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Thread: James Vernon McVay - South Dakota

  1. #11
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    McVay lawyers: No death penalty

    Defense lawyers for a confessed killer say South Dakota law doesn’t allow for the execution of a mentally ill inmate.

    James Vernon McVay, 42, pleaded guilty but mentally ill to first-degree murder for cutting the throat of 75-year-old hospice nurse Maybelle Schein last summer.

    McVay killed Schein and stole her car in what he’d later describe to investigators and television reporters as a plot to assassinate President Obama.

    Among a series of recent motions filed in advance of his sentence hearing is one that claims an execution would be cruel and unusual because of his mental illness and is not allowed under South Dakota law.

    The case raises thorny questions about the appropriate application of the death penalty for those diagnosed with mental illness, a term broad enough to include illness as serious as debilitating schizophrenia and as mild as depression.

    No one who’s pleaded guilty but mentally ill in South Dakota has been sentenced to die, but prosecutors think a jury ought to decide the appropriate punishment.

    In a “motion to preclude a pre-sentence hearing,” McVay’s public defenders say a jury hearing on a death sentence is specifically allowed only if a person is found guilty of murder by a separate jury or pleads guilty voluntarily.

    Someone who pleads “guilty but mentally ill” in South Dakota must be sentenced by a judge, they say.

    “The only sentence that can be imposed by a court (judge) under South Dakota law and the United States Constitution, absent a waiver of a right of trial by jury, which James McVay has not done, is life without parole,” the brief states.

    The lawyers also say that of the states that both allow the death penalty and explicitly define the parameters of “guilty but mentally ill” as a plea, only four have issued death sentences to defendants who made such a plea.

    However, plenty of inmates diagnosed with mental illness have been executed or sit on death row, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

    One of them, Roger Berget, the brother of South Dakota death row inmate Rodney Berget, was executed despite his being diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Roger Berget also attempted suicide before his sentence hearing.

    He was executed in Oklahoma in 2000.

    The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that a person diagnosed as “insane” cannot be executed, but mental illness is viewed differently.

    “The court has not said mental illness is something that bars a death sentence, but they have said it’s something that should be considered,” said Richard Dieter, director of the DPIC.

    Minnehaha County State’s Attorney Aaron McGowan did not comment specifically Thursday on the briefs filed by McVay’s lawyers. No response briefs have been filed.

    “The Public Defender’s Office has filed numerous motions that we disagree with that we will respond to and litigate in due course as this case proceeds,” McGowan said.

    During a late January hearing in the case, McGowan did take pains to distinguish the mental illness afflicting McVay from that of a person who doesn’t know right from wrong.

    McVay’s psychiatrist said the inmate meticulously planned and thought through his bizarre assassination plot during his time in disciplinary segregation and aggravated his mental illness by ingesting shoplifted Robitussin cough syrup and alcohol to induce hallucinations.

    “So he stole the cough syrup and the alcohol to conjure up the liquid courage to carry out this plan he’d formulated in the penitentiary?” McGowan asked Dr. Michael Farnsworth during the hearing.

    “That may be,” Farnsworth said.

    McVay was caught near Madison, Wis., on July 2, 2011, the same day he killed Schein. Detectives used the OnStar tracking system in Schein’s car to track his location.

    The inmate had been paroled out of disciplinary isolation into a minimum-security community transition program less than 48 hours before the murder.

    He told Judge Peter Lieberman during a hearing last November that he’d spent his time in isolation listening to Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity on an AM radio and forming his plot.

    Upon his release, he stole a knife, cough syrup and alcohol from Walmart then spent the night under a bridge in Sertoma Park hallucinating and praying to Satan, he said.

    He climbed under an open garage door and walked into Schein’s home the following morning, woke her up and cut her throat, then watched her bleed to death before stealing her car.

    Farnsworth also said during the January hearing that the inmate clearly is mentally ill but has a calculating nature and understands right from wrong.

    In another motion, McVay’s lawyers said that if a death penalty hearing is held, jurors at the hearing should not be allowed to see the interview he gave to a Wisconsin television station shortly after his arrest.

    On July 6, McVay was interview by WKOW of Madison’s Tony Galli. He told the reporter he’d planned to kill Obama on the golf course. He also said he had no regrets about killing Schein and that he didn’t care if he died for what he’d done.

    “Allowing the state to use the interview, directly or indirectly, would persuade the jury in an unfair and illegitimate way,” the defense lawyers write.

