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Thread: Louisiana Capital Punishment News

  1. #71
    Senior Member Frequent Poster Fact's Avatar
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    Hate crime laws are stupid regardless. Murdering a police officer is a capital crime in every jurisdiction where there is a death penalty. Nobody gets away with assaulting cops.

  2. #72
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    State asks to rule out next Louisiana execution before 2018

    BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) - Louisiana won’t carry out its next scheduled execution before January 2018 if a federal judge approves a request by state Attorney General Jeff Landry’s office.

    In a court filing Tuesday, Landry’s office asked for an 18-month extension to a judge’s order that delayed the execution of Christopher Sepulvado.

    A federal lawsuit challenging Louisiana’s method of lethal injection has kept Sepulvado’s execution on hold since February 2014. The state’s execution protocols changed as drugs used in lethal injections became scarce.

    U.S. District Judge James Brady previously ruled out executing Sepulvado and at least four other death-row inmates before July 11, 2016. Landry’s office says it would be “prudent” to extend the order until Jan. 8, 2018, given the litigation’s “fluid state.”

    Sepulvado was convicted of murdering his 6-year-old stepson in 1992.

    http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...-execution-be/
    "There is a point in the history of a society when it becomes so pathologically soft and tender that among other things it sides even with those who harm it, criminals, and does this quite seriously and honestly. Punishing somehow seems unfair to it, and it is certain that imagining ‘punishment’ and ‘being supposed to punish’ hurts it, arouses fear in it." Friedrich Nietzsche

  3. #73
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    Louisiana inmates sue over solitary confinement on death row

    BATON ROUGE, La. — Three inmates on Louisiana's death row say in a lawsuit they face inhumane isolation for 23 hours a day in cells "the size of an average of home bathroom."

    A class action filed Wednesday claims prison officials are violating the constitutional rights of death row prisoners at Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola.

    The federal lawsuit says the conditions are inhumane and jeopardize their physical and mental health.

    The suit asks the court to order prison officials to alleviate the conditions of solitary confinement for all prisoners on death row at Angola.

    A spokesman for the state Department of Corrections said the agency can't comment on pending litigation.

    Last Friday, a federal appeals court revived a similar lawsuit challenging conditions on Virginia's death row.

    http://m.startribune.com/louisiana-i...row/417492603/
    Don't ask questions, just consume product and then get excited for next products.

    "They will hurt you. They will hurt your grandma, these people. The root cause of this is there's no discipline in the homes, they don't go to school, you know, they live off the government, no personal accountability, and they just beat people up for no reason, and it's disgusting." - Former Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters

  4. #74
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    La. death penalty ban clears hurdle

    Louisiana senators are moving ahead with a bill to end executions in the state, a rare proposal in a Republican-controlled region that tends to favor capital punishment.

    A Senate judicial committee Tuesday voted 6-1 to have the full Senate consider the proposal, which would eliminate the death penalty as punishment for any offenses committed on or after Aug. 1.

    Though he supports capital punishment, Republican Rep. Steve Pylant told the committee cash-strapped Louisiana should not be spending money on costly death penalty appeals, especially when only one person has been put to death in Louisiana since 2002.

    “In Louisiana we’ve lost the will to carry out executions,” he said. Pylant is co-sponsoring an identical bill in the House.

    A familiar coalition of religious leaders and defense attorneys attacked capital punishment, citing moral concerns and questioning whether it deters crime. The state’s 82 percent reversal rate of death sentences since 1976 is the highest in the nation, but supporters of the death penalty said some of the reversals have come about from technicalities.

    Houma-Thibodaux Bishop Shelton Fabre, who represented the Louisiana Conference of Catholic Bishops, said the death penalty is an offense to God and Christians and helps perpetuate a culture of death and violence.

    It’s important to stand with victims and help ease their grief, Fabre said, but doing so does not compel a person to support the death penalty.

    A more unorthodox defense of the bill came from former Louisiana prosecutor A.M. Stroud. Stroud recounted how he and his legal team had “celebrated the night away” after securing the death sentence in the 1984 first-degree murder trial of Glenn Ford. Three decades later, Stroud found out that Ford, who was still on death row, was in fact innocent. Ford was released from prison, given a $20 gift card and died a year later.

    “I think about Glenn Ford every morning when I wake up,” Stroud said. “We human beings cannot handle the power of life and death. We’re not designed to do that. That’s God’s work.”

    Although the bill says the proposed law would not apply retroactively, critics said they feared future courts would not allow the 74 inmates sentenced to death in Louisiana to be executed and instead could one day release them on parole.

    Southern University Law School professor Michelle Ghetti and her daughter, Christie Battaglia, both said they were terrified by the possibility of Ghetti’s ex-husband, John Battaglia, ever being released from death row in Texas.

