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Thread: James DeJarnette Robertson - South Carolina Death Row

  1. #11
    Senior Member CnCP Legend JimKay's Avatar
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    Boys who torture and kill animals often grow up to be serial killers.

    http://www.crimemuseum.org/blog/9-ea...ial-killers-2/

  2. #12
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    Yes and men that abuse women are 85% more likely to abuse animals. Interestingly, I clicked on the link you posted and up came Ed Gein. Reason I mention this is that it seems that boys that have either promiscuous, abusive, or absent mothers are at a higher risk to abuse women later in life and or, become serial killers. Ed Gein's mother it seems was a religious nut who probably contributed to Ed's lack of early socialization.

  3. #13
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    James Robertson, York County’s only death row inmate, gets new shot at avoiding sentence

    By Andrew Dys
    The Herald

    ROCK HILL - Just when it appeared that Rock Hill’s James Robertson had run out of options in trying to avoid the death penalty, the S.C. Supreme Court has offered one more legal maneuver.

    The S.C. Supreme Court ruled recently in a split decision that lawyers in death penalty cases must have a combination of death penalty trial experience, post-conviction relief experience, plus other continuing education. Robertson’s lawyers did not have that, the supreme court says. So, in an effort to reverse his conviction and sentence, Robertson gets a chance to argue that his lawyers blew the case in 1999.

    Legal experts say Robertson’s chances are small. The ruling does mean a slim chance at avoiding the death penalty, said Kennth Gaines, a criminal law expert and professor at the University of South Carolina law school.

    “The chances of success are low, Gaines said. “Really low.”

    James “Jimmy” Robertson, 43, was sentenced to death in 1999. He was found guilty of killing Terry and Earl Robertson in their Rock Hill home in November 1997 in an attempt to get their multi-million dollar estate. He fled to Pennsylvania, leaving a trail of credit card purchases and evidence, including the murder weapons, and was caught by police in Philadelphia. The 1999 trial was broadcast live nationwide on Court TV.

    All of Robertson’s appeals have failed. Execution dates have twice been set for Robertson, the only death row inmate with York County roots.

    But the S.C. Supreme Court ruled in 2016 that Robertson is entitled to a new hearing because of the qualifications of his lawyers in a failed 2008 lawsuit. Robertson claimed in that 2008 post-conviction relief lawsuit that his trial lawyers botched the case in 1999 by not pursuing a guilty but mentally ill plea deal, among other alleged errors. A judge had a three-day hearing in 2008 and ruled against Robertson.

    Robertson and an anti-death penalty group from Columbia, and Cornell law school in New York, say in court documents that Robertson’s lawyers in the 2008 lawsuit, Michael Brown and the late Joe Matlock, did not have the required experience.

    It took the S.C. Supreme Court 14 months to make a decision after hearing arguments in October 2015.

    “It is a technical decision, but the supreme court ruling says the law wasn’t followed,” Gaines said.

    The ruling does not free Roberson or give him a new trial. If he wins his lawsuit, Robertson could get a new trial or sentencing hearing.

    No date has been set for the new hearing, said Hayley Thrift Bledsoe, spokesperson for the S.C. Attorney General’s Office, which will again argue that Robertson does not deserve another appeal and should be executed.

    Efforts to reach Robertson’s current lawyers, Keir Weyble of Cornell Law school in New York and Emily Paavola of Columbia , were unsuccessful.

    “In capital cases, courts are very careful about the rights of a defendant,” Gaines said. “The lawyers for Robertson seemed like they left no stone unturned when trying to seek a new hearing, and they got one.”

    http://www.heraldonline.com/news/loc...126670744.html


    "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

  4. #14
    Senior Member CnCP Legend CharlesMartel's Avatar
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    ‘Can’t undo death’: Rock Hill man, convicted of killing parents in 1997, still appeals

    BY ANDREW DYS
    The Herald

    Twenty years ago, Terry and Earl Robertson were beaten and stabbed to death in their Rock Hill home. Their son, James Robertson was charged and convicted of the killings.

    Robertson, known as “Jimmy,” has been on South Carolina’s death row for 18 years, since his 1999 conviction for double murder, armed robbery and credit card fraud.

    Saturday, Nov. 25 is the 20th anniversary of the murders and subsequent arrest. The deaths, and the ensuing trial, captured the nation’s attention and continues to do so. This weekend, there will be a TV special focusing on the Rock Hill case.

    Meanwhile, Robertson is not done with his appeals.

    On Dec. 1, he will have a hearing on his latest attempt to get a new trial or his sentence overturned. State prosecutors with the S.C. Attorney General’s Office, and lawyers who took on Robertson’s case six years ago, are arguing whether Robertson’s should get a new trial because of errors in 1999 by his trial lawyers and by prosecutors.

