Prevention Not Punishment

Statement from MVFHR and NAMI on World Days

2009-10-08T16:37:00.001-07:00

Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights
National Alliance on Mental Illness

Statement on World Day Against the Death Penalty
and World Mental Health Day
October 10, 2009

The World Coalition Against the Death Penalty has designated October 10th “World Day
Against the Death Penalty,” and the World Federation for Mental Health has designated
October 10th “World Mental Health Day.” Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights
and the National Alliance on Mental Illness have taken the occasion of these two interesting
“World Days” to issue the following statement:

Today is a day of two calls to action: a call to end the death penalty and a call to
make mental health treatment a global priority. As organizations who have
come together to form the “Prevention, Not Execution” project, we bring
these two calls together and declare that it is time to end the death penalty for
people with mental illness.

This past year, Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights and the National
Alliance on Mental Illness released a report called Double Tragedies: Victims Speak
Out Against the Death Penalty for People with Severe Mental Illness, giving voice to
families throughout the United States whose lives have been forever changed
by the intersection of murder, mental illness, and the death penalty. Two
months later, Amnesty International issued a report titled Hanging by a thread:
mental health and the death penalty in Japan, highlighting the Japanese government’s
continued executions of mentally ill prisoners.

The death penalty is inappropriate for people with severe mental disorders. On
this day of two intersecting worldwide calls for change, we urge prevention of
violence, through effective and accessible mental health treatment, rather than
executions.

Renny Cushing, Executive Director
Murder Victims' Families for Human Rights
rrcushing@earthlink.net
www.murdervictimsfamilies.org
617 930 5196

Groundbreaking New Report from MVFHR/NAMI

2009-07-06T09:37:00.000-07:00

For Immediate Release Contact: Susannah Sheffer

July 6, 2009 617-512-2010

sheffer@aceweb.com

Death Penalty and Mental Illness:

Families of Victims Speak out at National Convention;

“Double Tragedies” Report Released

San Francisco, CA—For the first time, families of murder victims have joined with families of persons with mental illness who have been executed to speak out against the death penalty.

Double Tragedies, a report being released today at a special session on the first day of the annual convention of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), calls the death penalty “inappropriate and unwarranted” for people with severe mental disorders and “a distraction from problems within the mental health system that contributed or even directly led to tragic violence.”

The report calls for treatment and prevention, not execution. It is available online at www.nami.org/doubletragedies.

The report, a joint project of NAMI and Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights (MVFHR), is based on extensive interviews with 21 family members from 10 states: California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Tennessee and Texas.

“Family opposition to the death penalty is grounded in personal tragedy,” said MVFHR executive director Renny Cushing. “In the public debate about the death penalty and how to respond in the aftermath of violent crime, these are the voices that need to be heard.”

“Most people with mental illness are not violent,” said NAMI executive director Mike Fitzpatrick. “When violent tragedies occur they are exceptional—because something has gone terribly wrong, usually in the mental health care system. Tragedies are compounded and all our families suffer.”

The report identifies an “intersection” of family concerns and makes four basic recommendations:

· Ban the death penalty for people with severe mental illnesses.

· Reform the mental health care system to focus on treatment and prevention.

· Recognize the needs of families of murder victims through rights to information and participation in criminal or mental health proceedings.

· Families of executed persons also should be recognized as victims and given the assistance due to any victims of traumatic loss.

At least 100 people with mental illness have been put to death in the United States and hundreds more are awaiting execution.

Other resources:

www.mvfhr.org

www.nami.org

www.nami.org/gradeso9

FRONTLINE:

2009-04-28T11:37:00.000-07:00

Tonight (April 28, 2009) PBS will air a new episode of FRONTLINE: "The Released" (60 minutes),which documents what happens when offenders with mental illness leave prison. It is scheduled to air at 9:00 PM EDT; check your local listings.

Here's a message from the Senior Editor:

Five years ago, FRONTLINE filmmakers Karen O'Connor and Miri Navasky went deep inside the Ohio prison system to see how it was caring for thousands of mentally ill inmates - a growing problem for prisons nationwide in the wake of the shutdown of most of the old state psychiatric hospitals.

This Tuesday night, O'Connor and Navasky return to Ohio to pursue the next chapter in this disturbing story: What happens to mentally ill offenders when they've served their time and leave prison? The film is called "The Released," and it just may be the most gripping and profound hour of
television you watch all year.

Meet Lynn Moore, for example. He's a paranoid schizophrenic with a history of drug and alcohol abuse, who's been arrested more than twenty times.

O'Connor and Navasky find him in a homeless shelter after he's finished his fourth prison term. He battles his addictions, struggles to find work, and, ultimately gives in to the voices in his head. "It is not delusions," Moore tries to explain, after attacking a trailer-home where he believed evil figures were gathering one night. "It was the devil, Antichrist, bin Laden, Saddam." It's hard to watch without asking yourself an uncomfortable question: Would Lynn Moore have been better off
in prison, where he was compelled to stay on the medication that had helped him so dramatically?

O'Connor and Navasky also follow a number of other men, including Keith Williams, who's soon to be released from Northcoast, one of Ohio's last remaining state hospitals. "The good news is that Keith is getting better," says one of his nurses at Northcoast, which now provides only short-term crisis care. "The bad news is that because of this, he'll be sent back into the community in Toledo, and he'll be back here within three months - probably very psychotic, and hopefully not having hurt somebody."

Can a patchwork of homeless shelters, group homes, and short-term care facilities really provide for the severely mentally ill after prison? How do we reconcile our desire to release the mentally ill from prison and state hospitals when only the state may be able to provide the care and supervision they need? What does it mean for people trapped in their minds really to be free?

We hope you'll join us for the broadcast this Tuesday night. You can watch two excerpts from the film right now at our web site, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/released/.

Ken Dornstein
Senior Editor

Expansion of Programs in Texas Counties to Divert Mentally Ill From Prisons

2009-04-24T11:17:00.000-07:00

According to Marc A. Levin of the Houston Chronicle, several counties in Texas are expanding programs to divert mentally ill offenders from prisons, saving millions of tax payer dollars. The article ("Expand program to divert mentally ill from prisons", April 22nd 2009) outlines several programs being instituted by Bexar, El Paso, and Tarrant counties to reduce the amount of mentally ill recidivists and money spent on their incarceration. Here is the full text of the article:

Mental illness is a key factor in driving up correctional costs in Texas.

There are 42,556 offenders with a mental health diagnosis in prison, 55,276 on probation and 21,345 on parole. Additionally, some 170,000 mentally ill inmates are admitted into Texas county jails every year.
Mentally ill inmates cost more to house and they stay longer. They are also more likely to recidivate.
Fortunately, there are policies that can reduce both the recidivism and cost associated with the mentally ill in the criminal justice system.
First, counties can divert mentally ill offenders from jail through programs that protect public safety while saving taxpayer dollars.
Bexar County has established a successful three-pronged jail diversion program that can serve as a model for other Texas counties.
First, it employs specially trained law enforcement personnel called Crisis Intervention Teams (CIT). These teams are often able to defuse incidents involving the mentally ill without an arrest. Participants in CIT programs spent on average two more months out of jail than non-diverted individuals, resulting in significant jail cost savings.
While the largest Texas metropolitan police departments have CIT personnel, smaller police departments can create a CIT program through cooperatives with other nearby departments.
With Bexar County’s second prong, arrested offenders are screened for mental illness and, if not a threat to public safety, released on a mental health bond or to a treatment center. Screenings are conducted at the Crisis Care Center, a 24-hour facility that provides significantly quicker service at a lower cost than the emergency room.
Once stabilized, offenders are released on a mental health bond. Because the wait for a trial date can be as long as six months, outpatient monitoring significantly reduces the utilization of county jail space.
Finally, Bexar County diverts such misdemeanants from jail through an initiative called MANOS, which includes intensive case management that consists of outpatient medication management and counseling.
Of the 371 offenders admitted to the MANOS Program, only 6.2 percent were re-incarcerated. This compares to a re-incarceration rate of 67 percent for mentally ill offenders without the intensive case management services offered by the jail diversion program.
Savings from Bexar County’s jail diversion program are estimated at between $3.8 million and $5 million per year.
The state can also take steps to address the impact of mental illness on the criminal justice system. About 2,500 probationers and 800 parolees participate in a state-funded initiative involving intensive case management and a smaller case load with a specially trained officer.
The three-year re-incarceration rate is 15.1 percent for participating probationers and 16 percent for parolees. In contrast, there is a 52 percent re-incarceration rate for mentally ill probationers and parolees who do not receive treatment. Increasing the number of probationers and parolees in this program could more than pay for itself through lower recidivism.
Another way to address mental illness in the criminal justice system is through mental health courts. Several Texas counties — including Bexar, El Paso, Tarrant and Dallas — have established mental health courts in which a judge orders the defendant to obtain treatment and supervises his progress. Harris County’s criminal district judges voted in January to designate a full-time felony mental health court. The court is not yet in operation.
A RAND Institute study found significant cost savings from mental health courts due to lower jail utilization.
Finally, defendants who are mentally incompetent to stand trial can be diverted from a state hospital. In 2008, the state launched outpatient competency restoration pilot programs.
Taking Travis, Tarrant, Bexar and Dallas counties together, some 427 offenders are projected to be served in 2009. The total cost of these four programs is $2.16 million compared with the state hospital cost of $14.95 million based on an average cost of $35,000 per offender.
Accordingly, it makes sense to expand these pilot programs to additional sites.
Mentally ill offenders will always pose a substantial challenge in the criminal justice system.
But through initiatives like these, we can achieve our goals of enhanced public safety and reduced costs to taxpayers.

Levin is director of the Center for Effective Justice at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a nonprofit, free-market research institute based in Austin.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/outlook/6387282.html

More on Andre Thomas, Insanity Defense

2009-04-13T11:34:00.000-07:00

The case of Texas death row inmate Andre Thomas has prompted a great deal of discussion about the insanity defense and about whether the death penalty is an appropriate punishment for offenders with severe mental illness.

Here's an article that appeared Sunday in the Dallas Morning News ("Case Fuels Texas Debate on Insanity Defense," April 12, 2009):

Everyone agrees Andre Thomas is crazy.

In 2004, he cut out the hearts of his wife and her two children and pocketed them. Before his murder trial, he plucked out his right eye. In January, while on death row, he ripped out his other eye and swallowed it.

Thus far, courts say Thomas is not insane.

His case is a classic example of the complexities of Texas' insanity defense law - and why some mental health advocates are pushing to change it. Several bills pending in the Texas Legislature would do just that.

With medication and treatment, Thomas eventually was found mentally competent to stand trial, because he could communicate and assist his attorney in his defense. At trial, he was found to be sane at the time of the crime because he knew the difference between right and wrong. And he may be found competent to be executed if he understands what execution means and why he is being killed.

Thomas is "clearly 'crazy,' " a judge on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals wrote in a concurring denial of his appeal last month, "but he is also 'sane' under Texas law."

Death penalty opponent Maurie Levin, an adjunct professor at the University of Texas School of Law, is appalled. "There is something just horribly wrong with a system that permits somebody as severely mentally ill as Andre Thomas to be found competent to stand trial or sane at the time of that crime," said Levin, who consulted with Thomas' defense attorney.

"We need to change the law," said Brian Shannon, a Texas Tech law professor, because a mentally ill person may know their conduct is wrong but be unable to fully comprehend the situation because the illness affects his "emotional state and thinking and reasoning ability."

Some defendants, such as Thomas, know killing is wrong but say God is telling them to do it.

Proposed legislation

Shannon supports bills pending in the Legislature to broaden the law, in all cases, not just capital cases, to say that a defendant must "appreciate," not just "know," the difference between right and wrong and that the wrong should be a moral one, not just legal.

Such changes, which have been proposed in past sessions, would bring Texas closer to the federal standard on insanity. Supporters are hopeful for passage this time, but for now, the Texas law is similar to that in other states.

"Texas is right within the norm," said Bruce Winick, who teaches law at the University of Miami, and psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the medical school. "People aren't going to say, 'Oh, there goes Texas again.' "

Texas, like many states, narrowed the insanity defense in the 1980s amid outrage over John Hinckley's acquittal in the attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan. Hinckley has been confined to a mental hospital since 1982.

Shannon said Texas law also should change to inform jurors what happens to defendants found not guilty by reason of insanity. They do not "just walk free," he said.

A bill authored by Rep. Senfronia Thompson, D-Houston, would allow jurors to be told that such defendants are sent to a mental hospital if acquitted. Long-term hospitalization is not guaranteed, but "even if someone gets well and is discharged, there's still oversight by the court," Shannon said.

Prosecutors oppose efforts to broaden the not guilty by reason of insanity defense.

"The people who are truly mentally ill, to the degree that their functioning is impaired, I think they are protected by the existing system," said Karla Hackett, who handled the Thomas appeal for Grayson County.

Thomas' attorneys had numerous opportunities to explain the effect of his mental illness to jurors. In the weeks before the murders, Thomas heard voices, behaved strangely and left mental facilities without treatment.

But jurors also heard how he planned the crime, intentionally avoided detection, then turned himself in to authorities. Prosecutors said drinking and drug use also contributed to his psychotic episodes.

"There's no doubt he has mental illness," Hackett said, but " why does he have mental illness?" Under Texas law if the illness is caused or worsened by "voluntary intoxication" such as drug or alcohol abuse, "you don't get to claim insanity."

Levin said the prosecution is implying that "if he hadn't been intoxicated, he wasn't crazy, he was faking. I think Andre's actions since the crime - including gouging out his eye pretrial and taking out a remaining eye three months ago - have proven them wrong."

Jurors weigh in

Jurors heard experts from both sides, but didn't buy the argument that Thomas' mental illness meant he shouldn't be held criminally accountable, Hackett said.

Thomas' appellate attorneys, who declined to comment, claim his trial counsel was ineffective. Appellate courts have disagreed and deferred to the jury's judgment.

"What angers people is when they don't know the whole case," Hackett said. "It's, 'Oh, my gosh, he's got no eyeball, I can't believe they're doing this, he must be crazy.' Well, don't say that until you've been there, until you've sat in the jury box for six weeks."

Hackett said changing the wording of the law would "open up a whole new area of litigation. Now we're going to argue, what does the word appreciate mean? Whose morals?"

Williamson County District Attorney John Bradley said the current law "strikes the appropriate balance."

Informing jurors about what happens if the defendant is found not guilty by reason of insanity would make the process less objective, Bradley said. He thinks jurors might speculate about what could happen and be "frightened into convicting the defendant" if they understood the limits of judicial oversight when a defendant is found not guilty by reason of insanity.

High court ruling?

Winick, the University of Miami instructor, expects the U.S. Supreme Court eventually to weigh in on the issue. So far, the court has ruled only that an inmate must be competent to be executed. Last summer the high court also ruled a mentally ill defendant cannot represent himself in court.

But the court has not ruled on whether an inmate may be forcibly medicated to render him competent - and therefore eligible for execution. That issue may be ripe for the Supreme Court to decide.

Winick thinks the court ultimately may have to rule whether it is unconstitutional to impose the death penalty on someone who is sane but mentally ill. That issue is a "natural extension," he said, of the court's decisions prohibiting execution for the mentally retarded and juveniles because they have less ability to understand the consequences of their crimes.

Ron Honberg, director of policy and legal affairs for the National Alliance on Mental Illness, said it probably would be years before the issue reaches the court. The decisions regarding mental retardation and juveniles relied heavily on the fact that more than half of the states had abolished the death penalty for those individuals. So far, only a handful of states are even considering a
ban on executing the mentally ill. Texas is not among them.

- - - - -
DETERMINING INSANITY

Under current state law, mentally ill defendants undergo tests of mental competence at several stages:

1. Before trial: Defendants must be able to understand the trial process and be able to communicate with their attorney and understand the proceedings. A judge may make the determination at an examining trial where the defendant is represented by an attorney and may present evidence from experts. The defendant may request a jury decision.

2. At the time of the crime: If the defendant claims at trial to be not guilty by reason of insanity, he must prove he did not know his conduct was wrong while committing the crime. As in any criminal trial, he may request a judge or a jury.

3. At the time of execution: If the case results in a death penalty, an inmate cannot be executed if he does not understand what it means to be executed and why he is being put to death. If a claim of incompetence is made, a judge must hold a hearing to determine competency. Lower courts differ on whether an inmate may be forcibly medicated to achieve competency, which makes him
eligible for execution. The U.S. Supreme Court has not ruled on forcible medication.

- - - - -

Editor's Note: A district judge has ordered the forced medication of Texas death row inmate Steven Staley. Staley suffers from severe paranoid schizophrenia and has been hospitalized up to 19 times while on death row. He often has refused to take his medication because he thinks he is being poisoned.

In September 2007, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals refused to hear Staley's appeal, ruling that the trial court's order was not "an appealable order" and that it would not consider overturning it.

More information on his case is available here and here.

Death row inmate takes plea and life in prison

2009-04-01T11:38:00.000-07:00

According to the Associated Press, Charles Mines has been taken off death row after being granted a new punishment trial. Mines will now spend the remainder of his life in prison ("Death Row Inmate Takes Plea and Life in Prison", March 31, 2009) Here is the full article:

A condemned Texas inmate who won a new punishment trial from an appeals
court has agreed to a plea bargain that takes him off death row but likely
keeps him imprisoned for the rest of his life.

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals a year ago threw out the death
sentence of Charles Mines, 59, who was convicted of using a claw hammer to
fatally beat an 80-year-old woman at her home in Waxahachie 21 years ago.

The court said Mines deserved a new sentencing trial because jurors didn't
properly consider mental illness when they decided he should be executed
for the slaying of Vivian Moreno. Frances Moreno, 57, one of the murdered
woman's 13 children, also was severely beaten in the same attack in May
1988. A relative found the 2 women on the floor in a bedroom.

Mines appeared Monday before State District Judge Gene Knize and entered
into the plea agreement accepting a life sentence for capital murder. He
also pleaded guilty to 2 new charges of aggravated robbery and accepted
life sentences on each of those convictions.

As part of the agreement, Mines waived all credit for time already served,
waived his rights to appeal and reserved prosecutors the right to seek the
death penalty again if he finds a point for appeal.

"We feel comfortable we have him on a plan that should keep him in
prison," Cindy Hellstern, an Ellis County assistant district attorney,
told the Waxahachie Daily Light.

Hellstern said if Mines received a life sentence at a new punishment
trial, he immediately would have been eligible for parole. At the time of
his original trial, a life sentence meant parole eligibility after 15
years in prison. Another death sentence would have started the appeals
process all over again.

"This was the best thing we could do to ensure he stays in prison the rest
of his life," she said.

More than 30 relatives of the victims were in court for Monday's hearing.

"It is some type of closure, but not all the way," said Frank Moreno,
whose mother was killed. "It is a step in that direction.

"I feel good that he will not come out of prison."

Evidence at his trial showed Mines had undergone a psychiatric evaluation
at a state hospital a week before the slayings. He pleaded not guilty by
reason of insanity to a capital murder charge for Vivian Moreno's death
and attempted capital murder for her daughter's attack. He was tried on
the charges after a state court hearing determined he was competent to
stand trial.

A psychiatrist who examined Mines during a 5-day observation period a week
before the killing determined Mines was not mentally ill and should not be
committed, but that he did have a mixed personality disorder with
paranoia, passive-aggressive and anti-social features.

Evidence showed Mines, a transient, stole food and jewelry from the Moreno
home. He was arrested 3 days later when he was found camping not far from
the home. He confessed after police identified his fingerprint on a window
sill.

Mines' trial in Ellis County was held just weeks before another capital
murder case involving Johnny Paul Penry, whose mental illness claims and
subsequent appeals changed the way Texas juries are asked to decide
mitigating issues in death penalty cases.

The 5th Circuit agreed with lawyers for Mines who said jury instructions
for his case were virtually identical to the ones given in Penry's trial
and that the U.S. Supreme Court found those instructions unconstitutional.
The Supreme Court late last year refused to overturn the 5th Circuit's
decision in Mines' case.

(source: Associated Press)

Death row inmate loses appeal on mental illness

2009-03-23T11:12:00.000-07:00

An article released by the Associated Press ("Death row inmate loses appeal on mental illness"), March 22, 2009 states that death row inmate Jeffrey Wood has had his mental illness appeal rejected by the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Wood, who was merely an accessory to capital murder, came within hours of being executed last August but was allowed time to be tested for mental illness. Here is the full article:

A Texas death row inmate who came within hours of execution has lost an
appeal. His lawyers argued in a federal appeals court that he's too
mentally ill to be put to death.

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the appeal from Jeffery
Wood, 35, condemned for the January 1996 slaying of Kriss Keeran at a
convenience store in Kerrville, Texas.

Wood was convicted of capital murder even though he sat in the car outside
while his roommate, Daniel Reneau, fatally shot Keeran, 31. Under Texas
law, a participant in a capital murder is equally guilty of the crime.
Both men then robbed the store, taking more than $11,000 in cash and
checks.

Reneau was executed in 2002.

Wood was scheduled to die last August, but a federal judge delayed the
lethal injection hours before the execution so Wood could be tested to
determine whether he's mentally able to understand why he should be
executed. He does not have an execution date.

