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Thread: Artez Hammonds - Alabama Death Row

  1. #1
    Administrator Michael's Avatar
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    Artez Hammonds - Alabama Death Row


    Marilyn Michell







    Summary of Offense:

    Was convicted of capital murder in Houston County on November 6, 1997 for the 1990 slaying of Marilyn Mitchell, 23.

    The State's evidence tends to show the following. In the spring of 1990, Marilyn Mitchell graduated from the University of Alabama school of nursing and moved to Dothan where she was to begin her nursing career and to marry. Ms. Mitchell was 5 feet, 1 inch tall and she weighed around 110 pounds. Her friends recalled that she was a cautious individual, and that she always kept her apartment doors locked. She moved into a townhouse in Dothan where she and her fiancé intended to reside after they married later that summer.

    On May 14, 1990, Artez Hammonds and another individual delivered newly purchased bedroom furniture to Ms. Mitchell's townhouse and placed the furniture in the second floor master bedroom.

    On the evening of May 15, 1990, Ms. Mitchell's fiancé came to the townhouse and discovered the front door unlocked. He heard water running in the upstairs bathroom and, as he climbed the stairs, he discovered Marilyn Mitchell's blood-soaked body lying in the hallway at the top of the stairs. He telephoned the police. The police investigation revealed that Marilyn Mitchell was apparently in the downstairs kitchen baking a cake when she was attacked. There were no signs of forcible entry.

    When Ms. Mitchell's body was found at the top of the stairs, she was dressed only in a T-shirt, naked from the waist down, and she was lying on her back in a large pool of blood; her legs were spread wide apart. Forensic reports indicated that Ms. Mitchell had been repeatedly stabbed and cut with a knife in the neck and chest. The wounds to the neck perforated her jugular veins and carotid artery and caused massive bleeding. There were over 30 lacerations to the neck area, including a wound that severed the voice box. There was also evidence of ligature strangulation, possibly from Ms. Mitchell's T-shirt, which had been used to restrain her.

    In the opinion of the medical examiner, all of these wounds were inflicted while Ms. Mitchell was still alive.   There were two extremely violent stab wounds to the chest area, one of which penetrated Ms. Mitchell's sternum and punctured her aorta. Another vicious stab wound to the chest actually cut through three ribs. The medical examiner opined that the stab wound that punctured the aorta was the wound that finally killed Ms. Mitchell. Swabs taken from Ms. Mitchell's vaginal and anal cavities indicated the presence of spermatozoa, although there was no evidence of anal penetration.

    Semen was also found on a paper tissue found in a bedroom next to a bed;  the comforter on the bed was missing. Blood splatters were also found in the home. Evidence indicates that the attacker may have cleaned up after the attack, positioned the body, smoked a cigarette, and then flicked ashes on Ms. Mitchell's body. In addition to the comforter, Ms. Mitchell's engagement ring and approximately $400 were also apparently taken from the townhouse.

    The police investigation continued for many years without success until, in 1996, the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences conducted DNA testing on the semen samples recovered at the crime scene and discovered that the genetic characteristics of the tested samples were more likely to be found among black males than white males.

    This new information led police investigators back to the furniture delivery men. Police discovered that Artez Hammonds had been convicted for the attempted murder of another woman and that he was serving a 20-year sentence at Holman Prison.

    Because Hammonds was a convicted felon incarcerated in an Alabama penitentiary, a sample of his blood was drawn, pursuant to the Alabama combined DNA indexing system (“CODIS”) program (see § 36-18-20, Ala.Code 1975, et seq.), and the sample was sent to the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences for DNA analysis and comparison.

    The forensic scientists who conducted the DNA analysis testified that the DNA taken from Hammonds's blood sample matched the DNA contained in the semen found on the paper tissue, the spermatozoa found on the vaginal and anal swabs, and the bloodstains located on the inside of the door and baseboard of Ms. Mitchell's home.

    Additionally, Hammonds's thumbprint was found on the telephone in the victim's bedroom. Testimony also revealed that after the murder Hammonds had in his possession a diamond ring similar in appearance to Ms. Mitchell's engagement ring;  he later pawned the ring.

    http://caselaw.findlaw.com/al-court-...s/1116891.html

  2. #2
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    On August 29, 2005, Hammonds filed a habeas petition in Federal District Court.

    http://dockets.justia.com/docket/ala...cv00831/31483/

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    AG asks judge to resolve Artez Hammonds suit

    A lawsuit challenging the conviction and death sentence of a Dothan man has languished in federal court for more than six years, and no activity has been connected to the suit in the past two years and five months.

    Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange is now asking a federal judge to resolve the suit, claiming that “justice delayed is justice denied.”

    The attorney general’s office filed the motion this week in response to a writ of habeas corpus filed on behalf of Artez Hammonds, who has been on Alabama’s death row since 1997 for the 1990 rape and murder of Marilyn Mitchell.

    The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals and the Alabama Supreme Court affirmed Hammonds’s conviction and death sentence, despite expressing concern over prosecution comments made during the trial that disparaged Hammonds’s constitutional right not to testify at trial.

    Attorneys for Hammonds filed a separate petition in 2002 challenging the conviction, which was denied by the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals in March of 2005.

    In August of 2005, attorneys for Hammonds filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in federal court. The petition is a request asking the judge to reverse a lower court’s decision due to a legal or factual error.

    The petition was assisted by an attorney from The Justice Center, a non-profit criminal defense office based in New Orleans that provides representation to defendants facing the death penalty across the South. However, since U.S. District Judge Mark Fuller granted Hammonds’s attorneys permission in June of 2009 to supplement their original brief, no activity has occurred in connection with the case.

