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  1. #1
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    Azad Haji Abdullah - Idaho Death Row




    Azad Haji Abdullah


    Facts of the Crime:

    Azad Abdullah told police he’d been in Salt Lake City on October 5, 2002 when his wife, 37-year-old Angela "Angie" Jewitt Abdullah, was found murdered in Boise, her home intentionally set aflame in an apparent attempt to cover up the crime.

    Federal investigators first suspected an anti-Muslim hate crime based on earlier threats and acts of vandalism against the Islamic Center of Boise, where the Abdullah family attended religious services, but quickly ruled out that possibility.

    Just a few days later, the spotlight turned back to Azad when Boise officers found they couldn’t confirm his alibi. By November, what started as circumstantial evidence ultimately led to charges for first-degree murder, arson, felony injury to a child, and the attempted murder of three children — two of Angie’s and one a guest in the home — who escaped the blaze.

    Azad pleaded not guilty, but after two years of pre-trial hearings and conferences, he changed his plea to guilty in November 2004.

    According to court records, he was sentenced to 10 years in prison for felony injury to child, 15 years for each attempted murder and 25 years for arson.

    For his wife’s murder, Azad was sentenced to death.

    In an Idaho Press-Tribune report shortly after her death, Angie Abdullah was described by acquaintences as “well-loved, honest and joyful.” She worked for the Idaho Refugee Services Program and volunteered through the Islamic Center of Boise.

    “She wasn’t a soap-box-type activist,” Boise resident Steven Rainey told the IPT in 2002. “She was an activist in her everyday life. She wanted to make sure everyone found their place in the community.”

    Abdullah was sentenced to death on November 23, 2004.

  2. #2
    tammyi75
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    I would love to know where this offender is in his appeals process. I worked in the Idaho prison system for 5 years and was there when he was sentenced.

  3. #3
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    I am searching for information now.
    An uninformed opponent is a dangerous opponent.

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

  4. #4
    Senior Member CnCP Addict Stro07's Avatar
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    Idaho Supreme Court rejects death row inmate's appeal

    The Idaho Supreme Court on Monday found substantial evidence existed to find Boise resident Azad Abdullah guilty of the 2002 murder of his wife, Angie, and setting the family home on fire with gasoline.

    Abdullah, now 37, was convicted in 2004 of first-degree murder, first-degree arson, three counts of attempted first-degree murder and felony injury to a child. He was the second Idahoan sentenced to death under a 2003 Idaho law that requires juries to make that determination rather than judges.

    Abdullah is one of 10 men and one woman who now sit on death row in Idaho.

    The Supreme Court considered 23 challenges from the defendant during the guilt and penalty phases of his trial and another 15 post-conviction challenges, upholding his convictions and his death sentence.

    "In this case, the jury was instructed that the State must prove Abdullah engaged in conduct which caused Angie’s death. The jury was provided with substantial evidence to make this finding. The State was not required to prove the specific cause of Angie’s death," retired Justice Jesse Walters, who sat on the appeal case, wrote in the 189-page ruling.

    Abdullah, who continues to maintain his innocence, was accused of using a plastic bag to suffocate Angie Abdullah before setting the house — located at 2292 N. Siesta Way, near North Five Mile and West Fairview roads — on fire. The indictment accused him of killing his wife by suffocation and or Prozac poisoning.

    Three children who were inside the house and another one sleeping outside were able to escape the fire and get to safety. The three attempted murder counts were brought in reference to the children inside the house.

    The defense suggested Angie Abdullah took a lethal dose of Prozac, a drug prescribed to her for depression. A forensic toxicologist testified at trial that Prozac may have debilitated Angie Abdullah and was a contributing factor in her death but that it was not a "competent cause of her death."

    Azad Abdullah originally told police he was in Salt Lake City at the time of his wife's death. During closing arguments at the end of the guilt phase of the trial, which lasted six weeks, his attorney said Abdullah lied to police and did return to Boise on Oct. 5, 2002, the night his wife was killed, but that he did not enter the house or kill his wife.

    The Supreme Court ruled that the Ada County jury could have found Abdullah killed Angela by suffocating her with a plastic bag. The justices ruled that "the evidence produced at trial revealed that it was unlikely that (her) overdose was self-imposed," Walters wrote.

    http://www.idahostatesman.com/2015/0...#storylink=cpy

  5. #5
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    The Supreme Court considered 23 challenges from the defendant during the guilt and penalty phases of his trial and another 15 post-conviction challenges, upholding his convictions and his death sentence.
    Does this mean Idaho consolidates direct appeals and habeas appeals? If so, this would go some way toward explaining why it's taken the Idaho Supreme Court 11 years to wrap this up.

  6. #6
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    On August 25, 2015, Abdullah filed a habeas petition in Federal District Court.

    https://dockets.justia.com/docket/id...5mc08251/35711

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