In the appeal to the New Orleans-based appeals court, Wood's lawyers
contended they needed a 2nd expert to examine Wood.

"Mr. Wood lacks a rational understanding of his death sentence and of the
reasons for his imminent execution," attorney Scott Sullivan said in his
motion filed earlier this week.

Prosecutors argued Wood already had an expert "of his own choosing."

Last summer, Sullivan said in a motion that he met with Wood and that the
prisoner told him he believed his trial judge was corrupt but would accept
a $100,000 bribe and then deport him to Norway where he could live with
his wife. Sullivan said Wood also believed the government will pay him
$50,000 a year once he's released and that he's willing to give that money
to the judge.

The U.S. Supreme Court has barred the execution of prisoners determined to
be mentally disabled, but that protection has not extended to those with
mental illness.

(source: Associated Press)

"Crazy but Sane"

2009-03-18T13:16:00.000-07:00

That's how Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Judge Cathy Cochran has described Texas death row inmate Andre Thomas, who made national headlines last year after he reportedly plucked out his remaining eye and ate it (Thomas had plucked out his other eye while awaiting his capital murder trial). "Sanity" is a legal term that refers to mental status at the time of the crime; a defendant who knows the difference between right and wrong is deemed "sane."

Today the Court of Criminal Appeals rejected Thomas' appeals, even though it recognized him as clearly mentally ill. Interestingly, Judge Cochran noted that the deaths for which Thomas was sent to death row could have been avoided because Thomas twice went to hospitals for help but
left voluntarily and couldn't be committed against his will.

Here is the full article from the Associated Press ("Texas Judge: Eye-Plucking Inmate 'Crazy' but Sane," March 18, 2009):

A condemned Texas inmate who removed his only eye and ate it in a bizarre outburst several months ago on death row is ''crazy,'' yet sane under state law, a judge wrote in an appellate court ruling Wednesday that rejected his appeals.

Andre Thomas raised 44 claims in his petition to the state's highest criminal court, challenging his conviction and death sentence for the murder of his estranged wife's 13-month-old daughter five years ago in Grayson County in North Texas.

His wife and their 4-year-old son were killed in the same attack. The victims were stabbed and their hearts were ripped out. Thomas, 26, of Texoma, walked into the Sherman Police Department, admitted to the killings and said God told him to commit them.

The nine-member Texas Court of Criminal Appeals unanimously upheld Thomas' conviction and punishment.

Thomas ''is clearly 'crazy,' but he is also 'sane' under Texas law,'' Judge Cathy Cochran wrote in a 14-page statement accompanying the court's brief order.

Among claims in the appeal, Thomas' attorneys argued that instructions to his trial jury were incorrect regarding the law on voluntary intoxication, that the instruction should not have been given because it suggested his drug and alcohol use and not insanity were responsible for his actions, and that his trial attorneys were ineffective because they should have known the instructions were improper.

At Thomas' trial in Sherman in 2005, defense lawyers said the killings were the result of insane delusions caused solely by Thomas' mental disease. Jurors agreed with prosecutors, who argued his psychosis was caused or aggravated by his voluntary use of alcohol, drugs and prescription drugs.

''There was ample evidence to reject an insanity defense and support a jury finding that (Thomas) knew that his conduct was wrong at the time he murdered his wife and the children,'' Cochran wrote. ''There was also evidence that (Thomas) did not know his conduct was wrong at the time. This was a
quintessential fact issue for the jury to decide, and it did so.''

Cochran wrote that although ''reasonable people might well differ on the questions of whether (Thomas) was sane at the time he committed these murders or competent at the time he was tried, those issues were appropriately addressed by the defense, the prosecution, trial judge, and the jury during
the trial.''

While in the Grayson County Jail five days after his arrest, Thomas plucked out his right eye. A judge subsequently ruled he was competent to stand trial.

Last December, a death row officer at the Polunsky Unit of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice found Thomas in his cell with blood on his face and had him taken to the unit infirmary. Thomas told officials he had pulled out his remaining eye and ate it.

He was taken to a hospital for treatment, then was transferred to a prison psychiatric unit.

There was no reference to the second eye removal in the court opinion.

Thomas was convicted of killing 13-month-old Leyha Marie Hughes. Also slain March 27, 2004, were his wife, Laura Christine Boren, 20, and their son, 4-year-old Andre Lee.

''This is an extraordinarily tragic case,'' Cochran wrote, saying the deaths could have been avoided because Thomas twice went to hospitals for help but left voluntarily and couldn't be held without legal authority.
***
The Per Curiam order is at:
http://www.cca.courts.state.tx.us/OPINIONS/HTMLOPINIONINFO.ASP?OPINIONID=18129
Judge Cochran's concurring opinion is at:
http://www.cca.courts.state.tx.us/OPINIONS/HTMLOPINIONINFO.ASP?OPINIONID=18123

(Thanks to Steve Hall for providing the links.)
***
More information about Andre Thomas is available here , here , and here.

Tennessee Convict may be Re-evaluated for Competency

2009-03-18T12:30:00.000-07:00

According to The Tennessean, Paul Dennis Reid may have his competency re-evaluated. Additionally, a petition has been filed with the Davidson County Criminal Court alleging that Reid had ineffective assistance of counsel during his trial for the murder of two restaurant workers. ("Lawyer says Reid is delusional", March 17, 2009). Here is the full article:

The attorney representing convicted killer Paul Dennis Reid is convinced the death row inmate is delusional.

During a post-conviction hearing in Davidson County Criminal Court, attorney Kelly Gleason asked that Reid's mental competency be re-evaluated.

"He thinks he's getting out of jail on June 1," Gleason said. "He thinks I'm an actress, not an attorney, and he's requested that I take him shopping at the Oak Ridge Mall for clothes, shoes and other hygiene products he might need once he gets out."

Reid was convicted of killing seven people at fast-food restaurants in Nashville and Clarksville in 1997.

Gleason, an assistant post-conviction defender, has represented Reid since August 2004 and maintains that he has never been competent.

"He was found in federal court to be incompetent," she said. "The state is choosing to ignore it."

But Davidson County Deputy District Attorney Tom Thurman argued that Reid had been evaluated numerous times and was found competent. The most recent competency hearing was held in May 2008. At the time, Davidson County Criminal Court Judge Cheryl Blackburn ruled that there wasn't enough evidence to show Reid was incompetent and that he should decide the course of his appeals.

In the courtroom Monday, both the defense and the prosecution declined to call witnesses for the post-conviction hearing, which centered on a petition filed by Reid in April 2003. In the case of the deaths of two workers at a Captain D's restaurant in Donelson, the petition argues that Reid had ineffective assistance of counsel.

Reid claimed to believe that he was under surveillance by secret government agencies and that his trial lawyers should have found the tapes that would prove his innocence.

He also claimed that his trial was not fair because the judge, the jury and all of the witnesses were scripted by the government to cause his death, the petition said.

Judge To Issue Ruling

Blackburn is expected to issue a written judgment in the Captain D's post-conviction petition within the next few months.

Gleason says if the petition is dismissed, she will appeal the decision.

Reid, dressed in a white Tennessee Department of Correction uniform and shackled at the wrists and ankles, sat quietly during the hearing. When it was over, Reid smiled and waved to several people before leaving the courtroom.

Since his conviction, Reid's execution has been stayed several times, most recently in 2006 when a federal judge intervened. The U.S. Supreme Court refused to lift the stay.

He is facing seven death sentences for killing seven people and injuring another in a 1997 crime spree in Middle Tennessee. He killed three people at a Nashville McDonald's, two at the Captain D's in Donelson and two store clerks at a Baskin-Robbins in Clarksville.

TX Death Sentence Overturned

2009-03-16T12:57:00.000-07:00

According to The Daily News, Texas death row inmate Gaylon George Walbey has received a new sentencing hearing from the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ("Death-row inmate could get new hearing," March 15, 2009). Here's the full article:

A convicted killer sentenced to die for the 1993 slaying of a college teacher will soon return to Galveston, where attorneys will decide whether to seek a new punishment hearing or permanently remove him from death row.

After 12 years lobbying the courts for his client Gaylon George Walbey Jr., defense attorney Brian Wice won a new punishment hearing in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on grounds of ineffective assistance of counsel.

Meanwhile, the National Alliance on Mental Illness continues to lobby against states imposing death-sentences in cases against the mentally ill, a situation that is not unique to Texas, said Ron Honberg, the organization’s legal director.

Walbey, 34, who was diagnosed with schizophrenia as a child, repeatedly bludgeoned Marionette Beyah — his former foster mother and a Galveston College teacher — inside her island home May 4, 1993, authorities said.

No Supreme Court Review

With the assent of the state’s Office of Solicitor General and Galveston County Criminal District Attorney Kurt Sistrunk, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott decided not to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to review the appeals court’s decision, said Thomas Kelley, a spokesman for Abbott.

Wice declined to discuss his negotiations with Sistrunk, but said Walbey, who is no longer under a death sentence, would likely return to Galveston soon where a decision on whether to impose a life sentence or hold a new punishment hearing would be forthcoming.

Roger Ezell — who now works for Sistrunk — failed to investigate “a cornucopia of mitigating circumstances about (Walbey’s) horrific upbringing and background that would have led at least one juror to reject a death sentence,” Wice said.

Prosecutors gave Ezell, who defended Walbey, a mass of mitigating material, such as medical records and records from juvenile court, school, child services and health and human services, Wice said.

The records “painted a portrait of Gaylon’s upbringing and background that even the conservative Fifth Circuit described as ‘nightmarish,’” Wice said.

Ezell said a federal judge and lower appellate court upheld the death sentence, but a state district court and federal magistrate ruled in Wice’s favor, ultimately leading to the higher appeals court’s ruling.

The U.S. Supreme Court has with previous death-penalty cases raised the question whether mentally ill defendants understand the nature of the death penalty enforced upon them, Honberg said.

Scott Louis Panetti was convicted of capital murder in Texas in the 1992 death of his in-laws, but the U.S. Supreme Court ordered a temporary halt to Panetti’s death sentence and remanded the case for further consideration, saying Panetti was sentenced to die despite a well-documented history of mental illness. Panetti remains on Texas’ death row.

‘Not Unique To Texas’

Panetti represented himself and subpoenaed for his trial Jesus, former President John F. Kennedy and Pope John Paul II, Honberg said.

“This is not unique to Texas,” Honberg said. “We’ve followed cases in Virginia, Georgia, Indiana and other states as well. There are four states, North Carolina, Tennessee, Indiana and Kentucky, that have legislation pending or are considering legislation to reduce the application of the death penalty where serious mental illness is involved.”

Brain disorders have a profound impact on a person’s comprehension of reality, Honberg said.

Walbey was diagnosed with schizophrenia at a very young age, although it doesn’t appear that he suffers from it now, Wice said.

Beyah’s Death Remembered

Sistrunk, who tried the case and argued for the death penalty, said he remembered the circumstances surrounding Beyah’s death as if it were yesterday. These cases stay with you, and your victims stay with you, too, Sistrunk said.

“I still remember arguing to the jury how Ms. Beyah was repeatedly beat over the head by the defendant with a fire extinguisher, and that not having killed her, she was then stabbed repeatedly with multiple knives,” Sistrunk said.

One of the knives broke off in Beyah’s back, Sistrunk said.

“The defendant then tried to cut her throat, and that not having killed her, the defendant began choking her with an electrical cord,” Sistrunk said. “Finally he just left her there on the floor of her home, breathing her last breath, as he stepped over her and dug in her purse for her car keys.”

Decision By August

The decision on whether to seek a new punishment hearing for Walbey or to impose a life sentence must be made by mid-August, Sistrunk said.

“We’ve begun our review of the evidence from the first trial and are still awaiting evidence that was offered by defendant’s counsel during the appellate process,” Sistrunk said. “We’ve also contacted the family of Ms. Beyah to begin some discussions on our options at this point.”

Sistrunk could remember only one Galveston County case, that of Santiago Varelas, where a death sentenced was reversed. The case was retried in 2002, and the decision was made not to pursue the death penalty. Varelas was found guilty again and sentenced to life in prison, Sistrunk said.

“Having been personally involved in it and remembering it all, the temptation is to make a quick decision to seek death,” Sistrunk said of Walbey’s case. “But there is no substitute for reviewing everything that is available to us now, and that is what we will be doing over the next few months.”

Update on Paul Devoe

2009-03-11T12:27:00.000-07:00

According to the Austin American-Statesman, capital murder defendant Paul Devoe has been found competent to stand trial:

"A staff psychiatrist at North Texas State Hospital on Feb. 24 declared Paul Devoe competent to stand trial.

Devoe is accused of shooting to death a man at a Marble Falls bar, four people in a Jonestown house and a woman in Pennsylvania in August 2007 before being arrested in New York.

He has been indicted on capital murder charges in Travis County in the Jonestown deaths of an ex-girlfriend’s daughter, Haylie Faulkner, 15 and Haylie’s friend Danielle Hensley, 17. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.

Two doctors, one hired by the prosecution and another by the defense, declared Devoe incompetent to stand trial in December. Judge Brenda Kennedy sealed Devoe’s mental health reports, saying that their public disclosure would violate Devoe’s right to due process and a fair trial."

The article is available here.

See earlier posts about Devoe here and here.

Patient Dumping in San Antonio?

2009-03-09T16:18:00.000-07:00

SAN ANTONIO (AP) -- The San Antonio Express-News reports nearly 600 patients discharged from the San Antonio State Hospital have been dropped off at the downtown Greyhound bus station since January 2008.

One of them -- Raquel Padilla -- was found dead three days later in a concrete ditch -- having never gotten on that bus back to Del Rio.

The 54-year-old suffered from schizophrenia and mild retardation but was in the care of the state hospital for the seriously mentally ill until workers decided to send her home by dropping her off at the bus station.

Her brother Juan Padilla says she wasn't capable of taking care of herself, especially in the big city.

The San Antonio State Hospital superintendent, Bob Arizpe, said employees were following procedure when they dropped Padilla off, and a staff member saw her standing in line for the bus on Dec. 20.

Other state mental hospitals also drop patients at bus stations in comparable numbers says Emily Palmer -- a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of State Health Services.

But no exact figures were available.

The story is available here.

Op-Ed: Prohibit the Death Penalty for Offenders with Mental Illness

2009-01-16T13:19:00.000-08:00

Here's an op-ed that appeared in the The News-Sentinel (Fort Wayne, Indiana), from Kathleen Bayes. Bayes is the executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness-Fort Wayne.

Indiana should pass bill to prevent death penalty for severely mentally
ill

Thank You, Fort Wayne News-Sentinel editorial staff for your continued strong objection to reinstating the death sentence for Joseph Corcoran. Your editorial on Jan. 5 inspired me to continue the fight.

Please, please, Gov. Daniels, choose to commute the death sentence of Corcoran to life in prison without parole. End this pathetic injustice and enormous waste of money.

Order the Indiana attorney general's office to forgo any further appeals. Surely, they have more useful, productive ways to spend their time and money.

In the official study of the death penalty in Indiana, commissioned by Gov. O'Bannon and published in 2002, the costs to the county and state for an average death-penalty trial through all appeals totaled $568,836. That total did not include the cost of the defense in federal court and in clemency proceedings, all of which are paid by the federal courts and are substantial. The death penalty and its enormous cost should be reserved for the worst of the worst, if it continues to exist in Indiana at all.

Words cannot express Fort Wayne National Alliance on Mental Illness members' disappointment that the U.S. Court of Appeals has permitted Indiana to choose to reinstate the death penalty for Corcoran once again.

Corcoran is extremely mentally ill. This truth is no longer in question.

Corcoran is absolutely consumed with the brain illness, paranoid schizophrenia. Absolutely no one denies this truth after his 10 years in prison. Three experts say his mental illness is so severe that he is incompetent to make rational decisions. The state did not contradict this expert testimony. Corcoran's pattern of behavior over the last 10 years verifies this truth. One of the three appeals court judges, Judge Ann Claire Williams, agreed that Corcoran was mentally incompetent to waive
his right to having the trial court review his case.

This man is so ill with schizophrenia that all he wants to do is die. His profound schizophrenia prevented him from cooperating with his defense when he was first tried and convicted. His current defense attorney told me that no one wanted to take his case because he is so uncooperative in
his delusions. He just wants people to help him die, signing waiver after waiver of his appeals rights.

Putting Corcoran to death serves no moral purpose. Killing him will not deter future criminal activity driven by mental illness.

There is no logic, no rationale, no plan, nothing gained when a severely mentally ill person is overcome by the voices in his head and commits a capital crime. It is not an act of conscious will or choice. There is no way to deter total irrationality by punishment. Deterrence comes only from
treatment. Members of NAMI who live with mental illness will often tell us about irrational, regrettable behavior that resulted from their brain malfunction, not their conscious will. They will tell us how sorry they are when they return to sanity by effective treatment. They will tell us how hard they work to fix the damage the illness caused. Indiana chose not to execute children and the severely retarded. Indiana should also exempt the profoundly mentally ill.

No one is clamoring for Corcoran's execution except the attorney general's office. The grieving family has steadfastly remained silent. Let the torment of the resurrection of Corcoran's impending death pass from them. Release them from reliving this grief every two years.

The Indiana Legislature must change the law by passing Senate Bill 22. It will prohibit the death penalty in cases where a defendant is found to be afflicted with severe and persistent mental illness, carefully defined to avoid abuse. Senate Bill 22 will save the state of Indiana a lot of money. The proposed law has been passed out of the Bowser Commission, established by the Senate for thorough examination and review. It is strongly supported by the American Psychiatric Association, American Psychological Association, Mental Health American, NAMI National, the American Bar Association, many other organizations and most law enforcement personnel.

The state of Indiana should save its money and spend it on treatment, instead of punishment. Treatment is the true source of safety for all of us.

--------------------------------------------------
Kathleen A. Bayes is executive director of the National Alliance on Mental
Illness Fort Wayne.

Legislation Re Mental Illness & the Death Penalty Introduced in North Carolina

2009-01-14T11:07:00.000-08:00

The News & Observer reports that lawmakers in North Carolina will consider legislation aimed at prohibiting the death penalty for offenders with severe mental illness ("Bill would ban execution of mentally ill killers," January 13, 2009).

Here's the full article:

A coalition of advocates for the mentally ill and a state Superior Court judge spoke in favor today of legislation that would exclude the severely mentally ill from the death penalty.

Draft legislation introduced at a joint legislative committee today would allow a judge to determine that a defendant suffered from severe mental illness at the time of the killing. The defendant would
still face a murder trial, but the worst punishment would be life without parole.

Advocates of the legislation say it would only apply to those with severe mental illnesses such as schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, or those with severe brain injuries. People whose criminal acts were the result of drug or alcohol abuse would not be eligible.

"We're talking about individuals whose distortion of thinking is so severe that it's difficult for us to imagine," said James Ellis, a University of New Mexico law professor who successfully argued to the U.S. Supreme Court several years ago that the mentally retarded should not be executed.

Superior Court Judge Carl Fox said the proposed law could save the state money by avoiding capital murder trials for the severely mentally ill. Capital trials are much more expensive because they require an additional defense attorney and defense experts, and typically take longer to try.

Today, North Carolina juries decide during the sentencing phase of a capital trial whether mental illness is a mitigating factor.

Connecticut is the only state to prohibit executing the mentally ill. Nearly 20 other states incorporate similar language in their statutes that set up the standards for being found not guilty by reason of insanity. Advocates say North Carolina's insanity standard is much stricter.

The joint committee will hear more information regarding the proposal at another meeting at 2 p.m. Thursday.

Peg Dorer, director of the N.C. Conference of District Attorneys, said the group has not taken a position on the legislation, but she said the proposal is a bad idea.

She said it gives defendants too many opportunities to argue severe mental illness. If they do not get a favorable pretrial ruling, they still have the opportunity to persuade jurors during the sentencing phase and could continue to argue it on appeal.

"It's just dragging the whole system down," she said.
***

More on Paul Devoe

2009-01-14T11:04:00.000-08:00

Here's an update on Paul Devoe, from the Austin American-Statesman ("Judge orders Devoe mental records sealed," January 14, 2009):

An Austin judge Tuesday sealed the psychiatric records of murder suspect Paul Devoe, a day after details from the records were aired on television.

On Tuesday, an American-Statesman reporter tried to get copies of psychiatric reports by two physicians who declared Devoe mentally incompetent to stand trial. Although copies of the reports were in Devoe's case file at the Travis County district clerk's office, the reports were sealed later that evening by presiding Judge Brenda Kennedy. The contents of such case files are public records.

Devoe is accused of shooting to death a man at a Marble Falls bar, four people in a Jonestown house and a woman in Pennsylvania in August 2007 before being arrested in New York. Two doctors, one hired by the prosecution and another by the defense, in December declared Devoe unable to assist in his defense.

The psychiatric reports detailed Devoe's history of mental illness and drug use. They were previously obtained and aired by Fox 7 News Austin on Monday night.

Phone messages to Kennedy's office were not returned Tuesday night.

Joel White, a lawyer on the board of the Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas, said there was "no point" in Kennedy's sealing records after they were disclosed.

