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Thread: Utah Capital Punishment News

  1. #71
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Neil's Avatar
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    It seems as though Robert Dunham’s words from March 2020 are coming into fruition. After Colorado’s abolition he stated that the next three jurisdictions that were likely to shed the death penalty were Virginia, Utah, and Wyoming. Virginia’s abolition was first.

    Wyoming’s abolition bill was tabled this year but it’s definitely primed to make a comeback in 2023. The ingredients for Utah’s abolition are definitely coming into place since the top 4 counties in the state announced they won’t ever seek it again essentially killing it in the state and Cox’s words weren’t beneficial to its survival there either.
    Last edited by Neil; 10-02-2021 at 12:00 PM.

  2. #72
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    Proposed bill would prohibit Utah from seeking death penalty

    By Sara Knox
    KUTV

    SALT LAKE CITY — A new bill proposed by Utah legislators has been released to the public that, if passed, would remove the death penalty as a punishment for aggravated murder in the state.

    H.B. 147, sponsored by Rep. Lowry Snow (R-St. George) and Sen. Dan McCay (R-Riverton), will be considered during the 2022 Utah general session, which begins Tuesday.

    The bill would add a possible sentence for the aggravated murder of 45 years to life in prison while prohibiting the state from seeking the death penalty for aggravated murder committed after May 4, 2022.

    It also would prohibit the state from seeking the death penalty for aggravated murder committed before May 4, 2022, unless the state filed the notice of intent to seek the death penalty before the date.

    There are currently seven men on death row in Utah.

    The state has conducted seven executions since 1976. A total of 43 executions, including federal and military executions, were performed prior to 1976.

    https://kutv.com/news/local/utah-leg...-death-penalty
    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

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  3. #73
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    Death penalty repeal faces tight battle in House

    The bill to repeal the death penalty will get a hearing in Utah’s House of Representatives. Whether it’ll pass remains to be seen.

    Death penalty repeal

    House Speaker Brad Wilson, R-Kaysville, told reporters Friday that he doesn’t want it repealed.

    “I am personally not supportive of removing the death penalty as an option,” said Wilson. “I will say this, I could sit and argue both sides of this for an hour. I think it’s a valid question to ask if we should give government this power. And I think it’s worth evaluating, I am personally a no.”

    The Majority Leader, Rep. Mike Schultz, R-Hooper is on the same page as the speaker.

    “These are the worst of the worst offenders,” said Schultz. “I get there’s probably been some things around the country that would make people question the death penalty, but I think we’ve got a pretty fair process.”

    The larger House GOP caucus hasn’t taken a stance on repealing it, or not.

    Schultz told The Deseret News opinions are pretty split.

    Healing ways

    Rep. Casey Snider, R-Paradise, says capital punishment has brought healing in the ways it has been used.

    “I look at the Lizzy Shelley case, in Cache County three years ago… a little girl, abducted in the middle of the night by her uncle,” said Snider. “They find him a couple of hours later, walking the streets with pieces of her, in my district, a few miles from my home.

    That Lizzy was the same age as my daughter at the time she was brutally murdered and raped. In a plea deal, they said we will not seek the death penalty for you. We will put you in jail for the rest of your life if you will tell us where the body is, if you tell us where you left her. Because of that agreement, because we have those tools in place… it brought Lizzy home.”

    So, he’ll vote to keep it intact.

    The bill is currently in a House committee.

    (source: kslnewsradio.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

  4. #74
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    Utah Attorney General's Office opposes death penalty repeal bill

    A bill to repeal the death penalty in Utah will likely get a hearing, House Speaker Brad Wilson told reporters on Friday.

    The bill has been stuck in the powerful Rules committee, which determines if bills go forward in the legislative session. However, Speaker Wilson, R-Kaysville, said he remains opposed to ending capital punishment in Utah.

    On Friday, Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes' office told FOX 13 News it will oppose the bill by Rep. Lowry Snow, R-Santa Clara, and Sen. Dan McCay, R-Riverton, to "repeal and replace" the death penalty with a 45-to-life in prison sentence.

    "We need to reserve the death penalty for the worst of the worst," said Thomas Brunker, an assistant attorney general who works on death penalty litigation.

