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Thread: Robert Walter Scully - California Death Row

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    Robert Walter Scully - California Death Row


    Robert Walter Scully


    Facts of the Crime:

    On March 29, 1995, at approximately 11:30 p.m., Deputy Frank Vasquez Trejo saw an occupied pickup in the parking lot of the Santa Rosa Saddlery at 5338 Highway 12, west of Santa Rosa. The business was closed so Deputy Trejo stopped to investigate. In the vehicle were Robert Walter Scully, a recently paroled inmate from Pelican Bay State Prison with an extensive criminal history and also a member of the infamous prison gang, the Aryan Brotherhood. A female companion, Brenda Kay Moore, was also in the vehicle. Scully and Moore were casing a tavern next to the closed business, intending on committing an armed robbery. As Deputy Trejo was walking toward the suspect vehicle, Scully pulled out a sawed-off shotgun and confronted him at the rear of the pickup.

    Scully shot Deputy Trejo in the face with the shotgun, killing him instantly. Scully then took Deputy Trejo’s gun and fled the area. Scully and Moore forced their way into a house a short distance away and took a family hostage. The Sheriff’s Department was notified of the hostage situation and quickly set up a perimeter around the house with patrol deputies and the S.W.A.T. Team. After several hours, Scully and Moore surrendered to deputies. Scully was convicted of first-degree murder and sent to death row at San Quentin State Prison to await execution. Moore was convicted of numerous felony offenses associated with this incident and sentenced to 14 years in state prison. Deputy Trejo was awarded a posthumous Gold Medal of Valor for his sacrifice. Deputy Trejo was a 35-year law enforcement veteran, serving as a Police Officer in the cities of Lompoc and Tiburon before being hired by the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Department 15 years before his death.

    Scully was sentenced to death in Sonoma County on June 13, 1997.

  2. #2
    Senior Member CnCP Legend JLR's Avatar
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    The prosecution filed their response on September 6, 2013.

    http://appellatecases.courtinfo.ca.g...doc_no=S062259

  3. #3
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    Scully's case has been fully briefed on direct appeal before the California Supreme Court since February 4, 2015.

    https://appellatecases.courtinfo.ca....9RICAgCg%3D%3D

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    bow2daprincess1@yahoo.com
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    So basically in a nutshell california is never gunna execute anyone ever, is that what I'm understanding here?

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    Senior Member Member OperaGhost84's Avatar
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    It's still fun to pretend though.
    I am vehemently against Murder. That's why I support the Death Penalty.

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    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    On March 2, 2021, oral argument will be heard in Scully's direct appeal before the California Supreme Court.

    https://www.courts.ca.gov/documents/...rs/SMAR221.PDF

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    Moderator Bobsicles's Avatar
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    Robert Scully, on Death Row for killing Sonoma deputy, makes bid to overturn conviction

    The lawyer for a man sentenced to death for fatally shooting a Sonoma County sheriff’s deputy in 1995, five days after being released from prison, told the state Supreme Court on Tuesday that his trial should have been transferred elsewhere because the county was “saturated” with coverage of the menacing killer and his heroic victim.

    Robert Lee Scully “could not have gotten and did not in fact get a fair trial in Sonoma County” which still “felt itself under siege” when trial proceedings began a year and a half later, attorney Valerie Hriciga of the state public defender’s office told the court, which heard an hour of arguments remotely from its headquarters in San Francisco.

    Extensive news coverage portrayed Scully as a white supremacist, recounted his criminal record, described an “execution-style slaying,” and depicted the defendant as “a threat to (the) community,” Hriciga said. She said the deputy, Frank Trejo, was described in media accounts, justifiably, as a “fallen hero.”

    Scully’s trial lawyers said a pretrial survey found that 85% of county residents were aware of the case, and, of that number, 78% thought Scully was definitely or probably guilty. But Deputy Attorney General Julie Je told the court that the furor had subsided by the time of the trial.

    Potential jurors “are not expected to be totally ignorant of the facts of the case,” Je said. “Even pervasive adverse publicity does not inevitably lead to an unfair trial,” and the trial judge properly found that the jury had been adequately screened for bias.

    Scully was 37 when he was freed from maximum-security Pelican Bay State Prison in March 1995 after serving 11 years for robbery convictions in San Diego. A friend, Brenda Moore, was driving him in her pickup truck toward San Diego, where he was due to meet with his parole officer, but she changed her mind after a stop in Sonoma County and decided to return home. They were arguing when Trejo, 58, pulled up on a road about a mile east of Sebastopol.

    Scully, who was carrying a shotgun, disarmed the deputy, forced him to lie on the ground and shot him in the head. Scully later testified that the gun had discharged accidentally when he stumbled while walking backward. But a jury found he had intentionally killed the deputy, and he was sentenced to death in June 1997.

    While his lawyers still contend the killing was not intentional and should not have been a capital crime, the central issue in Scully’s appeal is Superior Court Judge Elaine Watters’ refusal to transfer the trial to another county. Watters found in two pretrial rulings that the local coverage of the case, although extensive, was not inflammatory or sensational, and that Scully’s public unpopularity was “universal” and not confined to Sonoma County.

    Arguing that the court should overturn Scully’s convictions and death sentence and order a new trial, Hriciga said Tuesday that pretrial questioning of prospective jurors showed they were still swayed by the emotional impact of the killing.

    “Families no longer felt secure in their homes,” the defense lawyer said. She said one prospective juror had watched Trejo’s memorial service on television, others told Watters they passed by a memorial to the deputy twice a day, and a juror in the case told the judge that Scully was assumed to be guilty.

    But Justice Martin Jenkins noted that jurors told the judge they could set their beliefs aside. Justice Teri Jackson of the First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco, temporarily assigned to the state’s high court for the case, observed that Scully’s trial lawyer had allowed the jury to be seated without using all of his allotted challenges. Hriciga replied that the lawyer had seen other prospective jurors’ written responses to pretrial questions and concluded they would be even less sympathetic than those already seated.

    A ruling in People vs. Scully, S062259, is due within 90 days.

    https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.sfc...g-15994650.php
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    Moderator Bobsicles's Avatar
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    Conviction and death sentence affirmed on direct appeal.

    https://law.justia.com/cases/califor...1/s062259.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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    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    On April 20, 2021, Scully filed a habeas petition before the California Supreme Court.

    https://appellatecases.courtinfo.ca....9TMCAgCg%3D%3D

  10. #10
    Moderator Bobsicles's Avatar
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    Petition for rehearing denied on direct appeal.

    https://law.justia.com/cases/califor.../s062259m.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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