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Thread: Wayne Powell - Ohio Death Row

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    Wayne Powell - Ohio Death Row




    Summary of Offense:

    On November 11, 2006, Powell murdered his ex-girlfriend, 33-year-old Mary McCollum; her mother, 52-year-old Rose McCollum; her son, four-year-old Jamal McCollum-Myers; and her niece, two-year-old Sanaa Thomas, in Toledo. The night before, Powell and Mary had been arguing. Powell then set fire to the McCollum house leaving the victims to burn to death.

  2. #2
    Senior Member CnCP Legend JLR's Avatar
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    Oral arguments to be held on March 20, 2012. Briefs can be found on the link.

    http://www.sconet.state.oh.us/Clerk/...bycaseinfo.asp

  3. #3
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    Former Toledoan seeks overturn of death sentences in fatal fire that killed 4

    Attorneys for a former Toledo man convicted of setting a 2006 house fire that killed four people, including two children, urged the Ohio Supreme Court Tuesday to save him from the lethal injection gurney.

    Wayne Powell, 47, faces four death sentences, one for each victim, as well as a 10-year sentence for aggravated arson.

    While four family members of the victims watched, Powell’s Dayton attorney, Gary W. Crim, argued that the trial judge erred when he allowed the jury to see a video tape in which Powell’s brother, Isaac, told police his brother had admitted pouring gasoline onto the side of the house.

    He also raised the argument that the prosecution should not have been allowed to point out to the jury during the mitigation phase of the trial that Powell had not taken the stand.

    Justice Evelyn Lundberg Stratton pointed to 90 cell phone calls that Powell made to one of his victims, his 33-year-old estranged girlfriend Mary Rose McCollum, the night before and during the early morning hours that abruptly stopped about the time of the fire.

    “He testified that he didn’t find out about the fire until he watched the news the next morning,’’ Justice Stratton said.

    She and other justices also questioned, even if they should find for Powell on these points, whether the error rises to the level of overturning four murder convictions and death sentences.

    “If we apply a harmless error analysis in light of pretty overwhelming evidence otherwise, where would this have made the difference?’’ Justice Stratton asked.

    The prosecution theorized that Powell poured gasoline into the house at 814 St. John Ave. through a crack in a door to set the fire that killed Ms. McCollum; her ailing mother, Rose Mary McCollum, 52; her 4-year-old adopted son, Jamal; and 2-year-old niece Sanaa’ Thomas.

    Powell is currently incarcerated at the new Ohio death row at the Chillicothe Correctional Institution.

    Mr. Crim argued that the prosecution improperly used a video tape of a police statement to challenge a statement made on the stand by its own witness, Powell’s brother Isaac. Lucas County Assistant Prosecutor David Cooper told the high court that a transcript of Isaac Powell’s prior testimony before a grand jury and the police video tape were used to “refresh’’ his memory about the gasoline statement.

    “They did not refresh his recollection,’’ Mr. Crim said. “They impeached him.’’

    He added that the video was the last thing the jury saw before beginning deliberations and again during deliberations when they raised a question.

    When cross-examined by the defense, Isaac Powell claimed he made the statement about the gasoline because he felt pressured by the police.

    Shortly after Tuesday’s Supreme Court arguments began, relatives of the victims walked in and sat near the front of the courtroom.

    “It was important to be here because that is my family,’’ said Felicia McCollum, Mary Rose’s sister and Rose Mary’s daughter. “That was our life. That was our world… That was our foundation. At the end of the day, we’re here to the end until the book is closed and ‘We’ll see you guys if you want to come to his execution.

    “I don’t care if it’s in Africa, if there’s a will and there’s a way, we’re going to get there,’’ she said. “We’re going to see it through until everything is completely done and over with, until he gets what he deserves.”

    http://www.toledoblade.com/Courts/20...-killed-4.html
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    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    State v Powell

    In today's opinions, the Ohio Supreme Court AFFIRMED Powell's convictions and sentences of death.
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    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Ohio Supreme Court upholds death sentence of Toledo man

    The Ohio Supreme Court unanimously upheld the murder convictions and death sentence of Wayne Powell for the 2006 Toledo house fire that killed four people, including two children.