    “Timely disposition of pending habeas petitions serves (the state’s and the defendant’s) interests by either affirming the State’s conviction and sentence of death, or by rectifying a grave injustice before further injury can be done,” states the motion, filed by Assistant Attorney General Beth Jackson Hughes.

    The motion asks the court to issue a final disposition in the case within three months.

    http://www2.dothaneagle.com/news/201...it-ar-2713708/

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    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Federal judge denies appeal of death row inmate

    A federal judge has denied the appeal of a death row inmate convicted of murder in the 1990 death of Dothan resident Marilyn Mitchell.

    U.S. District Judge Mark E. Fuller denied the petition for a writ of habeas corpus from Artez Hammonds, convicted in 1997 of the brutal rape and murder of Mitchell. Hammonds exhausted various appeals in the state court system before attorneys filed the petition in federal court on his behalf. It took almost seven years for the appeal to work its way through the court system.

    Mitchell was found dead in her Dothan townhouse on May 15, 1990, not long after graduating from the University of Alabama School of Nursing. The case remained unsolved until 1996 when the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences conducted DNA testing on samples recovered at the crime scene. The DNA testing resulted in a match to Hammonds, who was already serving a 20-year sentence at Holman Prison for attempted murder in an unrelated case. Hammonds was charged with capital murder and convicted by a Houston County jury in 1997. He was sentenced to death.

    Attorneys for Hammonds argued that his conviction and/or death sentence should be overturned for numerous reasons. Attorneys offered 25 separate examples of what they believed were incidents of ineffective counsel during Hammonds’ trial as well as his initial appeal.

    Fuller declined to consider several of the examples because attorneys had failed to bring up the incidents in earlier appeals. He ruled the remaining examples did not have merit.

    “That Hammonds’ lawyers had little evidence to work with hardly makes their efforts unsatisfactory,” Fuller wrote in his 100-page opinion and order. “Indeed, the overwhelming evidence of his guilt prejudiced Hammonds, not his attorneys’ performance.”

    Hammonds’ attorneys also argued that Hammonds did not receive a fair trial because District Attorney Doug Valeska made a reference to Hammonds’ decision not to testify during the trial, which is improper. Trial judge Larry Anderson instructed the jury to disregard the statement and Fuller agreed with the lower appeals court that the statement did not prejudice the jury to the point of causing a mistrial.

    Hammonds’ attorneys further argued that his trial lawyers could have argued mitigating factors during the penalty phase of the trial that could have kept a jury from recommending the death penalty.

    Fuller disagreed.

    “(Hammonds) raped and viciously stabbed to death a woman much smaller than he in a brutal, senseless and planned act of violence. Under these facts, this court can not say that had counsel presented more mitigation evidence, or better prepared the witnesses that testified, there would have been a reasonable probability that consideration of these facts would have led the jury to a different result,” Fuller wrote.

    Hammonds can appeal Fuller’s ruling to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. If the 11th Circuit denies the appeal, he can continue the appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

    http://www2.dothaneagle.com/news/201...te-ar-3681844/
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    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    On April 23, 2015, Hammonds filed an appeal before the US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.

    http://dockets.justia.com/docket/cir.../ca11/15-11797

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    On April 25, 2016, oral argument will be heard in Hammonds' appeal before the Eleventh Circuit.

    http://www.ca11.uscourts.gov/sites/d...s%20public.pdf

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    In today's opinions, the Eleventh Circuit DENIED Hammonds' appeal. The panel was made up of Judges Wilson (Clinton), Rosenbaum (Obama) and Jill Pryor (Obama).

    http://media.ca11.uscourts.gov/opini.../201511797.pdf

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    Senior Member CnCP Legend CharlesMartel's Avatar
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    Appeals court affirms death row inmate's conviction, but 'disturbed' by former Alabama DA's conduct

    By Ivana Hrynkiw
    AL.com

    A federal appeals court has called a former Alabama prosecutor's behavior "unconstitutional and unethical" in a 1997 death penalty case.

    The U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals describes former Houston County District Attorney Doug Valeska's misconduct in an opinion issued in October. The court also said it planned to forward its opinion on his conduct to the Alabama State Bar.

    The appeal was filed by death row inmate Artez Hammonds, who was convicted by Valeska in 1997. Hammond was asking the higher court overturn a Alabama Supreme Court ruling, which decided inappropriate comments by Valeska at the trial did not sway the jury.

    The opinion states, "Although Valeska's improper remarks 'almost persuaded' the Alabama Supreme Court to reverse Hammonds's conviction, it nonetheless held that 'the trial judge corrected any harm by giving appropriate corrective instructions.'" It continues, "Because Hammonds cannot show that he was actually prejudiced by any constitutional trial error, we affirm."

    Valeska was first elected Houston County District Attorney in 1986 and served until 2016, when he decided not to seek a sixth six-year term. He has been a controversial figure in the past, and was even the focus of a New York Times article last year.

    http://www.al.com/news/mobile/index....rms_death.html

  9. #9
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    On December 20, 2017, the Eleventh Circuit DENIED Hammonds' petition for en banc rehearing.

    https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketP...ts%20FINAL.pdf

  10. #10
    Administrator Aaron's Avatar
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    In today's orders, the United States Supreme Court declined to review Hammonds' petition for certiorari.

    Lower court: United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
    Case Nos.: (15-11797)
    Decision date: October 17, 2017
    Rehearing denied: December 20, 2017
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