    The bill proposes to keep the existing men on death row, but Brunker said there were concerns that may be unconstitutional. A coalition of prosecutors, including Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill, are trying to persuade the legislature to repeal the death penalty. Utah County Attorney David Leavitt said he will no longer seek it in homicide cases.

    Senate President J. Stuart Adams, R-Layton, said he was "keeping an open mind" on the death penalty repeal bill and whether Utah should end capital punishment. Sen. McCay said he understood the attorney general's opposition.

    "While they may feel that way, it is important to keep in mind it’s a difficult issue. It isn’t easy and there are victims families that have a lot of deal with," he said. "I’m hopeful if we do move forward with repealing the death penalty in the state of Utah, it will be based on policy and it will be based on the fiscal impacts and it will be based on long-term issues related to the death penalty."

    (source: Fox News)
    "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

  5. #75
    Moderator Bobsicles's Avatar
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    The death penalty abolition bill failed in the committee, according to Fox 13 News Utah
    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

  6. #76
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    Cool they can keep not doing anything for another decade.
    "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

  7. #77
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    Jeff Gray to bring back death penalty after becoming presumptive next Utah County Attorney

    By Lindsay Alerts and Samantha Herrera
    KSL News Radio

    UTAH COUNTY, Utah — It’s all but certain that Jeff Gray will become the next Utah County Attorney, having more than 70% of the primary vote over incumbent David Leavitt as of Wednesday morning.

    Add to that, Gray does not have a Democratic opponent in the general election, so it’s highly likely he’ll become the Utah County Attorney come January 2023.

    And in his first move, Gray told KSL NewsRadio’s Dave & Dujanovic, that he plans to bring back the death penalty.

    “I will absolutely bring back the death penalty,” Gray said. “The residents of Utah, the citizens of Utah, have made known their desires, and they see fit to have the death penalty. And I believe that it’s a violation of Mr. Leavitt’s oath to uphold the law when he says he will never pursue the death penalty.”

    Gray’s move would be in stark contrast to Leavitt’s 2021 announcement that he would no longer seek the death penalty.

    Gray said he doesn’t fault Leavitt for going to the legislature and seeking its repeal.

    “That’s his right as a citizen, but as a prosecutor, his obligation is to uphold the law. And when he says that he will never pursue it, that a violation of that duty,”

    Leavitt also spoke to Dave & Dujanovic about his loss. The people, he said, clearly chose which criminal justice policies they support.

    “My effort all along has been to return more power to people, through juries, and less power to prosecutors and police,” Leavitt said.

    Leavitt’s recent controversies


    Gray said he doesn't think Leavitt's recent negative publicity helped him win. He attributes his success to voters rejecting Leavitt’s policies.

    Leavitt however, does think the recent headlines and accusations have hurt him.

    “We’re dealing with a citizenry that will embrace them [lies] and believe them.”

    But, Leavitt said, while he won’t change his policies, he will spend the next six months setting Gray up as best as possible for his administration.

    https://kslnewsradio.com/1971006/jef...unty-attorney/
    "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

  8. #78
    Moderator Bobsicles's Avatar
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    Since it hasn’t been mentioned yet, Utah death row inmates are now housed at the Utah State Correctional Facility since they closed Utah State Prison.

    Meaning they’d have to make a new execution chamber if they were to ever to perform executions again.
    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

  9. #79
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    Judge to decide future of Utah’s death penalty

    By Ben Winslow
    KSTU

    A judge will decide whether a group of inmates can proceed with a lawsuit challenging Utah’s death penalty.

    Five death row inmates — Ralph Menzies, Troy Kell, Michael Archuleta, Douglas Carter and Taberon Honie — are suing the state, challenging the methods and protocols surrounding their pending executions. In arguments, their attorney argued it was cruel and unusual punishment and accused the state of not providing details about how executions are carried out.

    “The state could execute plaintiffs by using indisputably torturous drugs and plaintiffs would have no way to challenge that,” the inmates’ attorney, Cory Talbot, argued to the judge.

    On Thursday, 3rd District Court Judge Coral Sanchez heard arguments over a request by the Utah Attorney General’s Office to dismiss the lawsuit.