    The sentence hearing for McVay currently is scheduled for June 27, but the motions are likely to push back the date. Judge Lieberman has yet to rule on either one.

    http://www.argusleader.com/article/2...NEWS/306150024
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  2. #12
    Administrator Michael's Avatar
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    Judge: McVay can face death penalty

    A Minnehaha County Judge has ruled that a man who killed a woman in her bed in 2011 can face the death penalty.

    Defense lawyers for James Vernon McVay, 42, argued in written briefs that their client’s plea of guilty but mentally ill precluded a death penalty hearing.

    The death penalty would be cruel and unusual for a mentally ill convict, they said. They also argued that the wording of South Dakota’s guilty but mentally ill statute doesn’t allow the fate of a person who’s made the plea to be decided by a jury.

    McVay pleaded guilty but mentally ill to the crime of first-degree murder for the July 2, 2011, stabbing of 75-year-old Maybelle Schein in her Sioux Falls home, which took place about a day after his release from prison into a low-security community transition program.

    He was captured in Wisconsin several hours later and told detectives that the murder and the theft of Schein’s vehicle were the first steps in a plan to assassinate President Obama.

    Defense lawyers said the only sentence that ought to be available is a life without parole sentence from a judge.

    Judge Peter Lieberman rejected that argument after a motions hearing Wednesday.

    Lieberman said the details of McVay’s mental illness are available for presentation to a jury as mitigating factors weighing against a death sentence.

    Lieberman ruled from the bench on the issue, which has been argued through written briefs since last May.

    “Following the defendant’s argument would lead to an absurd result,” Lieberman said.

    Minnehaha County State’s Attorney Aaron McGowan said he’s pleased with the result.

    “We look forward to the next step in bringing this case to a close,” McGowan said.

    When McVay’s pre-sentence hearing would begin still is an open question.

    A jury of 12 would hear arguments and testimony then decide whether a death sentence is appropriate for the crime. For a death sentence to be imposed, all 12 jurors would have to vote for execution.

    The next motions hearing is set for April 1, but the pre-sentence hearing has not been scheduled.

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    No murder can be so cruel that there are not still useful imbeciles who do gloss over the murderer and apologize.

  3. #13
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    Confessed killer of elderly Sioux Falls woman appears in court

    A prison inmate who killed an elderly woman in her bed during a cough syrup and alcohol-induced stupor two years ago lashed out in court on Wednesday over his portrayal in the media and his treatment by prosecutors.

    James Vernon McVay, 43, faces the possibility of death by lethal injection for the murder of 75-year-old hospice nurse Maybelle Schein on July 2, 2011. The inmate pleaded guilty but mentally ill to the charge of first-degree murder in early 2012.

    A jury would need to vote unanimously to impose a death sentence for McVay to receive one.

    McVay told a psychiatrist that he’d spent the night before the murder drinking cough syrup and alcohol stolen from Walmart, and praying to Lucifer for the courage to kill.

    He climbed under Schein’s slightly-opened garage door, entered her house, woke her and slashed her throat before stealing her Buick sedan.

    He’s claimed that he was still under the influence when he was apprehended in Madison, Wisc., which is where he first told detectives that Schein’s murder and the theft of her car were part of a plot to kill and steal his way to Washington, D.C. and assassinate President Barack Obama.

    He told a Madison television reporter he planned to kill Obama on the golf course.

    McVay has since sought to suppress the interview and the statements made in the hours and days after his arrest, arguing that he was still under the influence.

    Those motions, as well as motions on the appropriateness of the death penalty for a mentally ill defendant, have helped delay the penalty phase of McVay’s trial for more than a year.

    The matter up for discussion Wednesday was characterized by Judge Peter Lieberman as procedural.

    It involved a potential conflict of interest for McVay’s defense team, but McVay, the judge and all of the lawyers agreed that no action was needed. Even so, the inmate used the hearing to accuse prosecutors of playing “psychological games” and cherry-picking information to make him appear dangerous.

    “I’m tired of it being conveyed to the public as if I’m some kind of a monster,” McVay said. “It feels like a joke.”

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    http://www.argusleader.com/article/2...-appears-court
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  4. #14
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    McVay wants details of murder withheld in death penalty sentencing

    A man facing the death penalty for a Sioux Falls murder wants to keep jurors from hearing the statements made in the days after his arrest because he was high on crack and alcohol and hadn’t slept for 36 hours when he made them.

    James Vernon McVay, 43, pleaded guilty but mentally ill to first-degree murder in the stabbing death of 72-year-old Maybelle Schein on July 2, 2011.

    Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. A jury will decide if McVay receives life in prison or a death sentence.

    All day Thursday, lawyers will argue over whether the statements he made to law enforcement ought to be suppressed prior to the penalty phase of his trial. Audio and video recordings of his lengthy statements will be presented during the suppression hearing.