    “Justice is not fast, especially in capital cases,” said Colin Miller, a University of South Carolina law school professor and legal expert in criminal procedure and evidence. “The ‘CSI effect’ is people expect cases to be resolved, finalized, quickly. Reality is there are people who receive death sentences that never are executed. Most of them are never executed.”

    South Carolina does not have enough lethal injection drugs to execute anyone. A planned execution of a convicted killer, set for Dec. 1, has been postponed.

    Not a question of guilt

    Kevin Brackett, 16th Circuit Solicitor who prosecuted Robertson along with former prosecutor and current S.C. Rep. Tommy Pope, said there is no doubt that Robertson is guilty.

    “The evidence against him remains completely overwhelming,” Brackett said.

    Tim Hager was the York County Sheriff’s Office lead detective in the case, with now-retired Ralph Misle.

    “There was no doubt whatsoever,” Hager said. “We knew within an hour of finding his parents, that Jimmy Robertson was a suspect.”

    Robertson was seen by a neighbor leaving the home in his father’s car on that evening in November 1997, after another person found the bodies, Hager said. Police found that Robertson used his father’s credit card at a Fort Mill store, then in Virginia. Both times, Robertson was captured on video.

    He was arrested the night of the killings in Pennsylvania, near where his brother was attending college.

    “The police in Philadelphia were waiting for him to get there, and took him right then,” Hager said.

    Robertson’s accomplice during the flight, his former girlfriend Meredith Moon, also was arrested. She told police where to find the bloody bat, hammer and knives that Robertson used used in the crime. The items were in an Interstate 95 trash bin in Maryland.

    Twice in the past 15 years, Robertson has been on the cusp of being executed. Each time, he or his lawyers filed appeals that stopped the execution. In 2005, the appeal came after the S.C. Supreme Court had set an execution date. In 2011, a federal judge halted the execution until all state appeals can be finished.

    “With the death penalty, courts recognize there is no chance to review the case if the person is executed,” Miller said. “Courts generally give a number of chances to review claims.”

    Those reviews can take years, or decades.

    “When it comes to the death penalty, everybody in the court system wants to be sure,” said Kenneth Gaines, a USC law professor and expert on criminal trials. “This is life and death....So the courts give death row inmates every opportunity to have their case looked at. You can’t undo death.”

    Moon took a plea deal in exchange for testifying against Robertson, and has since been released from prison.

    Two lawsuits

    In an effort to avoid death, Robertson has two lawsuits pending. He’s now 44.

    In York County civil court, Robertson has a lawsuit alleging that his trial lawyers in 1999 were ineffective, and that prosecutors used improper wording during some arguments. In federal court, Robertson has a lawsuit alleging that he has been held illegally for all these years.

    The civil lawsuit in York County, called a post-conviction relief action, seemed to be resolved in 2011, when a judge ruled that Robertson had competent counsel during the 1999 trial.

    But in 2016, the S.C. Supreme Court ruled the lawyer who represented Robertson in 2011 did not have the right death penalty post-conviction relief experience.

    Lawyers from South Carolina’s Death Penalty Resource & Defense Center, including John Blume, Keir Wyble and Emily Paavola, became Robertson’s lawyers on both appeals. All three are veteran death penalty defense lawyers. Efforts to reach Blume, Weyble and Paavola were unsuccessful.

    Judge Keith Kelly of Spartanburg has been assigned to Robertson’s appeal and hearings on Dec. 1, court documents show. The S.C. Attorney General’s Office is the state prosecutor in charge of trying to uphold Robertson’s sentence.

    Miller said there is no timetable for when Robertson’s appeals could be exhausted.

    That leaves police and prosecutors who put Robertson in prison waiting to see what happens.

    Pope, who used to receive Christmas cards sent by Robertson, has repeatedly said the convicted man’s motives are to seek attention. He said Robertson received a fair trial.

    Hager, Pope, Brackett and others will be interviewed as part of an Oxygen television special called “Homicide for the Holidays.” That show will be broadcast at 6 p.m. Nov. 25.

    There have been other TV specials about the case, and a book written on the crimes and trial.

    Miller and Gaines predict more appeals will come.

    “These things sometimes are pursued all the way to the United States Supreme Court,” Gaines said. “It could easily take another 20 years. Real life in the courts for the death penalty is not TV. It is not movies. It is not even close.”

    http://www.heraldonline.com/news/loc...186308478.html

  5. #15
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    After 20 years on death row, convicted killer of Rock Hill parents seeks new trial

    James Robertson remains on death row in South Carolina after being convicted of murdering his parents during Thanksgiving week 1997. Robertson continues to appeal his 1999 conviction and sentence. A hearing in his appeal is set for Dec. 1.