    The court, in weighing his sentence, considered Powell’s past growing up in a dysfunctional family as well as his history of drug and alcohol abuse, but in the end found that none of it could outweigh what he did.

    “Powell set fire to a home in the middle of the night,” wrote Justice Paul Pfeifer. “Eight people were inside the home at the time of the fire, including five children and a disabled woman.

    “Powell knew that people were inside the home when he started the fire, because he had been there earlier in the evening,” he wrote. “Four people, including two children, died during the fire. These facts establish a senseless, horrific crime that lacks any mitigating features.”

    The fire at 814 St. John Ave. in the early morning of Nov. 11, 2006, killed Powell’s 33-year-old former girlfriend, Mary Rose McCollum; her 52-year-old ailing mother, Rosemary; her 4-year-old son, Jamal McCollum-Myers; and 3-year-old niece, Sanaa’ Thomas.

    The jury had agreed with the prosecution that Powell followed through with prior threats to burn the house by pouring gasoline through a crack in a door and then setting the blaze while the victims and several others slept inside.

    The court did not accept claims of ineffectiveness of counsel.

    It did agree that the jury should not have been shown a video tape of Powell’s brother, Isaac, telling police his brother had admitted to pouring gasoline onto the side of the house. Isaac Powell testified during the trial that he couldn’t recall such a statement.

    But of those areas where the court agreed that error had occurred in the trial, it found the errors to be “harmless errors” that wouldn’t have changed the outcome of the case.

    Powell, 46, is on death row at Chillicothe Correctional Institution. He still has a round of federal appeals available to him.

    http://www.toledoblade.com/Courts/20...oledo-man.html
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    In today's Ohio Supreme Court opinions.

    2007-2027. State v. Powell.

    Lucas C.P. No. G4801CR02006035. This cause came on for further consideration upon the filing of appellant’s motion for stay of execution scheduled for May 7, 2014.

    Upon consideration thereof, it is ordered by the court that the motion is granted. It is further ordered that this stay shall remain in effect until exhaustion of all state postconviction proceedings, including any appeals.
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    2014 execution canceled for Wayne Powell, convicted for killing 4 people in 2006 house fire

    The Ohio Supreme Court today canceled its own set date for the execution of Wayne Powell for the arson deaths of four people, including two children, in a 2006 Toledo house fire.

    The postponement of the scheduled May 7, 2014 execution is a routine procedure designed to move the case into the next round of appeals after the state’s high court upheld his convictions and sentences last year.

    Powell, 47, was convicted of pouring gasoline into the house at 714 St. John Ave. through a crack in a door early in the morning of Nov. 11, 2006 and then setting the house ablaze. The fire killed his ex-girlfriend, Mary Rose McCullum, 33; her ailing mother, Rose Mary McCollum, 52; her adopted son, Jamal, 4, and niece, Sanaa' Thomas, 2.

    In addition to the four death sentences, Powell faces a 10-year prison sentence for aggravated arson. He is incarcerated on death row at Chillicothe Correctional Institution.

    http://www.toledoblade.com/Courts/20...ouse-fire.html
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  8. #8
    Moderator Bobsicles's Avatar
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    Distributed for conference October 9, 2020.

    https://www.supremecourt.gov/search....c/20-5119.html
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    Petition for certiorari denied.

    Lower Ct: Court of Appeals of Ohio, Lucas County
    Case Numbers: (L-18-1194, L-18-1195)
    Decision Date: October 18, 2019
    Discretionary Court Decision Date: February 18, 2020

    https://www.supremecourt.gov/search....c/20-5119.html
    Thank you for the adventure - Axol

    Tried so hard and got so far, but in the end it doesn’t even matter - Linkin Park

    Hear me, my chiefs! I am tired. My heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever. - Hin-mah-too-yah-lat-kekt

    I’m going to the ghost McDonalds - Garcello

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