"You can't disclose records and try to take them back," said White, who is not involved in the Devoe case. "It's not within the spirit of the law. Once the information is made public, the court can't pretend to take it back with a sealing order."

Normally, White said, a defendant's psychiatric records are sealed until they are used in a trial. Once used in a judicial hearing, they become public record, he said.

Devoe will be sent to a maximum security psychiatric facility in North Texas.

Capital Murder Defendant Deemed Incompetent

2009-01-13T07:17:00.000-08:00

According to the Austin American-Statesman, Paul Devoe, who is facing capital murder charges, has been deemed incompetent to stand trial (January 13, 2009). Competency relates to a defendant’s mental state at the time of trial, not at the time of the alleged crime.

According to Chapter 46B, Texas Code of Criminal Procedure: Article 46B.003. Incompetency; Presumptions:

(a) A person is incompetent to stand trial if the person does not have:

1. sufficient present ability to consult with the person’s lawyer with a reasonable degree of rational understanding; or

2. a rational as well as factual understanding of the proceedings against the person.

(b) A defendant is presumed competent to stand trial and shall be found competent to stand trial unless proved incompetent by a preponderance of the evidence.

Here's the article from the Statesman:

"Paul Devoe, accused of killing five people in Texas and a woman in Pennsylvania in 2007, has been found mentally incompetent to stand trial.

Two doctors, one hired by the prosecution and another by the defense, declared Devoe incompetent to assist in his defense. The order was signed by Judge Brenda Kennedy on Dec. 22, Travis County Assistant District Attorney Dayna Blazey said Monday. She said that doctors expect Devoe to recover from his current state with care and medication and that she expects him to eventually stand trial.

Devoe, 45, is accused of killing a Marble Falls bartender, four people in a Jonestown house and a woman in Pennsylvania during August 2007 before being arrested in Shirley, N.Y.

'This has nothing to do with his state when he committed the offense,' Blazey said. 'All it has to do with is right now; he is unable to understand the charges against him or unable to cooperate with his attorneys.'

Devoe's mental condition deteriorated while he was in custody, Blazey said. The state's psychiatric report states that he is unable to communicate with his lawyers, she said. He will be sent to Vernon State Hospital, a maximum security psychiatric facility in North Texas, until he is able to stand trial again, Blazey said. Travis County records indicate Devoe is in custody at the county correctional center in Del Valle.

Prosecutors said they were not aware of why the December decision was not disclosed until Monday.

Blazey said Devoe's trial was tentatively scheduled to begin in March. She expects him to recover in about two or three months, after which he would go to trial and prosecutors would seek the death penalty.

'We believe the evidence supports a conviction for capital murder,' Blazey said.

One of Devoe's attorneys, Tom Weber, declined to comment on the decision.

Jonathon Griffith, the son of murder victim Paula Griffith, 46, and brother of victim Haylie Marie Faulkner, 15, said he was not pleased with the declaration of incompetence.

'I think he's trying to game the system,' Griffith said. 'I personally think he's doing this on purpose. I'm sure he's been given medications, and he's not taking them.'

Griffith said he hopes Devoe will become lucid and stand trial 'sooner rather than later.'

Kennedy ruled in July that most of the potentially incriminating statements that Devoe made will be admissible at trial. Devoe's lawyers sought to suppress a series of statements that witnesses say he made about the crimes, including telling a cellmate, 'I killed six people,' and telling his sister that he shot people. According to court testimony, he also asked a Suffolk County, N.Y., police officer, 'Do you know how many bodies they found?'

In 2007, Devoe told the Long Island newspaper Newsday that he doesn't remember shooting five of the six victims and that he 'never meant to hurt anybody in any shape or form.'

But while in jail in Suffolk County, he said he was haunted by their deaths.

'All I hear is screams,' Devoe told the paper."
***
The article is available here.

More on Andre Thomas

2009-01-09T13:09:00.000-08:00

The New York Times has this story about Andre Thomas ("Texas Death Row Inmate Pulls Out Eye, Eats It," January 9, 2009):

HOUSTON (AP) -- A Texas death row inmate with a history of mental problems pulled out his only good eye and told authorities he ate it.

Andre Thomas, 25, was arrested for the fatal stabbings of his estranged wife, their young son and her 13-month-old daughter in March 2004. Their hearts also had been ripped out. He was convicted and condemned for the infant's death.

While in the Grayson County Jail in Sherman, Thomas plucked out his right eye before his trial later in 2004. A judge subsequently ruled he was competent to stand trial.

A death-row officer at the Polunsky Unit of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice found Thomas in his cell with blood on his face and took him to the infirmary.

''''Thomas said he pulled out his eye and subsequently ingested it,'' agency spokesman Jason Clark said Friday.

Thomas was treated at East Texas Medical Center in Tyler after the Dec. 9 incident. Then he was transferred and remains at the Jester Unit, a prison psychiatric facility near Richmond southwest of Houston.

''He will finally be able to receive the mental health care that we had wanted and begged for from day 1,'' Bobbie Peterson-Cate, Thomas' trial attorney, told the Sherman Herald Democrat. ''He is insane and mentally ill. It is exactly the same reason he pulled out the last one.''

At his trial, defense lawyers also argued he suffered from alcohol and drug abuse.

Thomas does not have an execution date.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in October upheld his conviction and death sentence for the death of 13-month-old Leyha Marie Hughes. Also killed March 27, 2004, were his wife, Laura Christine Boren, 20, and their son, 4-year-old Andre Lee.

Thomas, from Texoma, walked into the Sherman Police Department and told a dispatcher he had just murdered the three and had stabbed himself in the chest.

Thomas told police how he put his victims' hearts in his pocket and left their apartment, took them home, put them in a plastic bag and threw them in the trash.

Court documents described the three victims as having ''large, gaping wounds to their chests.''
***

Private Defender Program for Defendants with Mental Illness

2009-01-09T09:38:00.000-08:00

Texas Lawyer has this update on new model for legal representation in Lubbock ("First Private Criminal Defender Program in Texas to Commence," January 8, 2009):

"A first-of-its-kind program in Texas is scheduled to open Jan. 15 in Lubbock, providing specially trained private practitioners to represent indigent criminal defendants who are mentally ill or retarded.

Philip Wischkaemper , a Lubbock Criminal Defense Lawyers Association (LCDLA) member who helped develop the program, says, 'It's the first private defender service in the state.'

Private attorneys appointed by the director of the Lubbock Special Needs Defenders' Office, a nonprofit corporation formed by the LCDLA in October, will represent the indigent clients, says Lubbock solo Ted Hogan, a member of the corporation's board of directors.

On Dec. 22, the Lubbock County Commissioners Court approved a contract with the corporation to run the program. Precinct 4 Commissioner Patti Jones says the commissioners see the program as a way to ensure that jailed indigents with mental health issues receive legal assistance within 24 hours after they are arrested, so they can receive the services they need. 'That's been a void in the system,' Jones says.

On June 18, the Texas Task Force on Indigent Defense awarded a state-funded four-year grant totaling $419,360 to Lubbock County to set up the program.

David Slayton, Lubbock County's director of court administration, says the amount of state funding for the program will decrease in increments over the first four years of operations as the amount the county provides increases. In the fifth year, the county will assume full responsibility for funding the
program, Slayton says.

Hogan says the county will pay lawyers who represent mentally impaired clients, but the Special Needs Defenders' Office director will review the bills that the attorneys submit for payment.

Wischkaemper, the capital assistance attorney for the Texas Criminal Defense Lawyers Association , says a peer review committee will determine which attorney applicants qualify for appointments.

Attorneys seeking appointments through the new program must complete a minimum of 12 hours of continuing legal education on mental health issues in addition to CLE hours in criminal law, Wischkaemper says.
***

Earlier posts on this topic are available here, here and here.

Update on TX Death Row Inmate Andre Thomas

2009-01-09T07:50:00.000-08:00

According to KXII News, Texas death row inmate Andre Thomas has injured himself once again ("Grayson Co. death row inmate gauges out other eye," January 8, 2009). Thomas has been diagnosed with schizophrenia and appears to suffer from frequent bouts with psychotic delusional states and a preoccupation with death, religious, and suicidal thoughts.

Here's an account of his self-mutilation:

"A Grayson County man sentenced to die for killing his wife, her daughter and their son, gouged out his other eye in prison last month.

According to the warden at the state prison in Huntsville, death row inmate Andre Thomas gouged out his left eye in early December and then ate it.

Five days after the murders in March 2004, Thomas gouged out his right eye inside a Grayson County jail cell after reading a Bible verse.

The state's top Criminal Appeals Court upheld Thomas' conviction and death sentence back in October of 2008.

Thomas is now in a psychiatric prison facility in Richmond, Texas.

No execution date has been set."
***
An earlier post about Thomas is available here.

New Mental Health Court in Harris County

2009-01-08T15:41:00.000-08:00

The Houston Chronicle reports that Harris County judges have voted to get in line with the growing number of mental health courts nationwide ("Harris Judges Vote for Felony Mental Health Court," January 8, 2009).

According to the Criminal Justice/Mental Health Consensus Project, "Mental health courts (MHCs) are specialized dockets that link defendants with mental illnesses to court-supervised, community-based treatment in lieu of traditional case processing." In The Essential Elements of a Mental Health Court, the authors note that "Mental health courts are a recent and rapidly expanding phenomenon. In the late 1990s only a few such courts were accepting cases. Since then, more than 150 others have been established, and dozens more are being planned." Other mental health courts in Texas have been established in Smith, Bexar, El Paso, Tarrant, and Dallas Counties.

Here's the full article:

Harris County's criminal district judges voted Wednesday to designate a full-time felony mental health court, which will likely focus on defendants diagnosed with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and severe depression.

State District Judge Jan Krocker will preside over the court, the first of its kind in Harris County. A start date has not been determined. Funding is still needed, she said. She did not give an estimate, saying details must still be finalized.

About 30 percent of the defendants who come through Harris County's criminal courts have a mental illness, Krocker said. She expects many of those defendants also will need treatment for substance abuse.

"It is a tragedy both for society and the defendant when mentally ill offenders go through the system without treatment," Krocker said Wednesday. "The mental health court can rewrite some very sad stories so there are great endings."

Mental Health Association of Greater Houston President and CEO Betsy Schwartz lauded the move, noting that mental health courts have been in place for years in other parts of the country and have proved successful.

She said she hopes that the court will prevent some offenders from "recycling" through the system.

"Individuals with serious mental illness can be matched with case management and services in the mental health court and the judge will know them as a person, have a relationship with them," Schwartz said.

The new court might also help some veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder when they return to Houston from Iraq, Krocker said.

"We need to be prepared for the possibility that (some) may be mentally ill and homeless and may end up in the criminal justice system," Krocker said.

Harris County District Attorney Pat Lykos, who recently took office, applauded the judges' decision. Lykos emphasized mental health treatment as a theme in her election campaign last year.

"I think this is a major initiative," Lykos said Wednesday. "The criminal justice system is the last institution available to deal with these individuals. It's the institution of last resort. This is a moral issue. It's a dollars and cents issue."

Krocker plans for mentally ill defendants to be assigned to her court immediately after they are charged with a criminal offense if they have previously been diagnosed with a mental illness in the criminal justice system through the Mental Health and Mental Retardation Authority of Harris County.

Krocker also proposed that mentally ill defendants could be transferred to her court from another felony court if the judge, prosecutor and defense attorney involved in the case agree.

More than 7,700 defendants received psychotropic medications in Harris County in 2007, Krocker said. The Harris County Jail is the county's largest psychiatric hospital.

The court designation is one step in helping the mentally ill, Schwartz said, adding that other components must be in place.

"It can only be as good as the community support services that are available," Schwartz said.
***
Earlier posts on mental health courts are available here and here. More information is available from the Consensus Project.

Editorial: Unjust death penalty

2009-01-06T09:45:00.000-08:00

The following editorial appeared today in the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette regarding the case of death row inmate Joseph Corcoran. This year, the Indiana Legislature will consider a bill that would prohibit the death penalty for offenders determined to suffer from severe mental illness.

Unjust Death Penalty

"Reinstatement of the death penalty against Joseph Corcoran marks another sad twist in a cruel and misplaced effort to extract justice from a mentally ill man. The sentence should again be thrown out on appeal, and Indiana lawmakers, in the meantime, should finally pass a law banning the execution of the mentally ill.

Corcoran is a prime example of why such a law is needed. He demonstrated classic signs of paranoid schizophrenia when he shot to death his brother, his sister’s fiancé and two other men in 1997 because he thought they were talking about him. Five years earlier, he had been charged but acquitted in the shotgun slaying of his parents.

His horrific story would have ended with a life sentence if Corcoran had agreed to bench trial – with a judge instead of a jury reaching the verdict – but the terms of the deal from then-Allen County Prosecutor Robert Gevers placed the death penalty back on the table with a jury trial. After he was
convicted, Corcoran changed his mind and decided to pursue an appeal, but the Indiana Supreme Court ruled that his decision came too late.

That ruling was overturned in 2007, but last week the U.S. Court of Appeal issued a 2-1 decision reinstating the death penalty. At issue is the question of whether Corcoran is capable of making a rational choice. In her dissent, Judge Ann Claire Williams pointed to the fact that no testimony was presented to suggest that he was.

'The majority reasons that the Indiana Supreme Court was entitled to believe Corcoran’s contention that he wished to waive further proceedings because of his guilt, and I agree that ordinarily, the Indiana court’s decision to rely on one person’s testimony over other people’s testimony would be one to which we would defer,' Williams wrote.

'But this is not a case where the court picked the opinion of one expert who believed Corcoran could make a rational decision over an expert who disagreed,' she wrote. 'Indeed, the state presented no expert who contradicted the conclusions of these three experts. Rather, the person whom the court
credited was a person diagnosed with a severe mental illness that causes delusions, who told a doctor and his sister he wanted to die to escape those delusions.'

Corcoran’s attorneys said they will seek another hearing before the full federal appellate court. If it is denied, they will appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Gov. Mitch Daniels could also commute the death sentence, which he did in the case of Arthur Paul Baird, who killed his parents and pregnant wife in 1985.

Such cases could be avoided in the future if a bill pending in the Indiana General Assembly is approved. Sen. Karen Tallian, D-Portage, has again filed legislation based on the recommendations of the Bowser Commission. Senate Bill 22 would prohibit use of the death penalty in cases where a defendant is found to suffer from a severe mental illness.

This page has long believed that justice is not achieved by killing people. But even those who support the death penalty should agree that putting to death criminals who are mentally ill serves no purpose."
- - - - -

Senate Bill 22
Proposed bill establishes a procedure to determine whether a defendant charged with murder is an individual with a severe mental illness. Prohibits the imposition of the death penalty on a defendant found to be an individual with a severe mental illness. Provides that a jury serves as the fact finder in a sentencing hearing in a capital case, even if the defendant pleads guilty or is tried. … Permits a defendant to waive the right to impanel a jury during the sentencing hearing.
***
An earlier post on Joseph Corcoran is available here.

Update on Death Penalty Case in Indiana

2009-01-02T08:10:00.000-08:00

Here's an update from The Journal Gazette on the case of Joseph Corcoran, a severely mentally ill death row inmate in Indiana ("Quadruple-murderer loses death penalty appeal," December 31, 2008):

The state of Indiana can once again reinstate the death penalty against convicted quadruple-murderer Joseph E. Corcoran, according to a 2-1 ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals issued Wednesday morning.

Just over a year ago, the 3-judge panel of the 7th Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals in Chicago heard arguments about whether Corcoran's death sentence should be overturned.

In 1999, a jury convicted the then-22-year old Corcoran of four counts of murder. In July 1997, Corcoran shot and killed his brother, James Corcoran, 30; his sister's fiance, Robert Scott Turner, 32; and 2 of his brother's friends - Timothy G. Bricker, 30; and Douglas A. Stillwell, 30 -at a Bayer Avenue home.

At issue was whether Corcoran, who has paranoid schizophrenia, was mentally competent when he waived his right to have a court review his death sentence and whether his constitutional rights were violated when then-Allen County Prosecutor Robert Gevers offered to take the death penalty off the table if Corcoran would agree to a bench trial rather than a jury trial.

In April 2007, U.S. District Judge Allen Sharp overturned Corcoran's death sentence, ruling Gevers inappropriately punished Corcoran by pursuing the death penalty against Corcoran after he declined to face a trial before a judge and chose to allow a jury decide his fate.

The Indiana Attorney General's office appealed Sharp's decision and in it sruling, the 7th Circuit ruled that Corcoran's rights were not violated.

"If it is constitutionally permissible to use the threat of more severe punishment to encourage a guilty plea it should follow that the state's use of the same tactics to encourage a defendant to proceed by bench trial would also be constitutionally permissible," Judge William Bauer wrote in his opinion for the majority.

Judge Ann Claire Williams wrote a dissenting opinion, disagreeing with the ruling that Corcoran was mentally competent to waive his right to having a court review his death sentence.

Corcoran's attorneys could appeal this decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.

No Forced Medication in New Jersey Case

2008-11-13T06:18:00.000-08:00

Law.com has this article from the New Jersey Law Journal regarding a case in which a judge has ruled against forcibly medicating a defendant in order to render him competent to stand trial ("Defendant Can't Be Forced to Take Drug to Make Him Fit for Trial, Judge Rules", 11-12-2008).

This case raises interesting questions as to how the system should handle a defendant who has been indicted but whose mental illness makes it unlikely that he will be able to stand trial any time soon, if ever. Similar questions emerge in the case of death row inmates who have been deemed incompetent to be executed and are not being forcibly medicated (or for whom medication has not restored competency). These inmates remain in legal limbo, where the state is neither seeking their execution nor moving to commute the sentence.

Here's the article in full:

"Federal authorities can't force a mentally ill bank robbery suspect to take an anti-psychotic drug that could make him competent to stand trial, because the side effects might be harmful, a federal judge in Camden, N.J., has ruled.

Prosecutors argued that injections of Haldol had an excellent chance of making paranoid, hallucinating, delusional suspect Wayne Moruzin fit for prosecution on charges he held up a Westville, N.J., bank in 2005.

But Moruzin objected to taking the injections and U.S. District Judge Jerome Simandle ruled on Oct. 30 that there was insufficient evidence that the suspect would respond to the treatment and a chance that his health would be undermined by side effects. Moruzin has a history of drug abuse and hepatitis.

The government failed to establish that the proposed treatment 'is medically appropriate, is substantially unlikely to have side effects that may undermine the fairness of the trial, and, taking into account less intrusive alternatives, is necessary significantly to further important government trial-related interests,' Simandle ruled in U.S. v. Moruzin, cr-05-306.

While the ruling makes no new law, the case is unusual because the authorities have determined that Moruzin does not pose a danger to himself or others. In those cases, it's easier for the government to win the right to administer the drugs by arguing medical necessity.

The U.S. Attorney's Office does have the right to seek civil commitment in hopes Moruzin's condition will improve, but government doctors have testified that competency is not likely to occur without the anti-psychotic drugs that Moruzin refuses to take.

And because Moruzin could be sentenced to up to 30 years if convicted, a very long time would pass before a judge could release him on grounds he had served the equivalent of what a sentence would have been.

'The question becomes, what do they do with the indictment?' asks defense lawyer Mark Catanzaro, who has a firm in Moorestown, N.J. 'If he refuses to take the medicine he is not likely to return to competence. They are not obligated to dismiss the indictment right now but I don't know how long they can keep it open. I can't imagine five years from now there would still be an open indictment hanging out there.'

'It may not be a legal matter, but a practical matter,' Catanzaro says. 'Judge Simandle calls up and screams at [the prosecutors] and says, get this thing off my docket.'

Assistant U.S. Attorney Norman Gross did not return a call on Thursday.

In January 2007, U.S. District Judge Joel Pisano made the same ruling and dismissed the indictment in U.S. v. McCray, cr-04-493, a case involving a mentally ill bank robber. But he did so knowing it wasn't a get-out-of-jail free card for defendant Kevin McCray, who had already pleaded guilty to three bank jobs in Delaware and was serving a 36-year sentence in state prison.

Moruzin was arrested on Sept. 16, 2004, the day after he allegedly walked into the First Colonial National Bank, fired a shot from a chrome-colored gun and fled with $11,588.

Employees said they recognized him because he was a former customer. When police chased him down the next day they said they found some of the money, but not all of it. He admitted to eating a $50 bill, 'and requested a glass of water to help digest same,' the FBI complaint said.

A jury tampering charge was added to the indictment in 2005, after authorities intercepted a letter in which Moruzin suggested to a woman that she appear at his upcoming jury selection and inform potential jurors that he had been set up.

Simandle granted Moruzin the right to represent himself at trial, but the defendant's behavior suggested he might be suffering from a mental defect and Simandle ordered a hearing into whether Moruzin was competent to stand trial.

He wasn't. Based on medical evidence that Moruzin was paranoid and delusional, Simandle wrote in October 2006, 'he presently seems to be unable to have constructive dialogue about this case or his defense due to his hostility and paranoia, and there is little doubt that his unfounded mistrust of his attorney and his attorney's motives hampers his attorney-client relationship.'