    After serving 20 years on South Carolina’s death row after he was convicted of killing his parents for $2 million in inheritance, Jimmy Robertson will be back in a York County courtroom Tuesday claiming he deserves a new trial.
    Again.

    Prosecutors plan to fight James “Jimmy” Robertson’s claim that his trial lawyers were ineffective during the 1999 trial.

    The last time Robertson appealed in 2016, the S.C. Supreme Court ruled his court-appointed lawyer did not have the legal training required under South Carolina law, despite having 35 years of death penalty trial experience.

    Now, Robertson’s new lawyers will argue Tuesday that he deserves a new trial because the 1999 trial lawyers failed to do an adequate job. They want an expert on parricide, the crime of killing one’s parents, to be the focal point of a new trial.

    Robertson, now 45, was sentenced by a York County jury to death for the 1997 murder of his parents, Earl and Terry Robertson. Robertson was convicted of stabbing his mother to death, then crushing his father’s skull with a hammer and baseball bat after he blinded his father with bathroom cleaner.

    Robertson, then 24, tried to make the killings look like a break-in and fled toward Philadelphia, where his brother was in college. Robertson left a trail of evidence along the way, including a bat and bloody clothes. Robertson was arrested by police waiting for him in Philadelphia. He was sentenced to death in 1999 and has been on death row at Lieber Correctional Facility in Columbia.

    “The overwhelming evidence of Mr. Robertson’s guilt was littered up and down the East Coast,” said 16th Circuit Solicitor Kevin Brackett, who was part of the 1999 trial team that prosecuted Robertson. “The testimony and physical evidence left no doubt whatsoever that he brutally murdered his mother and father to expedite his inheritance. He is a remorseless killer and the sentence of death imposed by the jury was well deserved.”

    S.C. Rep. Tommy Pope, R-York, formerly 16th Circuit solicitor who was lead prosecutor in 1999, said Robertson is guilty and received a fair trial.

    “Jimmy Robertson sealed his own fate when he bragged in great detail of how he brutally murdered his parents,” Pope said. “A jury of York County citizens heard every detail and found Jimmy guilty beyond a reasonable doubt and sentenced him to death. His attorneys at trial did everything legally possible to protect his rights. Mr. Robertson should look in the mirror, not blame his attorneys, when he finds himself facing the death penalty for the death of his parents.”

    Rock Hill defense lawyers Jim Boyd and Bill Hancock represented him in the 1999 trial. Hancock has since died.

    Filing appeals

    Days before Robertson was set to be executed in 2005, he filed appeals court documents blaming his lawyers.

    His execution was again scheduled in 2010 before Robertson filed a federal lawsuit claiming he was wrongly convicted.

    Roberton’s claims blaming his trial lawyers, called post-conviction relief, were denied in 2011 after a civil trial. However, the S.C. Supreme Court ruled in 2016 that the post-conviction relief case was improper because the PCR lawyer did not have a handful of hours of continued course credit.

    So now, Robertson’s new lawyers say mistakes made during the 1999 warrant a new trial. The claims include the 1999 trial lawyers did not introduce mental health histories of both Robertson and Robertson’s mother. His lawyers said he was bi-polar and abused Ritalin.

    Robertson’s lawyers, Keir Wyble of Cornell Law School in New York and Emily Paavola of Columbia, have experts in bi-polar disorder and parricide who have been interviewing him on death row, documents show.

    The lawyers said in court documents that Robertson had “long-standing, severe, improperly treated mental health issues.”

    Robertson and his lawyers also say prosecutors improperly inflamed the 1999 trial jury.

    Prosecutors said in 1999 court documents that Robertson was tested for mental competency several times and knew right from wrong.

    “The prosecution showed how Robertson brutally and maliciously murdered his parents, and that the murders were motivated by greed to obtain the money from their estates or life insurance policies,” S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson wrote in court documents.

    Robertson’s defense lawyers in 1999 focused on trying to get a sentence of life without parole, attorney general prosecutors said. They testified previously in post-conviction appeal hearings that the defense team developed a mental health defense for Robertson.

    Judge Keith Kelly of Gaffney has been appointed by the S.C. Supreme Court to hear Tuesday’s case.

    Kelly could decide Tuesday whether to grant Robertson a new post-conviction relief civil trial. Either side could then appeal that ruling up to the S.C. Supreme Court or the U.S. Supreme Court, legal experts said.

    The federal lawsuit Robertson filed is on hold until the state appeal is finished.

    (source: heraldonline.com)
    "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

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