    Soon after his arrest, McVay explained that the murder to law enforcement and saying the DOC was responsible for Schein’s death because they allowed him to escape despite his psychosis. He’d walked away from a minimum security unit in Sioux Falls hours before the murder. He’d been placed in the minimum unit immediately after spending nearly two months in disciplinary segregation.

    “I really never thought I’d do anything like that, but after I’d done it, I thought ‘it would be nothing for me to do this again.’ It was nothing,” McVay told one officer.

    McVay was apprehended in Madison, Wisc. hours after slashing Schien’s throat in her Sioux Falls home and stealing her vehicle.

    In the hours and days after his arrest, he offered dozens of unsolicited statements about how he’d murdered the woman and stole her car as part of a plot to steal and kill his way to Washington, D.C., where he wanted to assassinate President Obama on a golf course.

    The inmate told officers about the murder and the plot to assassinate the president, and later repeated the same story to a television reporter in Madison.

    McVay’s lawyers in Sioux Falls now say their client’s mental state and his ingestion of myriad substances leading up to the arrest add up to prove that his statements weren’t voluntary.

    “He could not weigh the cost and benefits of the statements he was making due to his psychosis,” said Minnehaha County Public Defender Traci Smith.

    Minnehaha County State’s Attorney Aaron McGowan told Judge Peter Lieberman that there was no proof that McVay’s statements were anything but voluntary. He made many of the statements without being asked, and continued speaking after being read his Miranda warnings.

    The statements made to the television reporter and a letter McVay later sent to the Argus Leader are not part of the defense team’s motion to suppress evidence, but McGowan referred to both incidents as further proof that McVay voluntarily confessed.

    McGowan also pointed to the fact that McVay appeared calm, lucid and articulate through each of his interactions.

    “There is no indication of any psychosis,” McGowan said.

    Officers in Wisconsin testified Thursday morning about the short Interstate police chase that lead to McVay’s apprehension. Tire spikes were deployed to get McVay to pull over, but instead of complying with officer’s demands to exit the vehicle, one officer said, he turned up a Pink Floyd song and held still until police pulled him out.

    The situation, coupled with the knowledge that McVay was wanted in connection to a homicide in South Dakota, made for a tense situation, said Sgt. Jason Ostrenga of the Madison Police Department.

    “It made the hairs on the back of your neck rise,” Ostrenga said.

    Once he was in the back of a police cruiser and given his glasses by another officer, however, McVay’s demeanor changed.

    Kipp Hartmann, another Madison police officer, testified that the inmate said he’d “tell him anything he wanted to know” if he got his glasses back.

    “He told me I was going to find everything out, that he’d murdered a woman in Sioux Falls, South Dakota,” Hartman said.

    McVay proceeded to tell Hartman the details about the murder, with Hartman stopping him at one point to read him his Miranda warnings against self-incrimination.

    “I just want you to understand you’re under arrest at this point,” Hartman said.

    “Yeah, I know that, man,” McVay told him.

    He then talked about being surprised at how much blood the human body has. He also informed Hartman that Schein’s family had been trying to contact him through the stolen vehicle’s GPS system.

    “He asked me to get in contact with the victim’s family to let them know she was murdered and that he did it,” Hartman said.

    He elaborated further about his crime and how it made him feel.

    “I’ll probably murder again. And next time, it will be worse. You wanna know why, because now I know there is no God. If you put me in jail, I’ll probably kill inmates,” McVay said.

    The hearing will continue at least through Thursday.

    http://siouxfallsbusinessjournal.arg...lty-sentencing

  5. #15
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    Judge To Allow TV Interview In McVay Death Penalty Hearing

    The interview James McVay did with a Madison, Wisconsin TV station just days after being arrested for the murder of a Sioux Falls woman will be allowed at his death penalty hearing.

    McVay has pleaded guilty but mentally ill to the July 2011 murder of Maybelle Schein.

    He was arrested later the same the day of the murder in Schein's car in Madison, Wisconsin.

    During a jailhouse interview with a Local TV station, McVay said Schein's murder was the beginning of a cross-country killing spree that would end with the assassination of the President.

    At a motions hearing Wednesday morning, Judge Peter Lieberman said he will allow the interview during the death penalty hearing because “it is highly relevant for the jury to know how McVay feels about the crime.”

    http://www.keloland.com/newsdetail.c...ing/?id=154974
    An uninformed opponent is a dangerous opponent.