Doctors who evaluated Moruzin for the government recommended that the judge order the involuntary administration of anti-psychotic drugs, which would be the normal treatment for anyone with the defendant's condition and had a chance of making him competent to stand trial.

The drug of choice was Haldol by injection twice a month and then once a month.

The courts have given medical personnel the right to order such treatment if the patient is a threat to himself or others, but that wasn't the case with Moruzin.

His situation was covered by Sell v. United States, 539 U.S. 166 (2003), a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that says defendants have a constitutional right to avoid involuntary administration of anti-psychotic drugs but can be forced to comply if the government satisfies a series of legal tests.

Simandle ruled that the government flunked all the tests, starting with the one that gives the prosecution the benefit of the doubt when a crime is particularly serious.

Simandle ruled that although Moruzin is exposed to a possible sentence of 30 years, the strong likelihood of the alternative -- a civil commitment -- would undermine the need for a prosecution, he ruled.

Second, he ruled that there was insufficient evidence that Haldol would restore competency to Moruzin, who has been a drug abuser for 40 years and has been mentally ill for at least 32 years.
What's more, the side effects experienced by many patients, including pseudo-Parkinson's-type physical movements, grimacing, tongue protrusion and lip smacking, could make Moruzin's courtroom demeanor prejudicial, the judge ruled.

Third, the government hadn't proved that alternative treatments, including psychotherapy, were possible.

And finally, the government hadn't proven that Haldol was the appropriate treatment for Moruzin's illness, given the dangers of side effects, he ruled."

http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1202425954334

OpEd: Mental illness must be in consideration

2008-10-21T09:59:00.000-07:00

Here's an OpEd from George Haley, a mental health advocate in Tennessee, in which he offers his perspective as to why the death penalty is inappropriate for offenders with severe mental illness. This appeared on October 16, 2008 in The Tennessean: http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081016/OPINION01/810160338/1008.

In 2007, the Tennessee General Assembly created a committee to examine Tennessee's death penalty system for fairness and accuracy. The committee will conclude its work in December 2008, issuing its recommendations to the legislature in January 2009.

Thus far, the committee has highlighted a number of serious problems, including the lack of adequate defense services for those charged with capital murder, the failure to collect and analyze critical information about death penalty trials and appeals, the lack of accurate information concerning the cost of the death penalty to taxpayers, as well as the number of inmates with severe mental illness on Tennessee's death row.

In 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court in the Atkins v. Virginia decision held that it is a violation of the Eighth Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment to execute defendants with mental retardation. In making this decision the court determined that the disabilities of those with mental retardation "do not warrant an exemption from criminal sanctions, but diminish their personal culpability." Tennessee was one of 18 states that had already banned the death sentence for those with mental retardation prior to the Supreme Court decision.

Mentally ill not culpable

Currently, defendants diagnosed with severe mental illness are still eligible for the death penalty in Tennessee, even though the most severely mentally ill- those suffering from delusions, hallucinations, or significant disruptions of consciousness - are no more culpable than those with mental retardation. Though mental illness is a significant problem in our nation's prisons, only a small percentage of death row inmates suffered from the most severe mental illness at the time their crimes were committed.

Exempting the most seriously ill inmates from the death penalty does not exempt them from other penalties, such as life without parole or a life sentence. But, such an exemption does allow for a quicker resolution for victims' families while reducing the costs of lengthy appeals and providing a more humane approach toward those who are most ill.

In Tennessee, Richard Taylor was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1981 murder of a correctional officer - a crime committed only after prison officials stopped giving Taylor his anti-psychotic medication.

Over the next 20 years, Taylor stood trial twice despite his severe mental illness. Finally, in March 2008, Taylor's sentence was reversed by a Tennessee appeals court after he agreed to a life sentence in exchange for pleading guilty. Imagine the years of suffering for the victim's family and costs that could have been avoided if Taylor was ineligible for a death sentence and instead received a life sentence from the start. The state spent millions of dollars to seek death for a man who ultimately received a life sentence anyway. Regardless of one's feelings about the death penalty, Tennessee cannot afford to allow the execution of those with severe mental illness when less costly alternatives are available.

George Haley has served as president of NAMI-TN; chairman of the board oftrustees of Middle Tennessee Mental Health Institute; chairman of the board ofdirectors of Park Center, a psycho-social rehabilitation center; and a memberof the Board of the Tennessee Health Care Campaign.

Free Webinar: Law Enforcement and People with Mental Illnesses

2008-10-20T09:02:00.000-07:00

On Tuesday, October 28, the Council of State Governments Justice Center, with support from the Bureau of Justice Assistance, U.S. Department of Justice, will sponsor a one-hour webinar during which "national experts in law enforcement and mental health will discuss effective crisis response models. They will outline how community behavioral health care providers and law enforcement can collaborate and tailor responses to the problems of their jurisdiction. The webinar spotlights Improving Responses to People with Mental Illnesses: The Essential Elements of a Specialized Law Enforcement-Based Program, a report supported by the Bureau of Justice Assistance, U.S. Department of Justice. Written by the Council of State Governments Justice Center and the Police Executive Research Forum, it highlights 10 key components for improving officers' encounters with individuals with mental illnesses."

Presenters include Captain Richard Wall, Los Angeles Police Department; Fred Osher, M.D., Director of Health Systems and Services Policy, CSG Justice Center; and Melissa Reuland, Senior Research Consultant, Police Executive Research Forum.

Registration is free but is limited to the first 1,000 people. To register, go to http://www2.eventsvc.com/nationalcouncil/, select the law enforcement/mental health event, and enter the coupon code COUNCIL at checkout.

If you are registering for a webinar for the first time, create a profile with the email and password of your choice. A confirmation with webinar access information will be sent to the email address you enter.

Participation will require Internet access and a phone line. Participants from the same location are encouraged to use a single phone line - one individual may register and get access information for the whole group.

Contact Communications@thenationalcouncil or call 301.984.6200 with questions.

For more information, go to http://consensusproject.org/updates/announcements-and-events/Oct2008/webinaroct08.

Candidates for Harris County District Attorney Address Issue of Mental Illness

2008-10-20T08:48:00.001-07:00

On November 4, voters in Harris County will elect a new district attorney. In an article that appeared in the Houston Chronicle ("Race for DA puts justice system on trial," October 12, 2008), candidates C.O. Bradford and Pat Lykos expressed interest in reform, with a particular emphasis on addressing the needs of inmates with mental illness. Here are excerpts:

"Harris County voters looking for a district attorney candidate with a 'tough on crime' theme are out of luck this fall.

The situation is a startling departure from the law-and-order tone set for the last 30 years by Republican former district attorneys John B. Holmes Jr. and Chuck Rosenthal.

But Rosenthal resigned in disgrace early this year, opening the door for Democratic candidate C.O. Bradford and Republican candidate Pat Lykos, former police officers who have never prosecuted a criminal case, to put the local justice system on trial instead.

Bradford, the former Houston police chief, and Lykos, a former felony court judge, make sure to mention, in a county known nationwide for its frequent use of the death penalty, that the worst criminal offenders should be prosecuted to the hilt. But, despite substantive differences between the contenders, they both put greater emphasis on reforming the system so that many minor offenders get drug or mental illness treatment rather than a cell in the already crowded jail.

'Simply locking everybody up for everything isn't going to get us out of the process we are in now,' Bradford said. 'Our taxes are high, the jails are full and crime continues to go up. So let's exercise good stewardship of fiscal resources, reduce crime and understand that most people who commit offenses are salvageable, they can be rehabilitated, but they must be given realistic opportunities to reintegrate back into our society.

'That's not occurring and there are a number of reasons for that ... There are a lot of people who make a lot of money, billions of dollars, designing, building, constructing (prisons) and there's not a concern about whether you are guilty or innocent. They get paid to keep a warm body there. That's not justice.'

Lykos called this 'a critical period in our county. We have a tarnished law enforcement system. It is bad for justice, it is bad for public safety and it's bad for business. I pledge to you to restore public trust and confidence in the district attorney's office.'" ...

The article reports that "As chief, Bradford upgraded the domestic violence unit and established a crisis intervention team for encounters with mentally ill suspects. Coincidentally Lykos, who would be the county's first female DA, aimed many of her creative sentencing approaches at healing family strife and getting treatment for mentally ill inmates."

Read the full article.

New Resources for Victims of Crimes Committed by People with Mental Illness

2008-10-20T08:31:00.000-07:00

Last month, the Council of State Governments Justice Center published two guides on the rights of individuals who have been victimized by people with mental illnesses - the first ever national publications on this topic. Both were supported by the Office for Victims of Crime (OVC), Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice.

The first, Responding to People Who Have Been Victimized by Individuals with Mental Illnesses, details steps policymakers, advocates, and mental health professionals can take to understand and protect the rights and safety of these crime victims. It reflects the views of forensic directors, prosecutors, victim advocates, and victims of crimes committed by people with mental illnesses. The guide describes current policies and practices used in selected jurisdictions to respond to this group of victims, outlines barriers to upholding victims’ rights in such cases, and highlights action items for communities to consider.

The second report, A Guide to the Role of Crime Victims in Mental Health Courts, offers practical recommendations to mental health court practitioners about how to engage crime victims in case proceedings.

Go to http://justicecenter.csg.org/media/press_releases to read the full press releases for each guide.

Learn more and download both resources at http://consensusproject.org/issue-areas/victims/vpmi/. Hard copies can be ordered while supplies last through the National Criminal Justice Reference Service at www.ncjrs.gov (NCJ 223345).

Families Affected by Mental Illness and the Death Penalty Gather in San Antonio

2008-10-20T08:05:00.000-07:00

On Friday, October 3, the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) and Murder Victims' Families for Human Rights (MVFHR) launched a groundbreaking new project, Prevention Not Execution (sound familiar?!), which brings together victims' families and families of the executed, all of whom had been affected by mental illness, murder, and the death penalty.

After a private gathering involving the participants, who travelled from Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, North Carolina, California, Maine, Massachusetts, and elsewhere in Texas, the organizations held a press conference that featured Nick and Amanda Wilcox, Lois Robison, Kim Crespi, and Bill Babbitt. Ed Dickey, the head of NAMI San Antonio, and Ron Honberg, the Legal and Policy Director of NAMI, also spoke about this collaborative effort from the perspective of the nation's leading mental health advocacy organization.

The press conference included a powerful ceremony during which all of the participants placed a rose in a vase and lit a candle in remembrance of their loved ones, the victims' of these crimes, and the perpetrators.

You can view photos from the event and read the moving statements of each speaker at http://mvfhr.blogspot.com/.

In addition, WITNESS, a global human rights organization that uses video and online technologies to open the eyes of the world to human rights violations, is featuring online video from the event launch. The video appears on the home page of The HUB, the first global platform dedicated to human rights media and action. It includes portions of statements by Nick and Amanda Wilcox, Kim Crespi, and Bill Babbitt, as well as a portion of the remembrance ceremony that concluded the event. Here is the link to the video: http://hub.witness.org/en/node/8928 (you might need to install flash to view the content).
***
MVFHR will be conducting interviews with other family members who were not able to attend the San Antonio event and will release a report on this effort next summer.

Message to PNP Readers

2008-10-20T07:52:00.000-07:00

Dear Prevention Not Punishment Readers,

Thank you so much for supporting this blog over the last year and a half. I apologize that my postings have been rather sparse these last couple of months.

My Soros Justice Fellowship officially ended on September 1, 2008, which means that I no longer am focusing exclusively on issues related to mental illness and the death penalty. While I now have less time to devote to the blog than I would like, I aim to do my best to maintain it with up-to-date information. The following postings capture some *recent* developments on these important issues.

As always, your comments and ideas for future postings are much appreciated.

-Kristin

TX Death Row Inmates Lose Appeals

2008-10-09T08:13:00.000-07:00

Here's an update from the Associated Press regarding two Texas cases that involve issues of severe mental illness ("2 condemned killers in Texas lose appeals," October 8, 2008):

"A North Texas auto mechanic whose original death sentence for the 1987 murders of a man and a 4-month-old child was overturned on appeal had his 2nd death sentence upheld Wednesday by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.

In 1 of 2 death row cases rejected by the state's highest criminal appeals court, lawyers for inmate James Eugene Bigby contended there were 15 errors at his 2nd punishment trial in Tarrant County where jurors in September 2006 deliberated about 4 hours before handing down another death sentence.

In a 2nd case, the Austin-based appeals court upheld the conviction and death sentence of a Grayson County man accused of killing his wife, their son and her daughter. Andre Thomas, now 25, confessed to fatally stabbing all three in their chests in March 2004 and ripping out their hearts.

Neither Thomas nor Bigby has an execution date.

Bigby, now 43, had been convicted and condemned in 1991 for shooting MikeTrekell, who was cooking steaks for himself and Bigby, and drowning Trekell's 4-month-old son, Jayson, in a bathroom sink on Christmas Eve. He confessed to the slayings but pleaded innocent by reason of insanity.

The 2 were among four people killed during a seven-hour spree by Bigby in Fort Worth and Arlington.
The 1st jury convicted Bigby of capital murder just hours after he grabbed a loaded gun from a drawer in state District Judge Don Leonard's bench, charged into Leonard's chambers and pointed the gun at him. The judge, a prosecutor and a bailiff eventually wrestled the gun away from Bigby.

Defense witnesses had testified that Bigby was a paranoid schizophrenic, but the jury rejected Bigby's insanity defense. The former Kennedale automechanic appealed.

In 2005, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Bigby's conviction but overturned his sentence, saying it violated a 1989 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that juries should consider mitigating factors, such as mental illness, when deciding whether a defendant should die. The court said paranoid schizophrenia is a severe mental illness, and that Bigby had proven he had it at the time of the slayings.

Bigby's lawyers didn't dispute his actions but noted he'd been treated three times for mental disorders before the killings. They argued he shouldn't be executed because his paranoid schizophrenia and frustrations about a workers' compensation claim led to the killing spree. Prosecutors said drug use and his aggressive personality led to the killings.

In the latest appeal, Bigby challenged selection of some of the jurors, argued the indictment and jury instructions were faulty, again questioned the legality of mitigating evidence issues and the legality of the drugs used for lethal injection.

In Thomas' case, the maintenance man and laborer contended in his appeal that his trial court judge erroneously allowed into evidence video and audio tapes of his statements to police where he told about killing his estranged wife, Laura Christine Boren, their 4-year-old son, Andre Lee, and the woman's 13-month-old daughter, Leyha Marie Hughes.

He was convicted specifically of the infant's death.

Thomas, from Texoma, walked into the Sherman Police Department and told a dispatcher he had just murdered the three and had stabbed himself in the chest. He was taken to a hospital and agreed to speak with officers there. He also spoke later with detectives at the police department.

A judge said he understood rights and warnings that were explained to him.

Defense lawyers argued he suffered from mental illness and alcohol and drug abuse.

The appeals court, in upholding the conviction, ruled Thomas knowingly and intelligently waived his rights. The court also rejected arguments contesting jury selection and challenging introduction of crime scene photos and autopsy results of the victims other than the infant.

Other arguments turned down by the appeals court involved prosecution testimony about Thomas' sanity, that the court should have ruled on his competency before the trial, that his defense lawyers were incompetent and that the jury engaged in misconduct because following their verdicts they told the judge and lawyers they'd wanted to hear true remorse from Thomas.

In his statement to police, Thomas told how he put his victims' hearts in his pocket and left their apartment, took them home, put them in a plastic bag and threw them in the trash."
***
This article doesn't mention that Thomas gouged out his own eyeball while in a cell at the Grayson County jail, where he was awaiting trial. He was then declared incompetent to stand trial and sent to a mental hospital, but was released from care several months later. Doctors claimed that his condition had improved to the point that he would be able to understand the charges against him and help with his own defense.

Thomas' attorneys argued that he committed his crimes while suffering from severe, religious-based delusions about his wife. He was said to have quoted a Bible verse when he gouged out his eye: "And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell.'' (Mark 9:47)

MVFHR/NAMI Gather Next Week in San Antonio

2008-09-23T10:10:00.000-07:00

Media Advisory
September 23, 2008

National Project Launch

Murder Victims’ Families Oppose Death Penalty for People with Severe Mental Illnesses

Washington, D.C.— Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights (MVFHR) and the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) will launch a national project opposing the death penalty for persons with severe mental illnesses at a press conference in San Antonio, Texas on October 3.

The initiative builds on recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions that raise questions about the capacity of individuals diagnosed with severe mental illnesses sentenced to death to understand why they are being executed or even that they will die. A national report on the issue will be released in June 2009, based in part on testimony from family members at San Antonio event.

WHAT: National project launch—press conference

WHEN: Friday, October 3, 2008 3:00 P.M. – 5:00 P.M.

WHERE: University of the Incarnate Word
Bonilla Science Hall 129
Hildebrande—just west of Broadway intersection
San Antonio, TX 78209

WHO: Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights (MVFHR)
National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI)

- Renny Cushing, MVFHR Executive Director
- Ron Honberg, NAMI Policy & Legal Director
- Bill Babbitt, brother of a Vietnam veteran, who was diagnosed with PTSD and schizophrenia, killed a 78-year old woman, and was executed.
- Lois Robison, a mother whose mentally ill son was discharged from a hospital when his insurance ran out. A county hospital could not admit him unless he became violent. He killed five people. Instead of treatment, he got the death penalty.
- Kim Crespi, mother of victims murdered by husband who suffers from mental illness
- Amanda & Nick Wilcox, parents of victim who was murdered by a person with mental illness
- Other family members of murder victims or executed persons from around the United States

MVFHR is a national organization of family members of murder victims and families of the executed. NAMI is the nation’s largest grassroots organization dedicated to helping individuals and families affected by mental illnesses.

Contacts:

Susannah Sheffer for MVFHR: 617-512-2010 (cell) or sheffer@aceweb.com
Christine Armstrong for NAMI: 703-312-7893 or christinea@nami.org

www.mvfhr.org
www.nami.org

# # #

NAMI/MVFHR Gathering in San Antonio

2008-09-15T08:29:00.000-07:00

This column by Dr. María Félix-Ortiz appeared in the San Antonio Express-News on September 10, 2008.

Capital punishment of the mentally ill focus of meeting

This new millennium has seen substantial review of capital punishment.

In 2002, in Atkins vs. Virginia, the Supreme Court wrote that the intellectually disabled can be competent, “but, by definition, they have diminished capacities to understand and process information, to communicate, to abstract from mistakes and learn from experience, to engage in logical reasoning, to control impulses, and to understand others' reactions. Their deficiencies do not warrant an exemption from criminal sanctions, but diminish their personal culpability.”

This overturned a 13-year-old decision that had allowed execution of the mentally ill.
In 2005, the court opined that a juvenile's “immature and irresponsible behavior,” vulnerability to and lack of control over his environment and the fact that he was still developing his identity indicated diminished culpability. In Roper vs. Simmons, the court ruled that a juvenile's diminished culpability meant that execution couldn't serve as retribution or as deterrence of capital crimes.

Could similar reasoning apply to capital punishment of mentally ill offenders?

Mental illness and capital punishment are the focus of a national meeting co-sponsored by National Alliance for Mental Illness and Murder Victims' Families for Human Rights at the University of the Incarnate Word on Oct. 3 at 3 p.m. (in BSH 129). Speakers, who will share their perspectives as family members of murder victims and the executed murderers, include:

Bill Babbitt: His brother was executed in California for assaulting and killing a 78-year-old grandmother. Manny was a Marine who served two tours in Vietnam, after which he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and paranoid schizophrenia. Babbitt remarks (see www.mvfhr.org), “The police promised me that Manny would get the help he needed. For the rest of my life I have to live with the fact that I turned my brother in and that led to his death.”

Lois Robison: Her son became ill with paranoid schizophrenia. Larry was discharged after 30 days, as soon as he turned 21, because he wasn't covered by his parents' insurance. Robison took him to the county hospital, which discharged him and said “not to take him home.” He couldn't be hospitalized unless he was violent. Larry's first episode of violence was to kill five people. Robison remarks, “They told us if he ever got violent they would give him treatment and instead they gave him the death penalty.”

Amanda Wilcox: Her daughter, Laura, a receptionist, was killed by a man who had paranoid schizophrenia.

This event launches a national effort to collect interviews and generate a report to the next NAMI national conference. NAMI and MVFHR hope to educate us about this complex issue.

Effort to ban the death penalty for offenders with mental illness gains momentum in Kentucky

2008-09-04T14:08:00.000-07:00

Here's an excerpt from a lengthy article that appeared on September 3 in LEO, the alternative weekly paper in Louisville, Kentucky. The article ("Crazy and Condemned - Kentucky Could Be the First State to Ban Executions of the Severely Mentally Ill") chronicles an emerging effort in Kentucky to secure a legislative prohibition on the death penalty for offenders with severe mental illness. Other states may also introduce legislation during their 2009 sessions.

"It was clear from the beginning Eugene Gall was guilty. It also was clear he was insane.

Driving through a Cincinnati suburb on the morning of April 5, 1978, Gall — a paranoid schizophrenic with a criminal past — spotted a young girl walking alone through the tranquil neighborhood. The 12-year-old girl was on her way to school.