    With her daughter sobbing next to her, Ghetti described how her ex-husband killed the two young daughters he had had with his second ex-wife, Mary Jean Pearle, while Pearle was on the phone with him in 2001.

    “I am confident that if he had the chance to not be in prison, I would not be here anymore,” said Christie Battaglia, who was a teenager at the time of the slayings. “The worst way to hurt Mary Jean was to hurt the girls. His hatred for (my mother) is more than his love for me.”

    Gov. John Bel Edwards, a Democrat, hasn’t taken a position on banning capital punishment.

    Thirty-one states allow the death penalty. Louisiana’s last execution took place in January 2010 after convicted murderer Gerald Bordelon waived his right to appeal. The state’s next planned lethal injection is on hold until at least 2018 pending a federal lawsuit challenging the method.

    http://www.dailycomet.com/news/20170...-clears-hurdle
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  5. #75
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    Death penalty lives on in Louisiana

    By Greg Hilburn
    The Monroe News Star

    BATON ROUGE — An effort to abolish the death penalty in Louisiana died in a House committee Wednesday after one of the bill's original co-sponsors switched his vote.

    The bill's failure in the House Criminal Justice Committee signaled that a duplicate measure in the Senate by Sen. Dan Claitor, R-Baton Rouge, would suffer the same fate when it arrived, causing him to shelve his effort as well. "Why would I bring a bill (to the Senate floor) that can't get out of this (House) committee?" Claitor said.

    Rep. Terry Landry, D-New Iberia, said fellow former lawman Rep. Steve Pylant, R-Winnsboro, didn't warn him that he was voting against the bill. Pylant was the swing vote in the 9-8 decision. "I was surprised," Landry said. "It's not the way I would have conducted my business with a colleague."

    But Pylant said he never intended to vote for House Bill 101, but instead co-sponsored the measure so he could get his message out to the public that the state should start executing those who have been given the death penalty.

    Pylant has said in previous interviews he believes the death penalty is just, but it shouldn't exist if Louisiana wasn't following through on executions. "There are a few who don't deserve to live," he said.

    Louisiana has carried out just one execution in the past 10 years and that was of an inmate who asked that the sentence be carried out.

    "I was trying to bring attention to the fact we're not doing it now; I co-sponsored the bill to get the message out that we're not doing it," Pylant said. "I got on line so I could get my message out. We need to either get in the business (of executions) or get out of it."

    Landry said he will bring the bill back next year.

    "I still fundamentally believe there should be a moratorium on the death penalty," he said."It's cost us too many dollars and too many lives and too many families have been broken up."

    Faith leaders like Bishop Shelton Fabre, representing the Louisiana Conference of Catholic Bishops, testified the death penalty is an affront to God. Former death row inmates who were ultimately exonerated like Ray Crone of Arizona also testified in favor of the bill.

    "Ending the death penalty is not about public policy or public opinion but because of our belief that all human life is sacred," Fabre said. "It's essential in ending a culture of death and creating a culture of life."

    But families of victims testified against the bill, while Louisiana's district attorneys said it's an appropriate tool in the most heinous cases where the jury's conscience has been shocked by the viciousness of a crime.

    Edie Triche's son Jeremy Triche, a St. John the Baptist deputy, was murdered in 2012.

    "The death penalty will not return my son, but it's simply a matter of justice," she said.

    http://www.thenewsstar.com/story/new...ana/101784274/
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

  6. #76
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    Court extends halt in Louisiana executions after judge dies

    The Republic

    BATON ROUGE, La. — A court order blocking Louisiana from carrying out any executions has been extended indefinitely after the death of the federal judge who issued it.

    A lawsuit challenging the state’s lethal injection protocols has kept death sentences on hold since 2014. U.S. District Judge James Brady, who died Dec. 9 after a brief illness, oversaw the lawsuit and agreed to order the temporary stay of all executions.

    Brady’s order was due to expire next Monday, but U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick agreed Thursday to extend it until another judge is assigned to the lawsuit.

    Louisiana has more than 70 inmates on death row. The state’s last execution was in January 2010, when it carried out a death sentence for Gerald Bordelon, who was convicted of killing his 12-year-old stepdaughter in 2002.

    http://www.therepublic.com/2018/01/0...lty-louisiana/

  7. #77
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    Court overturns heat-index limit on Louisiana’s death row

    A federal appeals court has overturned an order requiring Louisiana prison officials to keep the heat index on death row below 88 degrees for three ailing condemned killers.

    Wednesday’s ruling by a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is the latest twist in a 2013 civil rights lawsuit that has cost taxpayers more than $1 million.

    U.S. District Judge Brian Jackson ruled in 2016 that Louisiana imposes unconstitutionally cruel and unusual punishment on the three death-row inmates once the heat index in their cells exceeds 88 degrees. Jackson’s order required prison officials to continue using new measures to control heat levels.

