitrariness; its costs that come with years of appeals and challenges; and whether one’s beliefs and morals can justify taking a life.

    And he believes that even without it, justice can still be served.

    “I have no sympathy for someone who goes out and disregards someone else’s right to life in the sense of living their life in that space, and they disregard that. There’s no sympathy there,” said Sen. Neal, who said that he had supported the death penalty at one point. “I think the issue is bigger than that individual. I think it is a larger societal issue that also has personal ramifications depending on who you are.”

    If SB 45 becomes law, Baze and the 25 others on death row with him would instead serve sentences of life in prison without the possibility of parole - much like they currently are, as executions remain on hold.

    The corrections impact statement for SB 45 projects a “minimal to moderate” fiscal impact, meaning less than $1 million, if the state were to abolish the death penalty.

    “Given that the state has conducted only three executions since capital punishment was reinstated in the United States in 1976,” reads the corrections impact statement, “a shift to life sentence for offenders who are currently under a sentence of death is not likely to substantially impact the length of time individuals with a capital conviction are incarcerated.”

    Male inmates with a sentence of death are housed at Kentucky State Penitentiary, which has an average annual incarceration cost of $65,378.02 per inmate, according to the corrections impact statement. Female inmates sentenced to death are housed at the Kentucky Correctional Institution for Women in Pewee Valley, at an annual cost of $38,887.47, the analysis says.

    For many who knew and loved Sheriff Bennett and Deputy Briscoe, three decades without their loved ones and years of delays - all while the convicted killer is still in prison - has served only to deny them the justice they believe they were promised by a judge and jury.

    “Thirty years-plus on death row isn’t the life I would envision for myself,” said Ed Drake, the late Deputy Briscoe’s long-time friend. “So [Baze] is being punished. But justice to me still hasn’t been carried out, and won’t be until there’s an execution date set.”

    Outside the Powell County Courthouse, monuments honor the city and county law enforcement officers who have died in the line of duty.

    “There’s five monuments there,” Judge-Executive Eddie Barnes said, looking at each of them on a cold winter day. “And that’s five too many.”

    Barnes worked in law enforcement himself for much of his career. He even served under Sheriff Bennett - and trained and was replaced by Deputy Briscoe when he decided to leave the sheriff’s office.

    “My personal opinion - this is Eddie’s opinion - [Baze] has exhausted all appeals,” Barnes said. “They’ve found him guilty. I think they need to carry out the sentence.”

    https://www.wkyt.com/2023/02/02/wkyt...outputType=amp
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