Two hours later, a motorist driving down a stretch of rural highway in northern Kentucky noticed a red windbreaker on the side of the road and stopped to retrieve it. About a mile later, she noticed a textbook in the road and pulled over once again.

Assuming the lost items belonged to a student at the local elementary school, the woman called the principal to report finding the jacket and a book bearing the name Lisa Jansen, written neatly inside the front cover. The principal told her no student by that name attended the school.

Later that afternoon, television newscasts began reporting that Lisa Jansen was missing. By the time the woman called police to report what she had found, they already had a suspect: Eugene Gall.
Just hours after Jansen vanished, police responded to a report of robbery at a small grocery store in Gardnersville, Ky., a tiny town about 20 miles east of Interstate 71. Officers raced into the parking lot as Gall tried to exit, armed with a .357 magnum revolver and $112 from the register. Gunfire erupted, and Gall shot and injured two cops and a bystander before he was captured.

After reviewing Gall’s rap sheet, police questioned him about the missing girl.

In 1970, Gall had been charged with several counts of rape, but a judge found him mentally incompetent to stand trial. He spent 19 months in a mental institution where doctors treated him with anti-psychotic drugs. Eventually, Gall was deemed competent and he pleaded guilty to the charges — although he claimed not to remember the rapes — and spent five years in a state penitentiary.
When police asked Gall if he had any information about Lisa Jansen’s disappearance, he did not deny involvement. Instead, he insisted he could not recall his whereabouts that morning.

The next day, after police found the girl’s body alongside a remote creek in northern Kentucky, 30 miles from her home, Gall was charged with kidnapping, rape and murder. Ultimately, a jury in Boone County, Ky., convicted Gall and sentenced him to death.

'He was severely mentally ill and there was an insanity defense raised, but the jury did not go that way,' says Edward Monahan, a longtime defense lawyer who represented Gall on appeal years later. 'The problem is that juries are very rarely able to bring themselves to make that finding, probably because they fear the person’s release into society and their safety being in danger.'

The jurors undoubtedly saw a monster who — regardless of mental illness — committed a gruesome crime, and they were unwilling to risk sending Gall to a psychiatric facility because he might one day be released. It’s a pervasive fear that compels juries to send inarguably insane defendants not only to prison, but also to death row.

But a growing consensus of legal experts and mental health professionals are pushing for an end to executing the severely mentally ill, claiming the punishment is inappropriate and unconstitutional in cases where a person’s insanity likely led to a crime.

The movement is gaining momentum nationwide and in Kentucky, where state lawmakers are expected to consider a bill next session that would prohibit the execution of the severely mentally ill. If approved, Kentucky would become the first state to enact such a ban.

The law would apply only to a narrow pool of defendants, and would ensure that those convicted still are severely punished, as opposed to institutionalized. They could face life in prison without parole — just not execution.

'When someone behaves in a way that hurts other people substantially, there should be accountability, but the accountability should be based on the culpability of the individual,' says Monahan, who took over as the state’s chief public defender Sept. 1. 'Someone who is severely mentally ill has less ability to be accountable for their conduct. … The ultimate penalty ought not be applied to people who cannot fully control their behavior.'... ”
***
Read the article in full.

Upholding Legal Rights of Mentally Ill Defendants

2008-08-25T15:22:00.000-07:00

That's the title of a new posting on the blog Women in Crime Ink, by Lucy Puryear, M.D.:

"On June 19, 2008, the Supreme Court of the U.S. issued a decision in which it held that a higher standard must be used to determine defendants' competence to represent themselves in criminal cases than the test used to determine the accuseds' competence to stand trial. Plainly speaking, this means that while a mentally ill defendant can be found competent to stand trial it does not necessarily follow that they can competently represent themselves as their own counsel.

Fundamentally this could be viewed as a negative decision for the mentally ill. One of our constitutional rights is self-representation in court. We are allowed to tell our story the way we want it told and to plead our case in a manner that we believe is in our own best interest. Now most of us would do a pretty terrible job of maneuvering ourselves through a court case, but sometimes taking your lawyers advice doesn't turn out as you'd hoped. I have heard defendants ask, 'Why didn't my lawyer do this, or why didn't they say that?' Sometimes juries will express, 'Why didn't we hear from the defendant, I want to hear his version of the story.' Not speaking for yourself is not always the right decision.

It becomes very complicated in a case where the defendant is floridly psychotic (hearing voices, speaking in gibberish). Nothing useful will come from that defendant trying to conduct his own trial. The court process becomes derailed and nothing good is accomplished for either the defense or the prosecution. Often the defendant by his very mental state convicts himself with little effort by the prosecution.

But does it make sense to allow someone to be competent to stand trial and yet too ill to represent themselves? Most courtrooms are all too ready to allow a mentally ill defendant to be tried. Recently the Supreme Court of the United States said yes in the Indiana v. Edwards decision.

In July 1999, Ahmad Edwards was discovered trying to steal a pair of shoes from an Indiana department store. After being discovered, he fired a gun at a store security officer and wounded a bystander. He was charged with attempted murder, battery with a deadly weapon, criminal recklessness and theft. He was diagnosed with schizophrenia and subsequently found incompetent to stand trial and was committed to a state psychiatric hospital for further evaluation and treatment. His competency and mental status fluctuated over the course of five years and he was not found competent to proceed to trial until July 2004.

In June 2005, Edwards stood trial. He asked to represent himself but the trial court rejected this request and the jury found him guilty of criminal recklessness and theft but failed to reach a verdict on the charges of attempted murder and battery. The State decided to retry him on the attempted murder and battery charges and he was retried in December 2005. The trial court again found that he was competent to stand trial but not competent to represent himself.

Despite being represented by counsel at his retrial, the jury convicted him on both counts. Edwards appealed, arguing that he had been wrongfully deprived of his constitutional right to represent himself. The case eventually reached the Supreme Court, which addressed the legal question of whether the standard for allowing defendants to represent themselves at trial should be higher than the standard for finding defendants competent to stand trial.

The Court decided that there was a higher standard for representing yourself than the standard for competency. To be found competent to stand trial you must be able to consult with your attorney with a 'reasonable degree of rational understanding.' This means in general that you are able to know what you have been charged with, be able to consult in formulating your own defense, and be able to explain the nature of the pleas involved. (In an interesting aside, Andrea Yates was found competent to stand trial although she initially wanted to plead guilty so that she would be executed by the state which was the only entity who could kill Satan inside of her. She understood the plea but her psychosis was unable to initially allow her to follow her lawyer's advice.)

The Edwards decision states that to be competent to represent yourself you must have the ability for 'organization of defense, making motions, arguing points of law . . . questioning witnesses and addressing the court and jury.' The court is stating that those that are mentally ill may be well enough be found competent but still not be able to represent themselves. While this may appear to be taking away the rights from persons with a disability it may be ultimately in their best legal defense. The Court also comments on the humaneness of the decision, 'A right of self-representation at trial will not affirm the dignity of a defendant who lacks the mental capacity to conduct his defense without the assistance of counsel,' Justice Stephen G. Breyer wrote. 'To the contrary, given that defendant's uncertain mental state, the spectacle that could well result from his self-representation at trial is at least as likely to prove humiliating as ennobling.'

The United States has long struggled with the treatment of the mentally ill. From locking them up in sanitariums for years to locking them up in jails. No one knows quite what to do with the mentally ill defendant who, although it may be obvious that they've committed a crime, it's also obvious that they are seriously disturbed. In Houston alone it is estimated that some 50% of the inmates in the juvenile justice system are seriously and chronically mentally ill. Jail is not a great treatment for a psychiatric disorder.

Texas in particular has struggled with the death penalty and the mentally ill criminal. We have had a history of executing those with known, documented, and profound psychotic illness. This is an embarrassment for our state and a terrible example for respecting human rights. This ruling by the United States Supreme Court is a very small step forward in assuring that those who commit crimes and are suffering from mental illness have both their rights protected and receive fair trails [sic]. What to do with a mentally ill defendant after conviction is the topic of another blog. I look forward to sharing my thoughts on a very complicated issue."
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Judge Orders Competency Evaluation for Jeff Wood

2008-08-22T14:26:00.000-07:00

Just hours before the execution of Jeff Wood was scheduled to take place, U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia in San Antonio granted a request by Wood's attorneys to delay the execution so they could hire a mental health expert to pursue their arguments that he is incompetent to be executed. Texas courts had previously refused similar appeals.

Here are excerpts from the story that ran in the Houston Chronicle ("Accomplice in 1996 slaying gets execution delay," August 22, 2008):

"Wood's 'motion presents non-frivolous arguments suggesting (he) currently lacks a rational understanding of the connection between his role in his offense and the punishment imposed upon him,' Garcia wrote in his order.

While Garcia wrote that the evidence was far from compelling, there were enough facts to conclude Wood had made a 'substantial threshold showing of insanity.'

Garcia wrote that his decision was based on the state trial court's refusal to afford Wood fundamental due process protections mandated by the U.S. Supreme Court's 2007 decision [in Panetti v. Quarterman], which blocked the execution of a mentally ill Texas death row inmate because lower courts failed to consider whether he had a rationa lunderstanding of why he was to be killed. (Ed. Note: Panetti has since been found competent to be executed though he does not have an execution date.)

Wood's attorneys say he suffers from paranoia and delusions, but the state does not recognize he suffers from mental illness. ..."

and

"Garcia appointed attorneys Scott Sullivan of San Antonio and Jared Tyler of Houston to represent Wood and a psychiatrist to work with them.

'We are relieved that we are going through the process whereby the court will determine if he is competent to be executed,' Sullivan said. 'It is a process that is dearly needed in this case.'

Sullivan said he will report the results of his client's psychiatric testing to the court early next year.

If the judge, after considering the psychiatric evaluation, finds Wood competent, he again will be scheduled for execution. If not, he will receive psychiatric care in a prison setting.

Sullivan acted as Wood's court-appointed attorney in an unsuccessful appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. Since the high court's rebuff, Wood, though indigent, has been without court-appointed counsel. A Kerrville state district court denied Wood's petition to obtain another court-appointed lawyer.

Sullivan said he has provided Wood free legal assistance as the execution date drew near.

In a terse parsing of legal procedures, Garcia noted that Wood, in his latest appeals, was granted neither a court-appointed lawyer nor expert assistance in establishing that he was not competent.

Instead, Garcia wrote, the state insisted Wood make a 'substantial showing of incompetency' before he was entitled to a court-designated lawyer or mental health expert.

'With all due respect,' the judge wrote, 'a system which requires an insane person to first make a 'substantial showing' of his own lack of mental capacity without the assistance of counsel or a mental health expert, in order to obtain such assistance is, by definition, an insane system.'

Garcia conceded that Wood's claim of incompetence 'is far from compelling,' but noted that 'petitioner's delusional thought processes convinced at least one jury he was incompetent to stand trial in May 1997.'

The judge noted that mental health experts who interviewed Wood during the period between his two trials found the killer's 'narcissistic tendencies and almost delusional belief in the inevitability of his ultimate vindication have grown more prominent.'

'Moreover,' the judge wrote, 'the petitioner exhibited a bizarre, seemingly paranoid, clearly suicidal ideation during his capital trial.' During thepunishment phase, Wood banned his attorneys from calling witnesses on his behalf.

Garcia wrote that Wood's petition for a stay 'at least arguably suggest(s) petitioner lacks a rational understanding of the causal link between his rolein his criminal offense and the reason he has been sentenced to death.'"

And here is the article that appeared in the New York Times ("Federal Judge, Chastising the Texas Courts, Orders a Stay of Execution," August 22, 2008):

"With only hours until his scheduled execution, a man won a stay Thursday when a federal judge granted him a hearing to determine whether he was mentally competent.

The condemned man, Jeffery Lee Wood, 35, was to be put to death Thursday evening for a killing committed by his partner in a 1996 robbery. But the execution was put off for at least six months by the decision of the judge, Orlando Luis Garcia of the Federal District Court in San Antonio, who suggested that he would hold the hearing next February or March.

The Texas attorney general, Greg Abbott, had yet to decide Thursday night whether he would appeal the decision, said a spokeswoman for his office, Lauri Saathoff.

Mr. Wood’s lawyers argue that he is too delusional to understand why he is to die and thinks that among other things he is the victim of a Freemason conspiracy.

Judge Garcia wrote that Mr. Wood’s bizarre statements at his trial and in prison 'at least arguably suggest the petitioner lacks a rational understanding of the causal link between his role in his criminal offense and the reason he has been sentenced to death.'

The judge said the Texas courts erred badly in the last week when they refused to hire mental health experts to determine whether Mr. Wood was mad or to appoint a lawyer to represent him at a competency hearing.

The United States Supreme Court has held that it is unconstitutional to execute insane people who cannot understand why they are being put to death or that their execution is imminent.

Judge Garcia said lawyers for Mr. Wood had submitted enough evidence of a delusional state of mind to warrant a hearing on the matter, and he strongly chastised the state courts for denying Mr. Wood a lawyer and a psychologist to help make that claim.

Mr. Wood was caught in a Catch-22, the judge said. The state courts ruled that he had to show he was insane for them to appoint a lawyer and a psychologist to help him prove he was insane. That, the judge said, is 'an insane system.'

Mr. Wood has a very limited intellect and a history of emotional problems, learning disabilities and, in prison, suicide attempts.

'He will become delusional and deny the apparent reality right in front of him,' said one of his lawyers, J. Scott Sullivan. 'He has a delusion a bribewould solve this whole problem.'

Mr. Wood was arrested shortly after his partner in crime, Daniel Reneau, fatally shot a cashier during the robbery of a gas station 12 years ago. Mr. Wood was outside in a getaway car when the shot was fired by Mr. Reneau, who was executed in 2002.

Mr. Wood’s mental problems were severe enough that one jury found him incompetent to stand trial. After spending time in a mental hospital, he was found competent by a second jury. In 1998, he was convicted of murder under a Texas law that makes all who are involved in a felony, like robbery, subject to the death penalty if one of them commits murder in the course of it.

Evidence of Mr. Wood’s mental troubles was never brought before the jury that imposed the death penalty, largely because he became angry and told his lawyers to do nothing during the penalty phase, instructions with which they complied. In his ruling on Thursday, Judge Garcia said that this behavior by Mr. Wood was 'bizarre, seemingly paranoid and clearly suicidal.'"
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Additional coverage:
http://www.abajournal.com/news/judge_delays_execution_blasts_insane_system_to_determine_sanity/
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gpkdpV0pGSS_ozv30DC1F1QkVd5wD92MUUEG4
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jTfYEAqM59CPb8mVNODlJeBudbiw
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/5956797.html

Jeff Wood Receives Stay of Execution

2008-08-21T12:45:00.000-07:00

A federal judge has granted a request to delay the execution of Jeff Wood, in order to allow his attorneys to hire a mental health expert to pursue their arguments that he is incompetent to be executed.

Here's a press release from Texas Defender Service:

STAY OF EXECUTION GRANTED IN TEXAS DEATH PENALTY CASE OF MENTALLY-ILL INMATE WHO WAS NOT TRIGGERMAN

WOOD EXECUTION HALTED BASED ON TEXAS STATE COURTS FAILURE TO PROVIDE DUE PROCESS ON ISSUES RELATING TO WOOD'S MENTAL ILLNESS

Austin -- Today, the Federal District Court granted a stay of execution in the case of Jeff Wood to allow the court to consider compelling evidence that Jeff Wood is too mentally ill to be executed. The Court held that the Texas state courts have not carefully reviewed the question of Wood's competence and that a stay of execution is necessary to ensure that Wood's mental health issues are fully presented and considered by the courts. The Court's Order Granting Stay of Execution is attached.

"We applaud the Federal District Court for upholding Jeff Wood's rudimentary due process right to have his competency evaluated," said Andrea Keilen, executive director of Texas Defender Service, who, along with attorney Scott Sullivan, are representing Mr. Wood.

The Federal District Court authorized an attorney and the assistance of mental health experts, pointing out that the Texas state courts had not complied with the basic due process that the United States Supreme Court required in another Texas case - that of Scott Panetti, a mentally ill death row inmate with a 20-year history of schizophrenia, who was permitted to represent himself at trial dressed in a purple cowboy costume.

In its 20-page order, the Court stated, "With all due respect, a system that requires an insane person to first make "a substantial showing" of his own lack of mental capacity without the assistance of counsel or a mental health expert, in order to obtain such assistance is, by definition, an insane system."

Prosecutors have indicated they will not appeal today's decision. Yesterday, the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles denied the application for clemency ona vote of 7-0 despite the mental health evidence and fact that it isundisputed that Jeff Wood did not kill the victim in this case, but rather wasoutside the building in a car at the time of the murder. The actual killer, Daniel Reneau, was already executed by the State of Texas in 2002.

Wood was convicted and sentenced to death as a party for the death of Kriss Keeran in Kerr County, Texas. Mr. Wood was convicted under Texas' "law of parties" statute that allows for the conviction of participants in a crime even if they have do not know a murder will be committed or commit murder themselves.

Wood has never taken a human life by his own hands. Keeran's unfortunate death was the result of a reckless scheme devised to steal the money that had accumulated in a Kerrville convenience store over a holiday weekend. Reneau armed himself, entered the store, and shot the victim. Wood was involved in the robbery this case because of his longstanding mental illness that allowed him to be easily manipulated by the principal actor, Daniel Reneau. Wood's emotional and psychological impairments, including his intellectuall imitations, diminished Wood's capacity to anticipate what Daniel Reneau would do inside the convenience store.

At the punishment phase of the trial, influenced by his mental health issues, Woods directed his lawyers not to present any evidence in his defense. Mr. Wood's attorneys made no cross examination of any of the State's witnesses. They presented no evidence or witnesses on Mr. Wood's behalf. And they offered no reasons or arguments why the twelve people sitting on Mr. Wood's jury should extend mercy to him and spare his life.

Wood's mental illness was a critical element at trial and in 1997, Wood was initially found incompetent to stand trial. Mr. Wood suffers today from the same psychological and emotional impairments for which a jury found him incompetent to stand trial in 1997. He has never received psychiatric or mental health care for these impairments. The same deficiencies that prevented Mr. Wood from communicating with his trial lawyer with a reasonable degree of rational understanding prevent Mr. Wood from having a rational understanding of his death sentence and impending execution.

A neuropsychologist who evaluated Wood's competence to stand trial said that Mr. Wood "ha[d] a delusional system, an inability to grasp the reality surrounding the issues specific to this case, his role in it, in the crime, as well as other things that present a direct threat to his own well-being, his own sense of self."
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More on TX Inmate Jeff Wood

2008-08-21T09:04:00.001-07:00

The following AP story contains more information about Jeff Wood's mental impairments ("Lawyers try to block execution set for Thursday," August 20, 2008). His attorneys have argued that Wood's delusions render him incompetent to be executed.

"Lawyers for condemned prisoner Jeffery Wood say his mental problems led him to get involved in a robbery scheme that left a Texas Hill Country store clerk murdered in a fatal shooting carried out by a partner while Wood sat outside in a car.

Attorneys for Wood were in the federal courts seeking permission to hire mental health experts to pursue their arguments that he was incompetent to be executed Thursday for the January 1996 slaying of Kriss Keeran, 31, at a Kerrville Texaco gas station convenience store.

Texas courts have refused the appeals.

Wood would be the 9th condemned prisoner put to death this year and the 5th this month in the nation's busiest capital punishment state. At least a dozen other Texas inmates have execution dates in the coming months.

Daniel Reneau, the gunman in Keeran's slaying and Wood's roommate, was executed in 2002. Wood, whose 35th birthday was Tuesday, was convicted under the Texas law of parties, which makes accomplices as liable as the actual killer in capital murder cases.

Wood's mental illness 'was a critical element throughout his trial and sentencing,' Wood's lawyers said.

Attorney Scott Sullivan said in a motion rejected Tuesday by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals that he met with Wood a month ago at death row and Wood told him he believed the trial judge in his case was corrupt but would accept a $100,000 bribe and then deport him to Norway where he couldlive with his wife.

Sullivan said Wood also believed, among other things, that the government will pay him $50,000 a year once he's released and that he's willing to give that money to the judge.

'Wood's delusional beliefs are true to him and always presented in grandiose fashion,' Sullivan said.

While the U.S. Supreme Court has barred the execution of prisoners determined to be mentally retarded, the same blanket prohibition has not been extended to those with mental illness.

Wood, who declined to speak with reporters as his execution date neared, initially was found by a jury to be mentally incompetent to stand trial. After a brief stint at a state hospital, a 2nd jury found him competent.

At his capital murder trial, he tried to fire his lawyers before the penalty phase. The trial judge denied the request but Wood's lawyers followed their client's wishes, called no witnesses and declined to cross-examine prosecution witnesses.

Wood's appeals lawyers urged Gov. Rick Perry to use his authority to grant a 1-time 30-day reprieve for Wood so a mental health expert could be appointed to examine him.

"Given his long-standing history of mental illness, Gov. Perry must not allow Mr. Wood's execution to go forward without allowing the court to rule on this rudimentary due process right," said Andrea Keilin, executive director of the Texas Defender Service, a legal group that represents death row inmates.

