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Thread: Catherine Thompson - California

  1. #1
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    Catherine Thompson - California




    Summary of Offense:

    Convicted of masterminding the 1990 murder of her husband Melvin Thompson for his life insurance.

    Thompson was sentenced to death in Los Angeles County on June 10, 1993.

  2. #2
    Administrator Michael's Avatar
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    June 11, 1993

    Widow Sentenced to Death in Murder of Husband

    A judge on Thursday sentenced a Westwood auto shop owner's widow to death for contracting her husband's murder so that she could collect on a $400,000 life insurance policy.

    Catherine Thompson showed no reaction as Superior Court Judge George Trammell told her he could think of no good reason to reconsider a jury's recommendation of death. Melvin Thompson was gunned down in 1990 in the bathroom of Kayser's Service, the auto shop he had owned for 20 years on Santa Monica Boulevard near Greenfield Avenue.

    Last September, a jury recommended that Thompson die for masterminding the murder. After months of legal maneuverings to persuade the judge to overturn the sentence, Thompson was ordered to Death Row.

    "He loved her. He trusted her," said Deputy Dist. Atty. Katherine Mader. "He never had a clue that she wanted him dead."

    Source

  3. #3
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    Thompson's case has been fully briefed on direct appeal before the California Supreme Court since November 2, 2010.

    On May 2, 2011, Thompson also filed a habeas petition before the California Supreme Court. It has been fully briefed since June 27, 2013.

    http://appellatecases.courtinfo.ca.g...pTICAgCg%3D%3D

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    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    On September 7, 2016, oral argument will be heard in Thompson's direct appeal before the California Supreme Court.

    http://www.courts.ca.gov/documents/SSEP716B.pdf

  5. #5
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    Death Penalty Stands for West Hills Woman Who Had Her Husband Murdered

    LOS ANGELES, CA -- The California Supreme Court Thursday upheld a woman's conviction and death sentence for arranging her husband's murder inside a West Los Angeles-area auto repair shop he owned.

    The state's highest court unanimously rejected the defense's contention that there were errors in the Los Angeles Superior Court trial of former West Hills resident Catherine Thompson, who is on death row for the June 14, 1990 killing of Melvin "Tom" Thompson in the restroom of his business.

    The 49-year-old man, who had been shot, died later at a hospital.

    Shortly after the murder, Thompson submitted a claim on two life insurance policies -- one issued for $100,000 and a second one issued the year of the murder for $150,000 that had a clause that made it potentially worth $300,000, the Supreme Court wrote in a 111-page ruling.

    In the ruling written by Justice Kathryn M. Werdegar, the panel found there was a "web of evidence demonstrating that defendant participated in a conspiracy" with Sanders and two others to kill the victim for financial gain, including "defendant's many refinancing and insurance frauds," the evidence of many telephone calls between her and Sanders in the days leading up to the murder and her "blurted-out statement upon her arrest that she `didn't know Phil at all"' though police had not yet revealed any evidence of Sanders' involvement in the crime.

    The justices also noted that Thompson had a "strong financial incentive to kill the victim" and quickly used the insurance money after he was killed.

    The panel found that the trial court "did not abuse its discretion in concluding that evidence of defendant's prior financial misdeeds was relevant to showing her motive for killing, and conspiring to kill, her husband in order to collect on his life insurance policies."

    The justices wrote that jurors could infer from the evidence that "defendant's financial house of cards was about to collapse, leading her to believe she had one last option to make a large financial score: killing her husband."

    http://patch.com/california/northrid...sband-murdered
    "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

  6. #6
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    In today's orders, the United States Supreme Court DENIED Thompson's certiorari petition on direct appeal.

    Lower Ct: Supreme Court of California
    Case Numbers: (S033901)
    Decision Date: December 1, 2016
    Rehearing Denied: February 1, 2017

    https://www.supremecourt.gov/search....c/17-5069.html

    Sentence was reduced to LWOP due to Gason not pursing her sentence.

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