    Lethal injection remains the state’s primary method of execution. However, if the state lacks the chemicals necessary to carry out such an execution, the Utah legislature recently modified laws to allow firing squad to become the default method. In the past, the Utah Department of Corrections has told FOX 13 News it does not have the chemicals for lethal injection.

    But the Utah Attorney General’s Office told the judge on Thursday that the agency believes the law allows them to use similar chemicals.

    “The protocol does not need to be modified,” assistant Utah Attorney General David Wolf argued. “The absence of sodium thiopental was anticipated. The state is free to either obtain sodium thiopental if they can, compound a similar drug, obtain similar drugs that are effective at causing death and if none of those are available? The firing squad.”

    Wolf argued that the inmates were, in some cases, decades too late in bringing up challenges to the death penalty in court.

    “With respect to the death penalty, that is the punishment. Death and execution is the punishment. So if they can’t come up with an alternative method to execute these prisoners, you’re essentially outlawing the death penalty,” he told Judge Sanchez.

    The judge did not issue a ruling immediately. Instead, Judge Sanchez said she would weigh the arguments and issue a ruling within a month or so.

    Of Utah’s seven death row inmates, only one has an execution that is imminent. FOX 13 News reported last week that Menzies, who was sentenced to death for the 1986 murder of Maurine Hunsaker, has exhausted his appeals and the Utah Attorney General’s Office was likely to seek his execution early next year.

    Menzies and Kell have opted to die by firing squad, the attorney general’s office said. Kell, Honie and Carter have chosen to die by lethal injection.

    https://www.eastidahonews.com/2023/1...death-penalty/
    "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

  10. #80
    Moderator Bobsicles's Avatar
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    Utah judge upholds death penalty after five death-row inmates sued to overturn it

    By Scott Lewis
    ABC4

    SALT LAKE CITY — An attempt by five plaintiffs to overturn Utah’s death penalty as “cruel and unusual punishment” failed as the state’s 3rd District dismissed their lawsuit earlier today, Dec. 22.

    The original lawsuit was filed in March of this year on behalf of five convicted murderers sentenced to die by Utah courts for their crimes: Ralph Menzies, Taberon Honie, Troy Kell, Douglas Carter and Michael Archuleta. All five were sentenced prior to 2004.

    The five plaintiffs sued the Utah Department of Corrections, the Utah State Correctional Facility, Gov. Spencer Cox, Warden Robert Powell, Asst. Deputy Executive Director Spencer Turley, Training Academy Director Travis Knorr, and 10 unnamed people in their official capacities with the state.

    Third Dist. Judge Coral Sanchez dismissed their suit today in a 29-page document explaining why their arguments do not hold under Utah’s Constitution.

    ‘Cruel and unusual punishment’

    One of the main arguments the plaintiffs made in their lawsuit wasn’t that the death penalty itself is unconstitutional, but rather that the methods used by Utah — lethal injection and firing squad — could cause unnecessary suffering.

    Utah is one of only four U.S. states that still allow executions by firing squads, including Mississippi, South Carolina, and Oklahoma. As of 2015, Utah made lethal injection the state’s primary method of execution but kept the firing squad as a backup method if the drugs needed for lethal injection are unavailable.

    With at least two of the plaintiffs slated to die by firing squad, their original lawsuit delved deep into the possibilities of botched executions by firing squads, which could cause those being executed to suffer for extended periods before their deaths. The lawsuit argues that the five men should be entitled to instantaneous death without risk of severe pain.

    In 2010, the Utah Department of Corrections updated its protocols requiring the state to “eliminate the risk of severe pain” in executing criminals. Judge Sanchez stated today that the five plaintiffs had four years from the 2010 changes to fight against the new protocols. Instead, Sanchez noted the plaintiff waited until 2023 to challenge the protocols, meaning the statute of limitations kicked in and made their lawsuit “untimely.”

    Sanchez also examined Utah’s death penalty laws going back to 1895, noting that the people of Utah have not significantly edited or rewritten the main laws since that time. Ultimately, Sanchez ruled that the laws as they are currently written do not require the courts to decide a ‘better’ method of execution. In short, as the laws are written now, the burden of proof is on the plaintiffs, and Sanchez ruled they had not met that burden.