The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles already has refused, on a 7-0 vote, to recommend the governor grant clemency to Wood, whose lawyers compared his case to another convicted Texas killer, Kenneth Foster. A year ago, Foster won a commutation from the parole board, Perry agreed and Foster now is serving a life sentence.

Foster also was condemned under the law of parties, although Perry's explanation for commuting Foster was that Foster and his co-defendant were tried together on capital murder charges for a slaying in San Antonio.

In Wood's case, he and Reneau were tried separately.

At least a half dozen other Texas inmates have been executed under the law of parties.

Reneau and Wood knew Keeran, 31. Wood's lawyers said his mental illness allowed him to be easily manipulated by Reneau, who they called "the principal actor" in the shooting.

Lucy Wilke, the Kerr County assistant district attorney who prosecuted Wood, described him after his 1998 trial as "not a dummy" and called the slaying "cold-blooded, premeditated."

Evidence showed Reneau entered the store before dawn on Jan. 2, 1996, and fatally shot Keeran once in the face with a .22-caliber pistol. Then joined by Wood, they robbed the store of more than $11,000 in cash and checks. Both were arrested within 24 hours.

According to court records, Wood was waiting outside the store and came in after Keeran was shot, then both fled with the store safe, a cash box and a video recorder containing a security tape showing the robbery and slaying. Evidence showed the pair had planned the robbery for a couple of weeks and unsuccessfully tried recruiting Keeran and another employee to stage a phony robbery."

Controversial Execution in Texas Set For This Evening

2008-08-21T08:35:00.000-07:00

AFP has the following story about Jeff Wood, who is scheduled to be executed in Texas this evening, barring any last-minute intervention by Governor Rick Perry ("US to Execute Mentally Ill Man," August 21, 2008). Wood was convicted under the "law of parties," even though he was not involved in the shooting death of Kriss Keeran and in fact was standing outside the convenience store when the murder took place.

Wood's attorneys have questioned his mental competence and have argued that he suffers from longstanding emotional and psychiatric impairments for which he has never received treatment.

More information is available from Texas Defender Service.

Here is the AFP article in full:

"Texas is scheduled today to execute a mentally ill man for conspiracy to murder in a case that death penalty opponents say illustrates why the practice is deeply flawed.

Jeffery Lee Wood, 35, 'has never taken a human life by his own hands,' and 'was outside the building in a car at the time of the murder,' his lawyers said in a statement.

Wood's partner in crime, Daniel Reneau, was executed in 2002 for killing a store manager during a robbery.

'At Reneau's trial, the prosecution had argued that Reneau was the person chiefly responsible for the crime and that Wood's role was secondary,' the Death Penalty Information Centre said.

'Wood was involved in the robbery in this case because of his longstanding mental illness that allowed him to be easily manipulated by the principal actor, Daniel Reneau,' his lawyers argued.

Texas is the top executioner in the United States, with 413 executions over the last 30 years, out of a national total of 1,119 for that period.

It is also one of the few US states that permit capital punishment in a case involving conspiracy to murder, not murder itself.

Seven people were executed for conspiracy after 1976, when the death penalty was reauthorised in the United States, but Wood will be the first to die since 1996.

'Executing someone who didn't kill violates the most basic principles of justice,' David Fathi, US program director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.

In right-leaning Texas, support for the death penalty and the state's tough 'law-and-order' approach remains high.

Advocates argue the punishment is just, deters crime and provides comfort to victims' families.

Ambiguity surrounding mental illness also makes Wood's case controversial.

Wood's lawyers asked the governor of Texas to delay Wood's execution by one month, after he had been in solitary confinement on Death Row for 10 years, 23 hours a day, to evaluate his mental health.

In 1986, the Supreme Court effectively banned executing anyone too mentally ill to understand what was to happen to them and why. But it did not establish criteria for evaluating mental competency.

'If a person is only mentally ill and not incompetent, the decisions are less clear and are up to individual judgments by the governor or the jury,' Richard Dieter, director of the Death Penalty Information centre, told AFP.

In March 2008, Richard Taylor, condemned to death for murdering a prison guard 27 years earlier when he was gravely afflicted with schizophrenia, had his death penalty commuted to life in prison in the southern state of Tennessee.

But Kelsey Patterson was executed in Texas in May 2004 despite having been diagnosed with paranoia and schizophrenia prior to his criminal act.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court recently authorised the state penal system to administer, by force if necessary, psychotropic medicine to two convicts on Death Row, to render them mentally competent and subject to execution.

The case of Raymond Riles, on death row since April 2, 1976 - more than 32 years - is emblematic of the ambiguity surrounding mentally ill inmates.

His execution was delayed three times, and after 1986 the Texas Department of Criminal Justice never set a new date for it. But he is still on Death Row."

LA County Jail - The Nation's Largest Mental Institution

2008-08-18T15:14:00.000-07:00

NPR's recent series on the U.S. prison population featured a story entitled "Inside The Nation's Largest Mental Institution," which focuses on the 1,400 mentally ill inmates in the Los Angeles County Jail.

Read a summary of the story or listen to the segment in its entirety here.

More on the Private Mental Health Defender's Office in Lubbock

2008-08-18T12:35:00.000-07:00

Texas Lawyer reports that the Lubbock Criminal Defense Lawyers Association (LCDLA) aims this fall to create a private defender's office that will represent indigent defendants with mental health issues ("First and Goal: LCDLA Close to Creating Nonprofit to Run Private Defender's Office," August 11, 2008). The Texas Task Force on Indigent Defense awarded the county a four-year, $407,000 matching grant to start the office.

Here's an excerpt from the article:

"Concerned that mentally impaired indigents too often languish in their jail, Lubbock County officials are trying a new approach - a private defender's office. It's a hybrid; a cross between a public defender's office and the assigned counsel system used in most Texas counties.

Lubbock solo Ted Hogan says the Lubbock Criminal Defense Lawyers Association (LCDLA) is creating a nonprofit entity that will seek to contract with the county to run the private defender's office, which will assign attorneys in private practice to represent indigent defendants who are mentally ill or retarded. The courts would no longer appoint attorneys in those cases.

David Slayton, Lubbock County's director of court administration, says the County Commissioners Court will decide Aug. 25 whether the county can negotiate a contract with the LCDLA's nonprofit entity without going through a formal bidding process. The aim is to get the private defender's office up and running this fall.

'This literally is the first of its type in Texas,' says James D. 'Jim' Bethke, director of the Texas Task Force on Indigent Defense, of the office being developed in Lubbock.

Bethke says he originally talked to Lubbock County officials and the criminal-defense bar about starting a public defender's office for mental health, but the idea did not generate much enthusiasm.

Slayton says a public defender's office would provide possibly two or three attorneys to represent indigents with mental health issues. The private defender's office will have access to attorneys in the private defense bar, and between 10 and 15 attorneys are expected to take the cases, he says.

In April 2007, Travis County opened the first stand-alone public defender's office for mental health cases. Jeanette Kinard, director of the Travis County Mental Health Public Defender, says her office is part of county government.

Kinard says her office, which has two attorneys, two social workers, two caseworkers and support staff, handles only misdemeanor cases for clients with certain types of mental illnesses, such as schizophrenia, major depression and bipolar disorder.

The office is funded to handle 500 misdemeanor cases a year, Kinard says. 'I think we'll end up with 400, which will be a more reasonable caseload,' she says.

Lubbock County is familiar with the concept of a public defender's office. Opened in late 2007, the West Texas Regional Public Defender's Office for Capital Murder Cases is based in Lubbock but serves 85 counties, extending from the Panhandle to Central Texas. Slayton says that since there are substantially fewer capital murder cases than other types of cases, the private defender's office for mental health is expected to have a bigger impact than the regional public defender's office.

The jail incarcerates about 13,000 inmates a year, Slayton says. Even with a conservative estimate that 10 percent of the inmates are mentally impaired, that would be about 1,300 cases, he says.

Bethke says a public defender's office is a governmental entity that employs lawyers whom a court can appoint to represent indigent defendants.

In contrast, a nonprofit entity will run the private defender's office in Lubbock County, and that entity will assign private practice attorneys to handle the cases, Bethke says.

Philip Wischkaemper, an LCDLA member and the capital assistance attorney for the Texas Criminal Defense Lawyers Association, says attorneys who want mental health case assignments will go through an application process in which a five-member peer review committee will scrutinize their experience and qualifications. Wischkaemper says he selected the committee members - with the agreement of LCDLA president Laurie Key - based on the fact that all of them are well-respected in Lubbock and do not take court appointments, especially in mental health cases. The peer review committee - made up of former U.S.Magistrate Judge J.Q. Warnick and criminal-defense attorneys Bill Wischkaemper (Philip Wischkaemper's brother), Charles "Chuck" Lanehart, Danny Hurley and Floyd Holder Jr. - also will monitor the performance of the attorneys assigned to represent indigent defendants with mental health problems, Philip Wischkaemper says. All the peer review committee members, except Warnick, are LCDLA members, he says. Key could not be reached for comment.

Wischkaemper says the LCDLA held a meeting of its membership after Bethke suggested the creation of a private defender's office in Lubbock. The association formed a committee of members to work on the project, Wischkaemper says.

Hogan, the LCDLA's point man for the project, says, 'The hope is in the long run we can set this up so it will run more efficiently than a public defender system or that the county can do with an assigned-counsel system.'

Lubbock County Judge Tom Head says county officials are 'very much in support' of the private defender's office, because they believe it will help keep the mentally impaired out of the jail. Head says inmates with mental health or mental retardation issues could make up as much as one-third of the jail population, although Hogan estimates their numbers at closer to 20 percent to 25 percent.

Drue Farmer, judge of Lubbock County Court-at-Law No. 2, is another supporter of the private defender concept, because the private-practice attorneys who will be assigned to represent mentally impaired indigents must receive training on how to recognize different types of mental illnesses as well as on competency and insanity issues. 'We felt like it was very important to have counsel specially trained to handle these cases,' she says.

Farmer says Lubbock County currently has a mental health wheel from which judges appoint attorneys. But while training on mental health issues is available to the attorneys on the wheel, their participation in the training is voluntary, she says.

Hogan says attorneys who currently represent mentally impaired indigents 'aren't sitting on their hands' while their clients sit in jail. But Hogan notes the attorneys don't have the resources to adequately serve these clients, who he says can take up an inordinate amount of attorneys' time.

The private defender's office should be able to represent mentally ill or retarded clients more efficiently, Hogan says. As planned, he says, the office will hire one lawyer who will serve as a full-time administrator. Two investigators/social workers also will be in the office to work with the mentally impaired clients, assisting them in meeting basic needs, such as finding housing and obtaining food stamps or checking on their whereabouts when they are scheduled for court appearances.

Hogan says many of the indigents with mental health issues are homeless and it has been difficult for attorneys to keep up with them. 'It's like herding cats,' he says.

Also as part of the office, the county will employ professional mental health workers who will screen jail inmates for mental illness or retardation and identify those who possibly could be diverted from the criminal justice system to treatment facilities. ..."
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The article goes on to describe the model for this private defender program and provides information about other innovative approaches to mental health issues in Lubbock County. This includes a partnership between Lubbock Regional Mental Health and Mental Retardation and jail staff that aims to provide services to inmates with mental health issues and, ultimately, divert them from the corrections system altogether.

Read the full article.

Earlier posts on this program are available here and here.

More on George Banks Competency Hearing

2008-08-18T10:10:00.000-07:00

The Citizens Voice, out of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, has this update on the competency hearing of death row inmate George Banks ("Final expert says Banks incompetent for execution," August 16, 2008):

"The psychological disorders that have turned mass murderer George Banks into a rambling paranoid have not improved since before he was scheduled to be executed in December 2004, psychiatrist Richard G. Dudley Jr. said Friday during the second day of testimony in Banks’ competency hearing.

Dudley, the third and final psychological expert called by Banks’ attorneys, said the killer’s psychosis and vast delusions have made him incompetent to be executed, to petition for clemency or assist his attorneys.

Banks, 66, went on a shooting spree in September 1982 that left 13 people dead, including four girlfriends, who ranged in age from 23 to 29, five of his children, ages 1 to 5, and four others. He has been on death row since June 1983.

Banks believes, 'Jesus from Washington, D.C.' vacated his sentence, but a conspiracy has kept him incarcerated at the State Correctional Institution here, about 30 miles northwest of Philadelphia, until he renounces God, Dudley said.

'The central theme of the delusions is that Jesus, (or) God has pardoned him and therefore there is no case against him,' Dudley said, echoing the testimony of the two defense experts who appeared Thursday — psychiatrist John O’Brien and forensic psychologist Jethro Toomer.

Dudley said Banks believes the state Department of Corrections would go to elaborate measures to push him to renounce his religious beliefs, including subjecting him to a simulated execution.

'He said Jesus has jurisdiction over his life, not man, not the courts,' Dudley said.

Those beliefs, combined with a rambling, unfocused and illogical thought process, make it impossible for Banks to comprehend the meaning and totality of his death sentence, Dudley said.

'As a result of this delusional system, he does not appreciate his death sentence,' Dudley said. 'The content of his delusions are directly related to his understanding of the crime and his punishment.'

Dudley evaluated Banks prior to his 2004 execution, which was stayed by a last-minute ruling from the state Supreme Court, and in April, in preparation for the competency hearing.

Dudley said Banks’ behavior during the April meeting prevented him from asking questions designed to gauge Banks’ understanding of his circumstances and possible execution.

'He blurted out various things,' Dudley said. 'I just stood there and listened to him.'

Jennifer Buck, an attorney with the state Attorney General’s Office, questioned how Dudley could determine that Banks is incompetent to face death without asking about the death penalty.

'You didn’t need to ask him?' Buck asked.

'Not again, no,' Dudley said.

'You only needed to ask him that once?'

'It would have been nice to ask him,' Dudley said. 'If he had been cooperative.'

The prosecution’s psychological experts, psychiatrists Timothy J. Michals and Stephen Mechanick, are scheduled to testify Monday.

Senior Judge Michael T. Conahan, who has presided over recent proceedings in the case, prevented Michals from testifying at a competency hearing in February 2006 after Banks’ attorneys said the psychiatrist met with Banks without their knowledge.

Conahan deemed Banks incompetent to be executed, but that decision was overturned on appeal by the state Supreme Court because the prosecution case had been compromised by the exclusion of Michals and the use of another expert, psychiatrist Michael Welner, who had little time to prepare.

In a September 2005 report, Michals said Banks had the competency to be executed.

'It is my opinion that although Mr. Banks has a psychotic disorder,' Michals said. 'He had sufficient mental capacity to understand that he has been tried, convicted and sentenced to death as a result of the death of 13 people.'
***
Read more about the Banks case here.

TX Death Row Inmate Raymond Riles - Incompetent to be Executed, Still on Death Row

2008-08-13T09:14:00.000-07:00

KPRC Local 2 news in Houston recently investigated the case of Texas death row inmate Raymond Riles, who has been declared incompetent to be executed on numerous occasions. Riles has spent more than 30 years on death row and will remain there indefinitely, despite the fact that the state is not seeking an execution date (and has not done so since 1986). All parties agree that Riles sufffers from severe mental illness and does not meet the standards for competency (awareness of his execution and the reason for it).

In its 1986 decision Ford v. Wainwright, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that it was unconstitutional to execute someone who does not understand the reason for or the reality of his or her punishment. The Ford decision left the determination of insanity and competency for execution up to each state. It did not include any guidance to states as to how to handle the cases of those found incompetent to be executed.

The American Bar Association Recommendation on the Death Penalty and Persons with Mental Disabilities, which has been endorsed by the American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, and the National Alliance on Mental Illness, states that if, after exhausting his or her appeals, a death row inmate has been found incompetent to be executed, the sentence of death should be reduced to the sentence imposed in capital cases when execution is not an option.

Read a verbatim transcript of the story ("Is 30 Years Too Long on Texas Death Row?"), which aired on August 12, 2008. You can also watch the video at http://www.click2houston.com/video/17178415/index.html, which includes footage of KPRC's death row interview with Raymond Riles.

"Tonight, Local 2 Investigates digs into the case of an inmate from Houston who has been on death row for more than 30 years. So why hasn't Raymond Riles been executed?

When you read and hear his first TV interview in more than 20 years, you may understand why.

His case has sparked a debate of what to do with inmates spending decades waiting for an execution. Local 2 investigative reporter Amy Davis uncovers why Riles' case could change the future of Texas' death row.

'They told me they were going to kill me unless I stopped preaching my mystic gospel,' Riles told us during an interview from death row at the Polunsky Unit in Livingston. 'God is the greatest and I didn't come to die on death row.'

As Riles speaks, you're almost able to read his mind -- by not understanding it.

'They're trying to silence me because I know about the satanic secret societies of the TDC shadow government e-system,' said Riles.

His mind appears mixed-up, full of delusions and paranoia. This is the latest chapter of Riles' story -- 33 years of crime and punishment.

Riles committed his crime back in 1974. He was convicted of killing Houston used-car salesman John Henry during a 1974 robbery. A Harris County jury sentenced Riles to death.

But 33 years later, Riles still waits on death row with no execution date and no plans for one.

'It's because he's incompetent to be executed,' explained Roe Wilson, an assistant district attorney for Harris County.

Wilson handles death row appeals and says Riles case is that simple. Mental health experts have ruled Riles doesn't understand why his execution is imminent, or understand exactly why he's being executed. That makes him mentally incompetent, according to the U.S. Supreme Court.

'If you don't meet the standard, then you cannot be legally executed,' said Wilson.

During our interview, Riles told us he believes God committed his crime, thinks he was chosen to release men from death row, and believes a lethal injection would not kill him.

Riles also blamed God for his prison suicide attempt in 1985. Riles set himself on fire in his cell.
'God did that,' said Riles. 'God consumed me in fire.'

In 1986, Riles was inches from the death chamber in Huntsville and just minutes from execution.

That's when a federal court issued a last-minute stay. It was the fourth time the state scheduled Riles' execution. A new date hasn't been scheduled for the past 22 years.

'As long as he's living, I'm still living,' said Helen Riles, Raymond Riles' sister. 'We're still living.'

Helen Riles spoke to us from her Houston home. She's calls her brother's three decades on death row 'bittersweet.'

While Raymond Riles hasn't been executed, Helen Riles is fighting to get her brother off of death row and into a mental health facility instead.

'I don't think he could ever come all the way back,' said Helen Riles. 'I really don't. But he would able to feel more comfortable and get more rehabilitation.'

And that's the debate. If an inmate can't be executed, should he or she remain on death row?

A new call is coming from a nationwide association of attorneys, death penalty opponents, and a U.S. group of mental health experts to change the way mentally ill inmates are treated on death row.

They all say a life sentence is more appropriate.

'It makes no sense for the state to keep someone on death row under severe conditions, when he's been recognized as severely ill," said Kristin Houle', with the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty in Austin.

On death row, all inmates spend 23 hours a day in their cell.

Houle' calls that cruel and unusual punishment for the mentally ill, claiming it gives inmates little access to psychiatric care.

The state disagrees.

'That really is not a factor in this case,' said Wilson. 'What the factor is, is that (Riles) was competent when he was tried and given a legal sentence. His confinement is still legal and he simply has a condition right now that makes him not eligible for execution. But that could change.'

That's right. Wilson says Riles is still periodically tested by doctors. His mental state and his future could always change.

Right now, Texas law doesn't allow a death sentence to be replaced by a life sentence.

Wilson argues Riles' punishment stands, no matter what his mental state is now. Many call that justice for the victims.

So, at age 58, Raymond Riles remains on death row -- 33 years and counting. His family and activists say they'll continue to work to change the law that keeps him there.

'I'm not just going to let him sit there and not fight for him,' Helen Riles said.

Courts and doctors have ruled five other death row inmates from Harris County are also mentally incompetent to be executed. Any change in Riles' case or state law could have a direct effect on many Texas inmates.

However, those inmates are all tested periodically. If they are ruled competent at any time, an execution date can be scheduled."

Improving Interactions Between Law Enforcement and the Mentally Ill

2008-08-12T14:09:00.000-07:00

A recent issue of Newsweek magazine reports on programs aimed at improving police officers' response to persons with severe mental illness ("Cops and the Mentally Ill," July 31, 2008). The law enforcement community is on the front lines in addressing the needs of those with severe mental illness, given the shortage of services and treatment facilities.

The article points out two interesting studies:

A 2005 study by researchers at the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University suggested that persons with serious mental illnesses are 11 times more likely than the general population to be victims of violent crime, with perhaps as many as 1 million crimes committed against those with serious mental-health issues each year.
According to a 2000 report by the federal government's National Institute of Justice, once a mentally ill person is arrested for disorderliness, that person is labeled a "criminal" and will likely continue to be arrested when acting out in the future, rather than receive treatment.

Read the full article here.

Is Mentally Ill Inmate Competent to be Executed?

2008-08-12T11:46:00.000-07:00

Here's an article from The Scranton Times-Tribune regarding Pennsylvania death row inmate George Banks ("Banks' mental capacity will be at issue at hearing," August 11, 2008), who suffers from severe mental illness. A hearing will take place later this week to determine whether Banks should be declared incompetent to be executed. He was found incompetent in 2006, but the state Supreme Court overruled the judge's decision.