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

  6. #16
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    Judge denies attempt to stop death penalty case

    A Sioux Falls judge has denied a motion to halt death penalty proceedings against a state prison inmate based on an allegation of insufficient funding of his public defenders.

    Lawyers for James Vernon McVay, 43, argued this morning that their office is understaffed based on national guidelines from the National Legal Aid and Defender Association.

    Minnehaha County Public Defender Traci Smith said her office’s workload is too heavy to offer McVay adequate counsel for his upcoming pre-sentence hearing.

    Smith has requested and been denied additional staff attorneys for the past two years as her client load has increased.

    Smith told Judge Peter Liebermann that with only 22 lawyers and three representing McVay for a 6-week jury hearing in March, it won’t be possible for her team to provide the best possible defense for him.

    Based on national guidelines and her office’s caseload, she said, the public defender’s office should have had 25 lawyers on staff in 2012 and is on pace to need 28 in 2014.

    The State’s Attorney’s Office has 25 lawyers, Smith said, and the backing of the law enforcement and state crime lab experts.

    “It isn’t just a matter of parity of resources, it’s about meeting our ethical obligation and our responsibility to our client,” Smith said. “If we aren’t given the resources we need, the state should be precluded from seeking the death penalty.”

    State’s Attorney Aaron McGowan told Lieberman that Smith’s numbers skew the real picture of funding for lawyers in Minnehaha County. Three of McGowan’s lawyers handle civil matters, he said, meaning there are only 22 lawyers to handle criminal issues.

    Those lawyers have to contend not only with defense lawyers from Smith’s office, but with the five attorneys in the Public Advocate’s Office and the 50 or so private lawyers hired to represent clients in cases with multiple defendants.

    “Our numbers are deflated because of the actual number of defendants we’re dealing with,” McGowan said.

    The state’s attorney’s office receives less funding from the county for education, training and expert witnesses than the Public Defender and Public Advocate’s offices as well, he said.

    Judge Lieberman told Smith he understood her concerns and recognizes that the assistance of law enforcement will always tip the scales in the state’s favor, but there are more defense lawyers than prosecutors on the county dole and that commissioners have done a good job managing the scare resources they have.

    “Unfortunately, since 2008, we’ve been dealing with shrinking resources, not expanding resources,” Lieberman said.

    The judge also said that the three lawyers handling McVay’s case – Smith and deputies Amber Eggert and Michelle Thomas – have given their client a “first-rate defense.”

    “I can’t see where the defense can in any way be faulted for not doing something they should have done,” he said. “If anything the defense would suffer from, it would be over-enthusiasm.”

    McVay pleaded guilty but mentally ill to first-degree murder in the July 2, 2011, stabbing death of 75-year-old Maybelle Schein. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty due to what they’ve described as a wantonly vile act committed as part of a home invasion and robbery.

    McVay was captured near Madison, Wisc., and told police and a television reporter that he’d killed Schein as the first step in a plan to rob and kill his way to Washington, D.C., to assassinate President Barack Obama.

    On Wednesday, Smith’s team argued, unsuccessfully, that jurors ought to be shielded from the television interview and that the death penalty was improper for a mentally-ill client.

    They had previously argued to suppress a law enforcement interview, in which McVay admitted to walking away from a minimum security transition unit at the penitentiary, shoplifting cough syrup and alcohol then spending the night in a park praying to Lucifer for the strength to kill.

    http://www.argusleader.com/article/2...h-penalty-case
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  7. #17
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    Death penalty hearing for man accused of killing S.F. woman begins in March

    The two-phase death penalty hearing for a state prison inmate who stabbed a woman to death in 2011 will begin in mid-March.

    James Vernon McVay, 43, pleaded guilty but mentally ill in 2012 to first-degree murder in the death of 72-year-old Maybelle Schein.

    Defense lawyers have tried to block the possibility of a death sentence for nearly two years, but Judge Peter Lieberman has consistently ruled that the question should be left to a jury.

    For a person to receive a death sentence in South Dakota, a jury of 12 must conclude that a murder has at least one of 10 statutorily-defined aggravating factors, and that those factors are not outweighed by mitigating factors, such as an offender’s remorse, potential for rehabilitation or difficulties during their upbringing.

    If one juror disagrees with a sentence of death, the sentence becomes life in prison without the possibility of parole.

    On Tuesday, Lieberman told lawyers for both sides that the sentence hearing for the confessed killer would be divided into two parts. For the first, prosecutors would be required to prove the aggravating factors beyond a reasonable doubt.

    If the jury concludes that an aggravating factor is present, the hearing would continue.

    “If they found he was not eligible, we would not go any further,” Lieberman said.