    “Plaintiffs have offered no legal precedent or historical facts to support their interpretation of the cruel and unusual punishments clause: that a method of execution must result in instantaneous death,” stated Sanchez’s ruling. “Plaintiffs have not alleged any facts to show the protocols implemented to execute people during the ratification era of the Utah Constitution were more likely to eliminate pain than the protocols he now challenges, which were written in 2010.”

    Also, Sanchez said the plaintiffs have not “identified a feasible, readily implemented alternative to the 2010 protocols that would significantly reduce a substantial risk of that pain.” Sanchez noted that it’s not the court’s “burden” to come up with a different method of execution.

    The plaintiffs also attempted to argue that intravenous drugs given in lethal injections often do not sufficiently numb a person before killing them. Sanchez stated that the lawsuit did not show “that the 2010 protocols will subject an inmate to a sufficiently imminent danger of needless suffering as required by the United States Supreme Court. They have not shown an ‘objectively intolerable risk of harm’ based upon the way the protocols are written.'”

    Sanchez’s entire ruling can be read at the end of this post.

    The plaintiffs’ crimes

    The five plaintiffs who asked the court to block the death penalty in their cases are as follows, according to their original March 2023 lawsuit and from information from the Utah Attorney General’s Office:

    Ralph Menzies — Sentenced to death in March 1988 in the murder of Maurine Hunsaker, a young mother of three who worked as a Kearns convenience store cashier. According to the AG’s Office, on February 23, 1986, Menzies kidnapped Hunsaker from her job and took her to Big Cottonwood Canyon. He kept her overnight in a picnic area near Storm Mountain. Her body was found two days later, tied to a tree with her throat slashed. He is facing death by firing squad. Today’s dismissal was Menzies’ final action for appeal in Utah. He can now only be spared by a pardon or by the action of the U.S. Supreme Court. A death warrant for Menzies is expected to be issued within weeks, according to the AG’s Office.

    Douglas Carter — Sentenced to death in January 1992 for the aggravated murder of Eva Olesen, 57, the aunt of a former Provo police chief who was found stabbed and shot in the head in 1985. After decades of appeals, the Utah Supreme Court in 2019 reversed Carter’s conviction and ordered a new trial after the witnesses — Epifanio Tovar and Lucia Tovar — said police and prosecutors offered them gifts and money, coached them to lie in court and threatened them with deportation if they didn’t cooperate. The Tovars were immigrants without legal status. Until Carter can receive a new trial, he remains subject to his original sentence. Carter originally faced death by lethal injection.

    Taberon Honie — Sentenced to death in May 1999 in the death and sexual assault of his ex-girlfriend’s mother, Claudia Benn, 49. Honie used a rock to smash through a glass patio door before he cut Benn’s throat four times and slashed her with a kitchen knife. She also faced bites and sexual assault. Police arrested Honie covered in blood. Three children were in the home at the time of the killing. 5th District Judge Robert Braithwaite was quoted as saying, “It was not a sentence I gave to the defendant; he earned it. If this isn’t a death penalty case, I don’t know what is.” It is unclear which method of execution is slated for Honie.

    Troy Kell — Originally sentenced to life in prison by a Nevada court for the 1986 murder of James “Cotton” Kelly, also known as James Thiede. Kell was sent to Utah as part of a prisoner exchange program, but later killed Utah Department of Corrections inmate Lonnie Blackmon in 1994, along with accomplice Eric Daniels. Kell was set to be executed in 2003, but decided to appeal his case. He faces death by firing squad.

    Michael Archuleta — Sentenced to death in March 1993 in the murder of Gordon Ray Church in 1988. Archuleta and accomplice Lance Conway Wood were tried separately. Archuleta was on parole at the time, as was Wood. The two attacked Church, bound him, placed him in a trunk, drove 76 miles north of Cedar City, removed Church from the trunk, attached live battery cables to his privates and beat him severely. They then inserted a tire iron into his rectum, forcing it into his body until Church’s liver was punctured. Wood received a life sentence in his trial. Archuleta faces death by lethal injection.

    What’s next?

    The five plaintiffs have 21 days to file an amendment to their original complaint. If they do not, Sanchez’s order stands and their lawsuit is dismissed without prejudice. Dismissal without prejudice means that suit can be amended and brought before the court again.

    https://www.abc4.com/news/crime/utah...o-overturn-it/
    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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