Last month, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that two death row inmates with mental illness can be forcibly medicated in order to render them competent to continue their appeals and face execution.

A full timeline of the case accompanies the article, excerpted below:

"George Banks sits in his cell at the State Correctional Institution at Graterford for days at a time, alone with the fantasies and delusions that have played in his psyche since before the 1982 killing spree that left 13 people dead in Wilkes-Barre and Jenkins Township, including five of his own children.

He often remains behind, locked away in his own world, during the hourlong period each day when he and the other inmates in the prison’s death row unit are permitted to leave the solitary confinement of their cells for exercise and recreation.

Banks, 66, has lived at SCI-Graterford, a maximum-security facility in Montgomery County, about 30 miles west of Philadelphia, since 1985.

A competency hearing scheduled to begin Thursday at the prison could determine whether he dies there.

'You’ve got a man who is severely mentally ill, there’s no dispute on that,' Banks’ attorney, Luzerne County public defender Al Flora Jr., said. 'The only issue is whether he dies in prison as a result of lethal injection or whether he dies in prison as the result of a natural life.'

Banks has lived in the shadow of death since June 1983, when a jury convicted him of the murders of at least four girlfriends, his five children, ages 1 to 5, and four others, and then imposed a capital sentence.

He has survived on the strength of the appeals filed on his behalf in state and federal courts, and on the weakness of his own mental state.

Two years ago, Banks claimed God had granted him clemency and the U.S. government and the Islamic faith were conspiring against him.

In 2004, he claimed he was fighting a 'private war' with former President Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky, the former White House intern with whom Mr. Clinton had a sexual relationship.

Since his arrest in September 1982, Mr. Banks has attempted suicide at least four times and has gone on prolonged hunger strikes, including one in 2003 that caused his weight to drop more than 100 pounds.

Luzerne County Senior Judge Michael T. Conahan, who will preside over the competency hearing, must look beyond the delusions to determine Mr. Banks’ competency, Mr. Flora said.

The judge must weigh two questions: whether Mr. Banks understands he is under a sentence of death and that he will be executed, and whether he is competent to assist his attorneys in petitioning the state Board of Probation and Parole and the state Board of Pardons for clemency.

Judge Conahan ruled Mr. Banks incompetent on both criteria in February 2006, but that determination was overturned on appeal by the state Supreme Court because the judge had prevented a prosecution psychiatrist, Timothy J. Michals, from testifying.

'It is in my opinion that although Mr. Banks has a psychotic disorder, he has sufficient mental capacity to understand that he has been tried, convicted and sentenced to death as a result of the death of 13 people,' Mr. Michals said in a September 2005 report.

Mr. Michals said Mr. Banks had told him the conviction and death sentence, 'had been vacated by God and his continued incarceration and execution was the result of a wide-range conspiracy between the correctional officers, prosecutors and other government officials.'

Psychiatrists deemed Mr. Banks competent to stand trial in 1983.

Mr. Flora, using an insanity defense, described Mr. Banks at the time as 'delusional' and 'psychotic,' and suggested the 'torment and agony' of a childhood in an interracial home, coupled with living in a racist environment, had led 'to the destruction of George Banks.'

'Competency to be tried is different than competency to be executed,' Mr. Flora said last week. 'You can go through a whole round of appeals on his competency to be executed and you could come back four years later and his condition could have deteriorated.'

If Judge Conahan rules Mr. Banks competent to be executed, Mr. Flora said he could challenge the decision in the state Supreme Court and, if unsuccessful, take the case to the federal court system.
'You would be looking at years of appeals,' Mr. Flora said.

If Judge Conahan rules Mr. Banks incompetent, the decision must be affirmed by the state Supreme Court before Mr. Banks is removed from death row. ... "

Agencies Struggle to Provide Mental Health Services in Central Texas

2008-07-28T12:30:00.000-07:00

In "Mentally Ill Don't Belong in Jailhouse" (July 27, 2008), the Temple Daily Telegram presents a compelling and comprehensive picture of the issues facing people with severe mental illness in Central Texas. It also explores the limitations imposed on government agencies, given funding cuts, a decrease in facilities, and other constraints.

The following article is a lengthy but worthwhile read.

"Before Carolyn Law was sent to prison in March 2006 for killing her mother, she was a college educated woman who had worked in real estate and tried to control her schizophrenia through medication.

At one point, she was so successful at controlling her illness, the state used her in a video that promoted the services that helped her cope.

'She was a poster child for services offered through the (Central Counties Center for Mental Health Mental Retardation),' said Eldon Tietje, executive director for MHMR.

Tietje said Ms. Law could still be considered a symbol for the mentally ill, only now she would be a symbol for what is wrong with the state’s treatment of the issue.

'She is someone who did pretty good for a long time,' Tietje said. 'She could and did take advantage of services when they were available, but she deteriorated over time and didn’t comply with treatment.'

Much like Ms. Law’s condition, the state’s funding for mental health programs has eroded over time, Tietje said.

And Tietje is not the only local official voicing concern over the treatment options for mentally ill in the state.

Judge Martha Trudo, 264th State District Court, sentenced Ms. Law to 45 years in prison for murder. Judge Trudo thinks it’s time for the state to do a better job addressing mental health issues.

'It isn’t a problem to be hidden,' she said. 'We really need to be doing something about (the mentally ill). They end up being warehoused in the pen.

'We do not do a good job of taking care of the mentally ill in Texas. There are tremendous waiting lists, doctors won’t see them unless they get picked up and put in jail. Then we are obligated to do it.

'A lot of people can function and work if they have support.'

In March 2006, Ms. Law addressed the court before her sentencing and said that mentally ill people such as her are misunderstood. She also said she hoped to see advancement in the treatment of mental patients.

'You have heard from many people here who have been hurt. I’ve been hurt for the last 20 years,' she said. 'I’m the biggest victim of all, as I see it.'

The local mental health picture

In his 16 years at the top post at Central Counties MHMR, Tietje said referrals have doubled as the population in the area has increased.

'The prevalence of mental illness may not be greater but we have more people and the resources are less, also during that time most of the private hospitals have closed, so there are fewer in-patient services,' he said.

A 2003 state budget crunch took more than $100 million out of the community MHMR system. But rather than this being an anomaly, it looks more like a pattern. In 1994, Tietje said his budget was $16.5 million. It was slashed to $12 million in 1995, a 25-percent cut.

'A result of that budget cut, we lost a Fort Hood work program that served 200 people,' Tietje said.
Closely supervised program participants cleaned buildings and restocked the commissary on base.
Budget constraints have also contributed to the closing of a three-quarter-way house in Gatesville that helped get people back on their feet. It had 30 beds and was a place where people could stay and look for work while they stabilized on their medications.

'It was a structured environment that made sure they got meds and food,' Tietje said.

And the Gatesville center has not been the only facility that has been shuttered.

Clinics in Bell, Coryell, Hamilton, Lampasas, and Milam counties have all been closed.

Patricia Roy-Jolly, MHMR supervisor who works with community support services, said she has witnessed a general pattern with many of the mentally ill she attempts to help.

She said mentally ill people often commit a crime and are incarcerated in Bell County Jail, which, in turn, ships them to Austin State Hospital. In Austin, the person gets stabilized on medication and usually within about a month is sent back to the area with three weeks of medication and the charge to regularly visit a doctor.

Ms. Roy-Jolly said usually the patient makes one or two appointments before he or she stops taking their medication and disappears for a while until he or she is rearrested and the process starts all over again.

'We’re just in a terrible predicament. A lot of these people do not have family members or they have family members who can’t help them anymore,' Judge Trudo said.

'It’s probably time for Texas to look at having group homes or do something.'

One funding cut came at the hands of the Texas Commission on Alcohol and Drug Abuse when the agency overextended funds by not regulating properly.

'Our funding from substance abuse services went from $80,000 to $15,000. We gave up our patient substance abuse services,' Tietje said. 'We got rid of it because we couldn’t afford it.'

Right now the best option for temporary inpatient care for mentally ill patients is the Austin State Hospital, but up until about eight years ago Temple was able to provide inpatient crisis stabilization.
'We had to give it up because it became too expensive for us to run,' Tietje said.

And the Austin State Hospital is often near capacity. For at least two weeks this month the hospital was so full it was on diversion and recommending people go to San Antonio for services. The other option for jails was to warehouse the prisoners until a slot opened at the hospital.

Other programs or services impacted by budget constraints include: two-day treatment services in Temple and Killeen that served 30 to 40 people, access to counseling services, transportation and noon meals.

'There’s a whole lot less mental health services in these five counties than there was 13 years ago,' Tietje said. 'When there are no support services, people are less likely to seek or stay up on treatment.'

This year’s budget for Central Counties MHMR is $14.5 million.

'We have fewer resources today and inflation has eroded our spending ability. We have had no inflationary increases from any funding groups, county or state,' Tietje said. 'As a result, our services have eroded and more and more people with mental illness show up in jails or emergency rooms.'

The impact on the community

The struggles of the state in answering the question on how to deal with people who struggle with mental illness is often shared by the families and church communities of these individuals.

In Ms. Law’s case her former minister Joe Baisden, Belton Church of Christ, said he spent a tremendous amount of time ministering to her in the years preceding the killing of her mother.

'Carolyn used to be a member of my Bible class. I was called in many times when her mother and her had problems,' he said. 'She freely talked about mental illness and gave us a great deal of insight. When she was on her meds she came to support group and was smooth as silk - other times she was erratic.'

Baisden said he will never forget when his church community was having a fellowship day in Yettie Polk Park in Belton and he was called to help Law’s family.

She had dropped her boys off at a mall in the Austin area and was later arrested at the State Capitol building when she pulled a fire extinguisher off a wall and sprayed paintings on display in the building.

'It grieved me that she had this kind of destiny in this life,' Baisden said about Ms. Law. 'It’s sad.'"

Possible New Mental Health Court in Smith County

2008-07-28T12:03:00.000-07:00

The Tyler Morning Telegraph reports that Smith County commissioners have been asked to establish a “mental health court,” with the aim of providing better care for offenders with mental illness and reducing jail overcrowding ("Commissioners To Consider Creating ‘ Mental Health Court ’", July 27, 2008).

Here's an excerpt:

"It’s something like the county’s drug court, which diverts misdemeanor offenders with addiction problems.

A presentation will be made on Monday by Dr. David Self, chief forensic psychiatrist for the Rusk State Hospital, and Valerie Holcomb, with the Texas Corrections Office on Medically and Mentally Ill at the Andrews Center.

The Andrews Center estimates that about 20 percent of Smith County jail inmates have been treated for mental illness in the past. A mental health court would focus on intensively supervised probation for the mentally ill, who would receive outpatient treatment."
***
Numerous counties in Texas, including Bexar, El Paso, Tarrant, and Dallas, have established mental health courts, which addresses the needs of those with mental illness who come into contact with the criminal justice system. There are more than 150 mental health courts in operation throughout the United States.

PA Death Row Inmates Can Be Forcibly Medicated

2008-07-28T07:33:00.000-07:00

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has ruled that two death row inmates with mental illness can be forcibly medicated in order to render them competent to continue their appeals and face execution.

Texas courts have addressed this issue in the case of death row inmate Steven Staley, who has been diagnosed with severe paranoid schizophrenia and believes that he is being poisoned by medication. A state district judge ordered the state to forcibly give Staley anti-psychotic drugs. Last fall, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals ruled that it did not have jurisdiction to rule on whether this constituted cruel and unusual punishment and and took no action on the case. As far as I am aware, Staley remains in prison and on medication.

Here's the story from the Philadelphia Inquirer ("PA high court OKs forced drugging of mentally ill death-row inmates," July 23, 2008):

"Ruling in the case of Thavirak Sam, a Cambodian immigrant who killed three family members in 1989 and has been mentally incompetent for years, the court said that if Sam were left untreated, his appeal would remain in limbo indefinitely.

'Not to litigate the claims delays both justice and finality,' wrote Chief Justice Ronald Castille, who was Philadelphia district attorney when the killings occurred.

Sam's defense attorney, Jules Epstein, said he believed the rulings marked the first time in the United States that an appellate court had approved forcible medication for a death-row inmate who is not a danger to himself or others.

'The decision raises a profound question of what to do with mentally ill death-row inmates . . . who have no family or other dedicated person to speak for them,' said Epstein, a law professor at Widener University.

Deputy District Attorney Ronald E. Eisenberg said the rulings would allow appeals to proceed.

'This way, at least there will be a decision one way or another about the validity of the conviction and sentence,' he said.

The issue is important because the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1986 that convicted murderers cannot be executed if they are so mentally ill that they cannot understand why they face a death sentence and what that sentence means.

Sam, now 51, has been on death row since 1991, and prosecutors have been trying for several years to get him medicated so he can be competent enough to decide whether he wants to continue his appeal or be put to death.

At varying points over the years, Sam has imagined that the U.S. Supreme Court had ordered him freed and that a Cambodian prince had interceded on his behalf.

In another Philadelphia case, the high court also ruled that Herbert Watson, convicted in 1983 of shooting to death his estranged girlfriend, must be medicated to determine whether he wants to proceed with his appeal.

Castille wrote in that case that prosecutors were 'attempting to vindicate society's compelling interest in bringing an end to the litigation of this case, which is now well into its third decade.'

In both cases, Castille was joined by Justices Thomas Saylor, J. Michael Eakin and Seamus McCaffery. Justices Max Baer and Debra Todd dissented. ..."
***
Earlier posts on Steven Staley are available here and here.

Costs of Mental Health Care Overwhelm Harris County Jail

2008-07-21T11:05:00.000-07:00

Today's Houston Chronicle features the following article about the revolving door of severely mentally ill homeless offenders in the Harris County Jail ("Finding escape behind bars," July 21, 2008). Many of these inmates have been arrested on dozens of occasions; many have substance abuse disorders in addition to mental disorders.

As the number of these chronic inmates continues to increase, the cost of both incarceration and treatment has soared to $87 million annually. While some organizations have launched new programs aimed at providing support for severely mentally ill homeless people immediately upon their release from jail, the demand for services still far outpaces the limited resources available.

Here's the article in full:

"At the Harris County Jail, deputies and health care workers have a name for them — frequent fliers.
They are mentally ill homeless people who return to jail so often, sometimes on minor charges, that they become familiar to the psychiatric staff.

During a recent survey, county officials found that more than 400 of the jail's 11,000 inmates were homeless and suffered from a major mental illness: schizophrenia, bipolar disorder or a chronic depressive-psychotic disorder. They were among 1,900 inmates on psychotropic medications.

When the mentally ill homeless leave jail — and leave behind its mental health care staff — many stop taking medication and end up on the street again. Treatment resumes only when they commit a crime and return to jail or their dementia overwhelms them and they are brought to an emergency psychiatric center.

Treating the mentally ill as they cycle through jail and emergency psychiatric wards is expensive. A county budget analyst estimates that it costs $80,000 a year, per person.

At the jail, spending on mental health care has risen to $24 million annually, and the combined cost of incarcerating and treating the mentally ill is $87 million annually.

'The jails have become the psychiatric hospitals of the United States,' said Clarissa Stephens, an assistant director of the county's budget and management services office who has been studying the jail's mental health costs.

The Commissioners Court is so concerned about the rising costs that it has retained a consultant — psychiatrist Avrim Fishkind — to study whether providing outpatient services and supervised housing would reduce the numbers of mentally ill revolving through the jail.

'The costs of reincarcerating and court costs far outweigh what the costs would be if you housed, clothed and supervised the mentally ill,' Fishkind said.

A June survey of more than 11,000 inmates revealed:

•About one-quarter suffer from mental illness or once suffered from it.
•Of those on medication, 978 suffered from schizophrenia, bipolar disorder or a severe depressive-psychotic disorder.
•Of the 978 with a major mental health disorder, 423 likely were homeless.
•Of the 423 homeless with a major mental health disorder, 97 percent had been arrested at least once before during their lifetimes; 43 percent had a prior arrest during the last 10 years.

On the day of the survey, the jail's mentally ill homeless inmates included:

•A 39-year-old woman booked 45 times since 2001.
•A man, 26, booked 30 times since 1999.
•A man, 52, booked 33 times since 1992.
•A man, 25, booked 20 times since 2001.

Some of the mentally ill — many of whom also are substance abusers — keep committing crimes and getting rearrested, in part, because few are properly supervised when they are released, said David Buck, a Baylor College of Medicine associate professor and president of Healthcare for the Homeless-Houston.

Houston isn't alone in facing this issue. After many mental hospitals were closed in the 1970s and 1980s, countless patients were released in cities that were ill-equipped to house those who needed such care.

'What happens here happens in many communities. We are criminalizing mental illness,' said Betsy Schwartz, president of Mental Health of America of Greater Houston, a nonprofit that promotes effective treatment for the mentally ill.

Left to find her own way

Patricia George, 34, said her thinking always becomes clearer when she returns to jail and gets back on medication.

In the past 20 years, George, who says she is bipolar and schizophrenic, has been charged with 12 felonies and 31 misdemeanors, with most of the bookings in Harris County. In all, she has spent nine years in jail.

Like other mentally ill inmates, George has been expected to find her way — with no car and little money — to mental health providers, to line up counseling and to fill prescriptions for her medication in the weeks after her release.

In the meantime, medications she was taking in jail wear off, she said during an interview three days after her July 5 release from jail.

'Just walking down here (for the interview), I'm starting to hear voices,' said George, who finished a six-month sentence for prostitution.

Not filling prescriptions

Many of the mentally ill never fill their prescriptions or return to counseling, said Steven Schnee, director of Mental Health and Mental Retardation Authority of Harris County, a government agency that provides mental health care locally. They just return to their former lives, usually on the streets.
George, who often is homeless between jail stints, hopes she can avoid a return to jail this time. She has been working with Healthcare for the Homeless-Houston, which started a program that helps released mentally ill inmates find housing and reach appointments with mental health providers and counselors.

Michael Seale, director of the county jail's health services, said the mental health staff becomes frustrated because inmates stabilized in jail drift into psychosis when they get out.

'Whatever good work we've done may not have any value two or three weeks after they get out,' Seale said.

The jail — which has come under scrutiny recently for inmate deaths and was inspected by federal investigators earlier this month — spent about $10 million on mental health care in 2004. Two years ago, only 600 inmates were on psychotropic medications.

But staffing and funding then wasn't nearly adequate for the increasing numbers of mentally ill inmates.

Since mental health wards have been expanded, the jail now has beds for 244 mentally ill inmates, including 70 who are acutely ill.

The jail contracts with Harris County Psychiatric Center for 24 more beds.

The jail's mental health team delivers medications to an additional 1,650 inmates through outpatient treatment.

The team is big, employing 82 health care workers. That includes eight psychiatrists, 18 psychiatric registered nurses, 34 psychiatric technicians, seven licensed vocational nurses and 12 employees who screen incoming inmates.

Chief Deputy Mike Smith of the Sheriff's Office said the jail's mental health operation is comparable to the biggest non-jail mental health hospitals in the state.

Smith, as head of the jail, is among those credited with upgrading its mental health services. 'I've had people say I better watch what I say or I'll come across as a liberal,' he said. 'We shouldn't be treating our mentally ill in the jails. We should be treating them in the free world.'

Advocates say the number of mentally ill cycling through jails and psychiatric wards can be greatly reduced.

Many need to be placed in permanent supervised housing, Schwartz said.

Those who are less ill could be placed in apartments and monitored at least weekly by case managers.

But in Harris County, there are fewer than 1,500 rooms or apartments where the mentally ill can receive supervision or services, Schwartz said.

About 10,000 such units are needed.

'If these kind of housing opportunities existed, there would be far fewer mentally ill in jail,' she said."
***
An earlier post on the mental health care system (and its impact on criminal justice issues) in Harris County is available here.

More on Healthcare for the Homeless-Houston is available here.

Texas Mother to Remain in State Mental Hospital

2008-07-18T14:48:00.000-07:00

Below is an update on the case of Deanna Laney, from the Tyler Morning Telegraph ("Woman Who Stoned Children to Death Will Remain in Mental Facility," July 8, 2008). Ms. Laney was found not guilty by reason of insanity for the murder of her children. She has spent the last four years in state mental hospitals.

The Texas Code of Criminal Procedure "prohibits the court and attorneys from informing a juror or prospective juror of the consequences to the defendant if a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity is returned. The purpose of this provision is to prevent the jurors, if possible, from being influenced by the consequences of their decision to the defendant. It has been held that this provision does not deny fundamental fairnessto the defendant." (Texas Criminal Procedure and the Offender with Mental Illness: An Analysis and Guide, pp. 156-157).

Here's the article in full:

"Deanna Laney — who was found not guilty by reason of insanity after she stoned her young sons to death in 2003 — will remain in a mental facility for another year, a state district judge decided Monday.

A closed-door civil commitment hearing was held in 114th District Judge Cynthia Stevens Kent’s court, as it has been each year since Ms. Laney’s April 2004 capital murder trial.

After the hearing, defense attorney F.R. “Buck” Files Jr. said Judge Kent maintained the same order as she did last year.