    In the second phase of the hearing, the rules of evidence would loosen, Lieberman said. Relatives of the victim would be allowed to testify about the impact the crime has had on their lives, McVay would be allowed to speak to the jury without being questioned by prosecutors, and defense lawyers could present other mitigating evidence on his behalf.

    Minnehaha County State’s Attorney Aaron McGowan is alleging two aggravating factors in the McVay case: That his crime was wantonly malicious or vile, and that he committed it to obtain something of value from his victim.

    McVay walked away from the South Dakota State Penitentiary’s Community Transition Program unit on July 1, 2011 and shoplifted a knife, liquor, cough syrup and clothing from Walmart on Louise Avenue before spending a night in Sertoma Park.

    McVay drank the cough syrup and began hallucinating and praying to Lucifer for the strength to kill, having planned for two months to steal and kill his way to Washington, D.C., and assassinate President Obama.

    The inmate slid under Schein’s garage door on the morning of July 2, broke into her home and slashed her throat in her bed before stealing her car and driving it to Madison, Wis., where he was captured.

    He told detectives and later a television reporter of his plan to kill the president.

    Defense lawyers had argued that their client’s mental illness precluded him from a death sentence, but a psychiatrist concluded that McVay had consciously acted to enhance his psychosis and planned his actions methodically.

    Jury selection for the penalty phase of his trial will begin on March 17.

    http://www.argusleader.com/article/2...nclick_check=1

  8. #18
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    Judge: Limit photos in McVay death penalty case

    Prosecutors will need to trim the number of photos they intend to show jurors during the death penalty hearing for confessed killer James McVay.

    Judge Peter Lieberman ruled Friday that the jury wouldn’t need to see duplicative photographs of the same injuries to McVay’s victim in order to decide that the murder was “wantonly vicious or vile.”

    The brutality of 72-year-old Maybelle Schein’s murder is one of the aggravating factors that could lead to a death sentence for McVay.

    Prosecutors said Friday that the multiple photos, showing Schein’s nine stab wounds at the scene of the murder and again during her autopsy, were necessary to show the brutality of the killing. They also argued that they wouldn’t show every photo, but wanted to preserve their options

    Defense lawyers objected, saying the photos are repetitive and unnecessary and gratuitous.

    Lieberman told prosecutors to sift through the photographs before presenting them to jurors, but said he didn’t intend to hold prosecutors to the list of photos proposed by defense lawyers. Most of those photos didn’t include Schein’s face.

    McVay has pleaded guilty but mentally ill to first-degree murder. Jury selection in the pre-sentence hearing that will determine his fate begins on Monday and is scheduled to take as long as three weeks.

    http://www.argusleader.com/article/2...h-penalty-case
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  9. #19
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    Jury selection winding down in McVay case

    Jury selection is expected to wrap up early next week for the sentencing hearing of a man who killed a Sioux Falls woman as part of a cross-country plot to try to assassinate the president.

    KELO-TV reports that Judge Peter Lieberman says he expects opening arguments in the case of James McVay on Wednesday.

    The state is seeking the death penalty for McVay, who pleaded guilty but mentally ill to first-degree murder in the stabbing death of Maybelle Schein in July 2011. The 72-year-old woman was killed as she slept in her home. McVay drove her car to Wisconsin, where he was arrested.

    Twelve jurors and three alternates are being selected. Jurors will decide if McVay is eligible for the death penalty, and if so, whether he deserves it.

    http://siouxcityjournal.com/ap/state...73739afb8.html
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  10. #20
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    Jury chosen for James McVay death penalty trial

    Arguments will commence Wednesday in the jury trial that will determine if a South Dakota man will gets a sentence of life in prison or death by lethal injection for a 2011 murder.

    A jury of 15 was selected Tuesday morning after nearly two weeks of group and individual questioning.

    Jurors will be asked to decide the fate of 43-year-old James Vernon McVay, who pleaded guilty but mentally ill to first-degree murder in the stabbing death of 75-year-old Maybelle Schein.

    Prosecutors will attempt to prove to jurors that the crime was wanton, vicious or vile and that it was committed as part of a theft – two aggravating factors that could justify a death sentence in South Dakota.

    If the jury decides that McVay is eligible for a death sentence, defense lawyers will attempt to dissuade them from issuing a death verdict through the presentation of mitigation evidence, which could include information on McVay's upbringing or mental illness.

    If any juror votes against a death sentence, McVay will receive a sentence of life without the possibility of parole.

    The trial is expected to last two weeks.

    http://www.argusleader.com/story/new...trial/7163029/
    An uninformed opponent is a dangerous opponent.

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