    The 5th Circuit panel concluded Jackson violated a previous order by the appeals court by incorporating a maximum heat index in his ruling.

    https://www.seattletimes.com/nation-...nas-death-row/
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  8. #78
    Senior Member CnCP Legend CharlesMartel's Avatar
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    Inmate video captures disturbing conditions at infamous Louisiana State Prison

    By Grace Speas
    The Daily Dot

    Corey “C-Murder” Miller has ended his hunger strike against the Louisiana State Penitentiary, but a new video shared with the Daily Dot illustrates the “inhumane” conditions he was protesting against. A source close to his team also tells the Daily Dot that the former rap star is facing retaliation for the strike by being denied visits, and another inmate claims the infamous prison is serving food contaminated with shards of glass.

    Miller was on strike for over a week to protest his and other inmates’ living conditions this month. Miller is serving a life sentence after being convicted of murder in 2002, though he maintains his innocence. His story gained national attention when Master P, the well-known rapper and Miller’s brother, said on Instagram that the prison nicknamed “Angola” was a place of “injustice.” C-Murder recorded music on Master P’s No Limit Records.

    A source close to C-Murder’s team, who asked to be referred to as Rochelle, shared video footage with the Daily Dot which she said was filmed inside the prison in early February by a “prison guard that wants to report anonymously.” The video shows trash littering the floor and toilets overflowing. Its authenticity has been independently verified by the Daily Dot.

    The prisoner’s voice in the video has been altered to maintain his anonymity. He narrates the scene at the prison: “feces all over the sink, everywhere in the cell, all over the hallway, and everybody’s property all soaking wet.”

    The video was taken while prisoners were told to clean up the flooding, according to the inmate.

    “The conditions were so bad that a lot of people refused,” the inmate said in a phone interview with the Daily Dot. “Other people tried to clean it up with no gloves on, exposing us to all types of conditions that cause [contamination] problems.”

    The Daily Dot made repeated attempts to speak with prison officials, but they have not yet responded.

    The maximum-security prison—the largest of its kind by population in the U.S.—has a history of brutality toward inmates and corruption. A former major at the prison was found guilty in January of conspiring to cover up the beating of a handcuffed and shackled inmate, according to the Associated Press.

    According to AllHipHop, who spoke to Miller, Angola authorities had the rapper handcuffed for days in “the hole,” and his hands swelled up so big that the cuffs had to be cut off. The anonymous inmate described “the hole” as a solitary “dungeon” where prisoners go for punishment and said there is one at every camp in the prison.

    It was in the hole where the inmate said he was served a tray of food with ground-up glass. He sought medical attention for blood in his stool, and he claims medical personnel dismissed his concerns.

    “The medical team did not find any reason why he had internal bleeding, which is typical,” Rochelle said. “The medical staff will say one thing about the reason why you’re sick, and it always end up being something else.” A few days later, the inmate says he discovered ground up-glass in his stool.

    When Miller has complained to the guards about conditions, Rochelle said, he’s often thrown into the hole. She adds that it’s the dissenting prisoners who wind up with ground-up glass in their food.

    Along with claims of corruption, the anonymous inmate also said cats, lizards, and spiders roam freely about the prison and that there are worms coming from the shower heads.

    “An independent health department needs to investigate the prison system,” Rochelle said. “Outside medical staff need to evaluate inmate complaints.”

    A lawsuit was filed on behalf of three death-row inmates last spring that criticized the prison’s practice of keeping death-row inmates in solitary confinement at all times. In early February, the Advocate reported that the state of Louisiana is not required to prevent heat indexes at the prison from topping 88 degrees. This decision, made by a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans, overturned an earlier ruling made by a Baton Rouge federal judge.

    “There is a real health issue inside these walls,” Rochelle said. “Some dogs live better.”

    https://www.dailydot.com/upstream/c-...-penitentiary/
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  9. #79
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    Bill proposed to eliminate Louisiana death penalty by August 1st

    By Paul Braun and Devon Sanders
    klb.com

    BATON ROUGE, La. (LSU Manship School News Service) - A Senate judiciary committee on Tuesday approved a bill that would eliminate the death penalty in Louisiana effective August 1.

    Sen. J.P. Morrell, D-New Orleans, authored the bill, reasoning that the death penalty is an outdated and costly means of punishment.

    "The death penalty is an archaic holdover from a time where we were not as civilized as we are today," Morrell said.

    Sen. Bodi White, R-Central, provided the only vocal opposition. He argued that abolishing the death penalty would have no effect on the state’s high rate of violent crime.

    Morrell responded that “we have had the death penalty on the books since the founding of our state, and it has not deterred violent crime.”

    “Increasingly, we are finding individuals that commit these violent crimes are mentally unbalanced,” Morrell said. “Many of them are tortured, damaged people who do horrific things because they don’t value human life.”