When Ms. Laney was acquitted by a Smith County jury in April 2004, Judge Kent ordered Ms. Laney be placed in a maximum-security inpatient treatment facility. Since then, Judge Kent has presided over private hearings each year and determined that Ms. Laney should remain at an inpatient facility.
Last year, after attorneys discovered that Ms. Laney had been transferred from Vernon State Hospital to the Kerrville State Hospital and was being allowed unsupervised furloughs by doctors, Judge Kent put a stop to it at the request of prosecutors. Ms. Laney’s defense attorneys appealed her decision, but the 12th Court of Appeals ruled in April 2007 that the Texas Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation could not grant Ms. Laney passes to leave the facility with her parents to go shopping and dining in the Hill Country.

In June 2004, Vernon State Hospital transferred Ms. Laney from its maximum-security facility to Kerrville State Hospital, a non-secure impatient facility, court documents state.

Between August and December 2005, Ms. Laney’s treatment team granted her brief passes off the hospital campus in Kerrville.

THE MURDERS

A jury found Ms. Laney, a 43-year-old housewife who home-schooled her children, not guilty by reason of insanity for stoning her sons to death on Mother’s Day weekend in 2003.

Joshua, 8, and Luke, 6, were found dead in the front yard of the family’s New Chapel Hill home, and then-14-month-old Aaron was found seriously injured in his crib.

Ms. Laney’s attorneys admitted during the trial that she had stoned her children, but contended that she was insane and did not know that what she was doing was wrong. Ms. Laney told authorities God told her to kill her children.

Under Texas law, people are found legally insane if, at the time of an offense, they did not know their conduct was wrong because of some mental illness or defect.

Ms. Laney was defended in trial by attorneys Files, Tonda Curry and LaJuanda Lacy, while Smith County District Attorney Matt Bingham, former First Assistant DA Brett Harrison and current First Assistant DA April Sikes prosecuted the case.

Judge Kent issued a restrictive and protective order, limiting what attorneys can say about the case."

New Private Mental Health Defenders Office in Lubbock

2008-07-15T14:12:00.000-07:00

KCBD, NewsChannel 11 in Lubbock reports that officials in Lubbock County have received funding for a new program aimed at diverting offenders with mental illness from jail and providing them with quality legal representation ("New Program Addresses Lubbock County Inmate Mental Health," July 10, 2008). While both Travis and Bexar Counties provide public mental health defenders to those who have committed misdemeanor offenses, Lubbock's Private Mental Health Defenders office will be the first of its kind in Texas. The program will use county funds to pay a nonprofit organization to oversee cases defended by private attorneys

Here's the full story:

"Efforts are underway in Lubbock County to save taxpayers money and increase public safety. A $400,000 state grant will help Lubbock County open a Private Mental Health Defenders office. The goal is to address the mental health of Lubbock County inmates could save the county thousands of dollars at the same time.

If you commit a crime in the Hub City, you will most likely end up in the Lubbock County Jail. But Lubbock County Director of Court Administration David Slayton says, for some, crime is a by-product of mental health illness. 'These individuals need help, we understand that but we don't want there to be a public safety risk by releasing them back out on the street. To figure out how to best deal within the justice system has been really tricky,' Slayton said.

Slayton says, come this fall, the county will try something new - a Private Mental Health Defenders office. The office initially will be funded mostly by the state, but by the fifth year Lubbock County will pick up the entire bill. '[What] We anticipate is the savings in the jail cost will be enough to pay for this over, probably multiple times over,' Slayton added.

The state grant will put experts in the jail to help identify inmates with mental health issues. Something Sheriff David Gutierrez says will help the problem. 'We as sheriffs have had problems throughout the decades with mental health issues in the jail. The reality is that now we are trying to bring this across through the judicial system to identify them prior to intake,' Sheriff Gutierrez said.
Slayton says as part of the program the court will have the option to appoint specially trained attorneys to defend those identified with mental health problems.

Defense Attorney Ted Hogan says it will help move people more efficiently through the court system. 'It's a way of dealing with folks that aren't your traditional criminals. Helping folks get back on their feet who hopefully don't come back and enable us to do it much more efficiently than what the old system has allowed us to do,' Hogan added.

The idea, and its potential savings, has some Lubbock County commissioner's support. 'Take the grant money and do what needs to be done. Take care of these folks and give them [sic] learned council and keep those folks from possibly going to jail which will save us tax dollars,' Commissioner Bill McCay said.

But not all are in support. District Attorney Matt Powell tells NewsChannel 11 his office is already taking steps to make sure those with mental issues have good representation.

Still Slayton says many could benefit from the new office. 'It's good from the perspective of the tax payer, it's good for the defendant and they can get the mental help they need with their mental illness,' Slayton added.

This will be the first program of its kind in the state and one of the few in the country. It's expected to be up and running by the beginning of October."
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An earlier post about this program is available here.

Government Agencies and Foundations Invest in Mental Healthcare

2008-07-08T08:42:00.000-07:00

Here's an update from the Austin American-Statesman on efforts aimed at increasing funding for mental health services in Austin/Travis County ("Spending on mental illness sees a sudden boost," July 5, 2008):

"... Across Austin and in other parts of Texas, foundations and government organizations are giving more money to programs that help people with mental illnesses — an area that advocates say has long been underfunded in Texas.

The Travis County Healthcare District recently budgeted $3.2 million to pay for more in-patient care at local psychiatric hospitals, up from $1.9 million in 2007. St. David's Community Health Foundation last month awarded $2.3 million in grants to local nonprofit groups working on mental health issues, up from $1.3 million the year before.

In May, the Department of State Health Services handed out $25 million in new money to 17 local mental health centers, including more than $4.6 million for crisis care in Austin. The funding is part of $82 million the Legislature approved in 2007 to stem the tide of people with mental illness flooding emergency rooms, psychiatric hospitals and jails.

That state-sanctioned financial support was widely seen as a victory in Texas, which is ranked 47th in the country for its per capita spending on people with mental illnesses. It's unclear whether the extra spending will continue, though.

'It's hard to tell whether or not it's a turning point, but a lot of eyes are on this,' said Mike Maples, director of mental health and substance abuse programs for the Department of State Health Services.

Mental health advocates have long tried to push psychiatric issues into the spotlight. Those efforts have received a boost from media coverage of mental health problems facing Iraq war veterans. State and national lawmakers are debating ways to improve mental health care for veterans. And this week, the U.S. House passed a bill requiring group health plans to provide the same level of coverage for mental illnesses that is given to other health problems.

On the state and local level, crisis appears to be a driving force in the new spending.

Last fall, in an effort to stay within its state-allocated budget, the Austin-Travis County Mental Health Mental Retardation Center cut the number of patients it sent to Austin State Hospital. At that time, the center usually housed 100 to 110 patients at the hospital at any given time. Since then, the number has fluctuated: at one point in January, 56 Travis County patients were in the state hospital; this week there were 75.

With private mental health hospitals often full and unable to fill the void, dozens of suicidal, manic or violent people — insured and uninsured — have been diverted to area emergency rooms, where they might wait hours or even days to be sent to a local psychiatric hospital.

Local hospitals have responded by devoting more resources on the crisis patients.

The Seton Family of Hospitals, for example, added 16 beds at Seton Shoal Creek psychiatric hospital. It also set aside six beds at the University Medical Center at Brackenridge emergency room for people with mental and physical health problems — a move that cost about $460,000 during the fiscal year that ended July 1. Seton also said it would double its $3 million a year psychiatric residency program, adding four more residents to the program.

'You can't deal with community health problems if you're not also taking care of mental health issues,' said Greg Hartman, senior vice president of University Medical Center at Brackenridge. 'There's too much of a connection.'

The hospital bed shortage also spurred officials with the Travis County Healthcare District to increase mental health funding.

'I think (the bed shortage) was the catalyst for saying to ourselves, We've got to do something,' said Patricia Young Brown, president of the healthcare district. 'There has to be a better way.'

The district increased its contribution to the local mental health effort by agreeing to finance inpatient care over the next year that could help 368 to 728 additional indigent patients, depending on their length of stay in the hospital. Officials said they plan to continue that level of financing indefinitely.

Although the St. David's foundation also provided funding for in-patient psychiatric beds, most of its recent grants support local nonprofits. Waterloo Counseling, for example, will receive $112,000 for mental health employees, including counselors. Any Baby Can was given $149,00 to provide in-home counseling to 85 additional clients each year.

'It was really clear there was a lot of need, a big gap in mental health services," he foundation's president Dick Moeller said. ...'"

Read the full article.
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More information about the $25 million in grants awarded by the TX Department of State Health Services is available here.

North Carolina Inmate Found Incompetent for Execution

2008-07-02T09:01:00.000-07:00

According to the Associated Press (and reported in the Times-News Online), a Superior Court judge has found Guy LeGrande incompetent for execution ("Judge: NC inmate too ill for execution," July 1, 2008). LeGrande has been on death row in North Carolina since 1996.

It is interesting to note that LeGrande was allowed to represent himself at trial, despite compelling evidence of his severe mental illness. The U.S. Supreme Court recently considered this issue in the case of Indiana v. Edwards and ruled that someone who is deemed competent to stand trial may not necessarily be granted the right to self representation. As with the case of Texas death row inmate Scott Panetti, who also was allowed to represent himself despite his extensive history of schizophrenia, Guy LeGrande's trial has been called "farcical."

Here's the article from the AP in full:

"A death row inmate who wore a Superman shirt and represented himself at trial is too mentally ill to be executed, a judge has ruled.

Stanly County Superior Court Judge Robert Bell ruled that Guy LeGrande, 49, was 'not competent to be executed' because he is psychotic and delusional, according to a ruling signed Friday but released Tuesday.

LeGrande was convicted and sentenced to death in 1996 for the 1993 shooting death of Ellen Munford in a murder-for-hire plot.

'The court has finally stepped in and halted a colossal miscarriage of justice, the execution of a seriously mentally ill man,' defense attorney Jay Ferguson said.

District Attorney Michael Parker, who didn't try the original case, said he hadn't received a copy of the ruling and couldn't comment. The state attorney general's office said it was reviewing the decision.

The ruling came nearly a year after the last hearing was held in LeGrande's case. LeGrande's execution is stayed until the state decides whether to appeal, and the murder conviction is not affected by the judge's decision.

The judge said LeGrande refuses to cooperate with his [current] defense attorneys, Ferguson and James Monroe, even to the point of sitting apart from them in court.

'The gross delusions stemming from Mr. LeGrande's severe mental disorder puts an awareness of a link between his crime and its punishment in a context so far removed from reality that the punishment can serve no purpose,' the judge wrote in his 10-page order.

LeGrande's defense lawyers said their client also claimed to communicate with television star Oprah Winfrey through the television. LeGrande also believed that he was getting a pardon and a financial settlement from the state.

Transcripts of the trial showed that LeGrande cursed the jury and said he would meet them in hell. At one point he told them to 'pull the damn switch and shake that groove thing.'

LeGrande had been scheduled to be executed Dec. 1, 2006, but the execution was halted to review LeGrande's mental state."
***
LeGrande will most likely remain on death row, unless the state agrees for his sentence to be commuted. In its Recommendation on the Death Penalty and Persons with Mental Disabilities, the American Bar Association states that

"If, after challenges to the validity of the conviction and death sentence have been exhausted and execution has been scheduled, a court finds that prisoner has a mental disorder or disability that significantly impairs his or her capacity to understand the nature and purpose of the punishment, or to appreciate the reason for its imposition in the prisoner's own case, the sentence of death should be reduced to the sentence imposed in capital cases when execution is not option." [Italics added]
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Read more about Guy LeGrande on The Progressive Pulse, a blog sponsored by NC Policy Watch.

Additional coverage is available from the News & Observer.

The History of Crisis Intervention Teams

2008-06-30T15:07:00.000-07:00

The June 2008 issue of Law Enforcement Technology features an interesting article on the history of Crisis Intervention Teams (CIT), pioneered by the Memphis Police Department.

Here are a few excerpts:

"The program builds a team of officers available to respond to calls that partner with families, mental health providers and individuals who are diagnosed with mental diseases. The Crisis Intervention Team, or CIT, preserves the individual's dignity, insures greater safety for both responding officers and the mentally ill person — called consumers — and reassures families."

"NAMI (Memphis) credits CIT with saving lives and preventing injuries, both for consumers and officers," [Major Sam] Cochran [of the Memphis Police Department] wrote in an opinion piece on the department's Web site. "Officer injury data has decreased by seven-fold since the program's inception. University of Tennessee studies have shown that the CIT program has resulted in a decrease in arrests rates for the mentally ill.

"Most importantly, CIT officers give consumers a sense of dignity. This dignity generates a new respect and outlook on the police and the mental health systems."

Read "Diffusing Crisis" in its entirety.

Capital Murder Defendant Found Competent After Fourth Hearing

2008-06-30T10:29:00.000-07:00

The San Antonio Express-News reports that the case of Vincent Seard, who has been found incompetent to stand trial as a result of his severe mental illness on three prior occasions, is now ready to proceed ("Slayings suspect ruled OK for trial," June 17, 2008). Serious questions about his mental status remain, however. Seard faces a possible death sentence for the 2003 murders of Terry Ingram and Patricia Kutzer.

Here's the article in full:

"At the fourth competency hearing since he was charged with capital murder in the 2003 beating deaths of two Kerr County residents, Vincent Seard was found mentally fit for trial Tuesday.

But testimony at the three-hour hearing before state District Judge Steve Ables showed schizophrenia and delusional thinking remain issues for the accused, who says he embodies all that is evil and good, looks to numerology to bolster his defense and calls himself 'Vincent Seard Jeffrey, period.'

Ables' ruling that Seard was competent provided little comfort to Cynthia Ingram, whose husband, Terry, and their friend, Patricia Kutzer, were brutally bludgeoned at Kutzer's farm outside Comfort on March 10, 2003.

'It's still going to be forever,' Ingram predicted after watching the hearing. 'It's going to go on and on. I don't think it's going to end.'

Seard, who was arrested in California four days after the killings, is unlikely to face trial before 2009, said District Attorney Bruce Curry.

The defense has previously said an electrical shock Seard suffered may have led to the Houston-area musician's bizarre behavior, including the unprovoked attack at the farm just off Interstate 10.

Defense lawyer Kurt Rudkin put little stock in expert medical testimony that Seard, 44, can meaningfully assist his defense and understands the charges and court proceedings, including the possibility of being sentenced to death.

He said much of his consultation with Seard during five years as his court-appointed counsel has concerned which spirits share his body and how various number patterns may factor into his defense.
Taking the stand Tuesday, Seard spoke slowly and clearly — but often in cryptic terms — about defense strategies, the reasons he left incriminating evidence at the crime scene, and 'Oren,' an 'entity from the sea' that shares his being.

'With clarity now, being as I am whoever I say I am, balancing in the ying and yang ... even to now I am Oren,' he said.

Asked about leaving his dog, photos of himself and his driver's license at Kutzer's home, Seard said, 'The reason was, as was left many articles, I then left evidence to see that whoever was guilty of the crime, charge me with it.'

Rudkin told Ables he heard little evidence Tuesday that differed from a 2006 hearing, the third and last one in which Seard was ruled incompetent.

Curry said Tuesday's hearing was the first in which experts agreed Seard was competent.
Seard's condition has improved because of drugs, but he may relapse into 'frenzies' — as has occurred before — if he halts his medication, testified psychiatrist Richard Coons.

Based on a three-hour interview last week, Coons said he concluded Seard's illness may affect his ability to consult with an attorney 'but not enough to make him incompetent.'

Dr. Michael Jumes, director of psychology at Kerrville State Hospital, said he examined Seard four times, most recently April 2, at North Texas Mental Hospital in Vernon.

'He displayed a factual and rational understanding across the range of questions I posed to him,' Jumes testified.

Questioned by Rudkin whether he thought Coons and Jumes were forthright in their assessments, Seard said, 'Who is to say what is normal?'

Seard's sister, Diane Stills of Houston, hardly recognized the defendant as her loving sibling of bygone days. 'He's not the Vincent I grew up with,' she said. 'Let's put it that way.'
***
Note: Judge Ables also presided over the capital murder trial of Scott Panetti and allowed him to represent himself.

Coverage of the Indiana v. Edwards Decision

2008-06-23T12:35:00.000-07:00

The New York Times has this coverage of last week's U.S. Supreme Court decision in the case of Indiana v. Edwards ("Self-Representation by the Mentally Ill Is Curbed," June 20, 2008):

"A mentally ill defendant who is nonetheless competent to stand trial is not necessarily competent to dispense with a lawyer and represent himself, the Supreme Court ruled on Thursday.

The court said that judges could 'take realistic account of the particular defendant’s mental capacities' and, in the interest of achieving a fair trial, deny the constitutional right to self-representation that criminal defendants ordinarily enjoy.

The 7-to-2 decision overturned a ruling by the Indiana Supreme Court that had found that a schizophrenic man was entitled to a new trial on a charge of attempted murder because the trial judge had improperly denied his request to represent himself.

The defendant, Ahmad Edwards, who was sometimes quite coherent and at other times decidedly not so, had differed with his lawyer over defense strategy. He wanted to argue self-defense, while his lawyer wanted to present a defense based on lack of intent.

Mr. Edwards had fired a gun at a department store security officer after trying to steal a pair of shoes. He was found competent to stand trial after two psychiatric hospitalizations over three years after the shooting.

A landmark Supreme Court decision in 1975, Faretta v. California, established the right to self-representation as a basic constitutional right.

Writing for the majority on Thursday, Justice Stephen G. Breyer said the question in this case was answered neither by the Faretta decision, which did not involve a competency issue, nor by a subsequent decision that permitted a mentally ill defendant to waive the right to counsel and plead guilty.

Conducting a defense at trial without a lawyer’s help requires a higher degree of competence, Justice Breyer said.

Noting that the court has referred to the right to self-representation as an aspect of individual dignity, Justice Breyer said dignity was lacking in the 'spectacle that could well result' from a mentally ill defendant’s efforts, which he said were 'at least as likely to prove humiliating as ennobling.'

Justice Breyer said that rather than setting an all-encompassing definition of competency, the court would leave the decision to individual trial judges, who he said 'will often prove best able to make more fine-tuned mental capacity decisions, tailored to the individual circumstances of a particular defendant.'

Indiana had asked the court simply to overrule the Faretta decision, which Justice Breyer has criticized. But he said 'recent empirical research' indicated that the decision was not, in fact, leading to unfair trials when defendants were mentally competent.

The decision, Indiana v. Edwards, No. 07-208, drew a vigorous dissenting opinion from Justice Antonin Scalia, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas. Justice Scalia said the treatment Mr. Edwards received in being denied to present the defense of his choice 'seems to me the epitome of both actual and apparent unfairness.'

The only reason the court has previously accepted as valid for denying self-representation, Justice Scalia said, was a threat to the orderliness ofthe trial. But Mr. Edwards was 'respectful and compliant' and did not even have the chance to try representing himself, Justice Scalia continued, adding, 'The dignity at issue is the supreme human dignity of being master of one’s fate rather than a ward of the state — the dignity of individual choice.'

Justice Scalia said that 'trial judges will have every incentive to make their lives easier' by appointing lawyers rather than giving mentally ill defendantsa chance to proceed on their own.

'In singling out mentally ill defendants for this treatment,' he said, 'the court’s opinion does not even have the questionable virtue of being politically correct.'"

And here's an excerpt from an analysis provided by Lyle Denniston, with scotusblog ("Faretta survives, with limits," June 19, 2008):

"The Edwards opinion by Breyer, in dealing with mentally ill individuals who voice a desired to be their own defense counsel, provides one clear implication, and one quite unclear prospect.

It is clear, simply from the result, that states may now have one standard of mentally competency for putting a mentally impaired person on trial, and a higher standard that such a person would have to meet in order to be allowed self-representation. Ahmad Edwards had been found competent to be put on trial, but not to represent himself.

What is unclear, though, is what the higher standard is for representing one’s self when mental competency is at issue. The Court expressly rejected a proposal by the state of Indiana that self-representation be denied whenever the accused 'cannot communicate coherently with the court or a jury.' The state had suggested that approach, saying it 'fits Sixth Amendment doctrine, which allows some balancing of interests when defendants attempt self-representation.'

In fact, the state argued, if the Court did not adopt some such standard, that would be a reason to cast Faretta aside.

The Court said no to that approach: 'We are sufficiently uncertain…as to how that particular standard would work in practice to refrain from endorsing it as a federal constitutional standard here. We need not now, and we do not, adopt it.'

To which Scalia replied in dissent: 'Today’s holding is extraordinarily vague. The Court does not accept Indiana’s position that self-representation can be denied ‘where the defendant cannot communicate coherently with the court or a jury.'…It does not even hold that Edwards was properly denied his right to represent himself. It holds only that lack of mental competence can under some circumstances form a basis for denying the right to proceed pro se…We will probably give some meaning to this holding in the future, but the indeterminancy makes a bad holding worse.'

In other words, there will have to be sequels. In the meantime, states can experiment with various formulations of a standard — so long as it is not theone Indiana suggested."
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Additional coverage is available in The Washington Post and the Legal Times, and from the Associated Press.