    Morrell’s bill advanced by a 4-1 vote. Two Democratic senators, Troy Carter of New Orleans and Regina Barrow of Baton Rouge, voted for the bill, as did two Republicans, Sen. Dan Claitor of Baton Rouge, the committee chairman, and Sen. Fred Mills of Parks.

    White cast the lone no vote. Sen. Yvonne Colomb, D-Baton Rouge, and Sen. Jonathan Perry, R-Kaplan, were not present.

    Since 2000, seven people on death row in Louisiana had been exonerated, while only two had been executed, according to the Louisiana Budget Project. Louisiana conducted its last execution in 2010.

    A federal court has barred the state from carrying out executions since 2014 in part because of difficulties in obtaining the drugs considered humane for lethal injections.

    Louisiana is one of 32 states with a death penalty. There are 72 people on death row in Louisiana.

    Similar bills to abolish the death penalty were introduced last year by Sen. Claitor and Rep. Terry Landry, D-New Iberia. Claitor’s passed in a committee but was shelved after Landry’s bill failed to advance from a House panel.


    A much bigger test of the proposal to end the death penalty could come Wednesday when a new bill by Landry, HB162, will be considered before the same House committee that killed his proposal last year.

    No members of the public voiced opposition to the proposal at Tuesday’s hearing.

    Representatives from the Louisiana District Attorney’s Association and the Louisiana Sheriffs’ Association filed red cards in opposition to the bill but did not speak, possibly electing to save their dissent for the more conservative House committee.

    In the meeting Tuesday, Claitor, the committee chairman, brought up the financial burden of capital cases. Morrell agreed, saying in particular that the Louisiana Public Defender Board spends a “tremendous” portion of its annual funding outsourcing capital cases to more expensive criminal defense attorneys.

    A 2016 study by the Louisiana Budget Project reported that one-third of the Louisiana Public Defender Board’s annual budget of $33 million was spent on capital cases.

    https://www.kalb.com/content/news/Bi...479341653.html
    Last edited by aljazres; 09-30-2018 at 05:27 AM.

  10. #80
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    Proposal to abolish Louisiana death penalty advances

    Among those testifying in favor of the measure was Houma-Thibodaux’s Catholic bishop, Shelton Fabre

    By Natalie Anderson
    The Advocate

    BATON ROUGE -- Legislation that would abolish the death penalty in Louisiana is advancing to the Senate for consideration.

    Senate Bill 51, sponsored by New Orleans Democrat Sen. J.P. Morrell, passed out of the Senate Judiciary C Committee on a 4-1 vote today.

    “Life in prison without possibility of parole is in itself a death sentence,” Morrell said.

    The move comes a day after the Louisiana Supreme Court ruled Allen Robertson Jr. is not intellectually disabled and is to remain on death row. The Baton Rouge man known as “Lil Boo” was sentenced to die in 1995 for stabbing an elderly couple to death 27 years ago.

    East Baton Rouge Parish District Attorney Hillar Moore III supported the court’s decision.

    The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2002 that intellectually disabled defendants cannot be executed.

    Louisiana allows the possibility of a death sentence for those convicted of first-degree murder, as well as in cases of first-degree rape of victims under the age of 13. A death sentence is mandatory for the crime of treason. Louisiana is one of 31 states in the U.S. to allow the death penalty.

    Morrell said in the hearing that it’s becoming increasingly hard and expensive to carry out the death penalty.

    Sen. Dan Claitor, R-Baton Rouge, raised concern about the cost of sentencing criminals to life sentences instead of to death, but Morrell said the state could face millions if convicts are wrongfully killed.

    Houma-Thibodaux Bishop Shelton J. Fabre testified on behalf of the Louisiana Conference of Catholic Bishops as a “pastor of souls.” He said the death penalty perpetuates the cycle of violence and a “culture of death,” and said he felt the bill was crucial to promoting a “culture of life” in Louisiana.

    “The Catholic Church considers the death penalty an offense against the sanctity of life,” Fabre said. “Therefore, the use of the death penalty is unnecessary and unjustified in our time.”

    Sen. Mack “Bodi” White, R-Baton Rouge, the only vote against SB51, said he didn’t believe the measure would curb violent crimes.

    A bill to end the death penalty in the House was killed last year.

    If approved by the full Senate, the bill would head to the House for consideration. The bill would apply to crimes committed after Aug. 1.

    How they voted:

    For: Regina Barrow, D-Baton Rouge; Dan Claitor, R-Baton Rouge; Fred Mills, R-Parks; and Troy Carter, D-New Orleans.

    Against: Bodi White, R-Central.

    http://www.dailycomet.com/news/20180...nalty-advances
    Last edited by aljazres; 09-30-2018 at 05:24 AM.

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