Facts of the Crime:

Convicted March 22, 2001, in Pierce County of one count of aggravated first-degree murder for the stabbing death of his neighbor, Geneine Harshfield, 43, at her Tacoma home in 1996.
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Case Update:

Gregory was sentenced to death in May 2001.  However, in November 2006, the Washington Supreme Court overturned Gregory’s rape convictions and threw out his death sentence.  The case was then remanded to the Pierce County Superior Court for resentencing.  Since he is not currently under a sentence of death, he is not on death row or in our capital lit report.  Here is a link to the Washington’s Supreme Court’s opinion which discusses the case further:

 http://caselaw.findlaw.com/wa-supreme-court/1112456.html

The penalty phase hearing is scheduled for March 2011.  There is a status conference scheduled for November 15, 2010 which could change that date again, however at this time it appears we will not know what sentence Gregory will receive until March 2011. 

(Source: Washington AG's office and off2dr)

Schwarzenegger signs California's 'Chelsea's Law

(CNN) -- Anyone convicted of certain sex offenses against a child in California will get life in prison without parole starting Thursday, after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed "Chelsea's Law."

The law was named for 17-year-old Chelsea King, who was murdered this year by a registered sex offender who also admitted having killed 14-year-old Amber Dubois.

"Because of Chelsea, California children will be safer," Schwarzenegger said. "Because of Chelsea, this never has to happen again."

The "one-strike" provision applies to forcible sex crimes against minors that include aggravating factors, such as the victim's age or whether the victim was bound or drugged.

The unanimous passage of the bill by California lawmakers was a rare display of bipartisanship, spurred by outrage over the King and Dubois murders.

It included an urgency clause that made it immediately effective. "Very few things bring Democrats and Republicans together these days, but your daughters have," Schwarzenegger said to their parents before signing the law in a San Diego ceremony.

Kelly King, Chelsea's mother, spoke after the governor. She thanked lawmakers for inspiring "our next generation of voters by your actions."

"You've shown them what is good and right and sound decision making in government," King said.

The measure also puts those convicted of certain sex crimes against minors on lifetime parole.

Registered sex offender John Gardner III admitted last March to the killings. A few days after King's body was found, Gardner led authorities to the remains of Dubois, who had been missing for more than a year.

Gardner was sentenced in April to three consecutive terms of life without parole for the murders and an attack on a jogger in a plea deal that spared him the death penalty.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/09/09/california.chelseas.law/index.html?section=cnn_latest
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Get these predators off the street for good.

The following Executions are scheduled for September to this point (Serious Dates Only):

September

September 9 - Holly Wood - Alabama

http://off2dr.com/smf/index.php?topic=4792.0

September 10 - Cal Coburn Brown - Washington

http://off2dr.com/smf/index.php?topic=4242.0

Septemer 15 - Kevin Keith - Ohio

http://off2dr.com/smf/index.php?topic=5586.0

September 16 - Gregory Wilson - Kentucky

http://off2dr.com/smf/index.php?topic=2077.0

September 23 - Teresa Lewis - Virginia (Female)

http://off2dr.com/smf/index.php?topic=1994.0

I am opening this thread because Kasey one of our new members lost a sister Phree to this murdering scumbag.

Facts of the Crime:

On 8/22/92, Sapp murdered 11-year-old Martha Leach and 12-year-old Phree Morrow near downtown Springfield. Sapp raped Martha and Phree and then beat them to death. Sapp was connected to the rapes and murders through DNA testing in 1996. Between 1993 and 1995, Sapp murdered 31-year-old Belinda Anderson and buried her body in a garage floor. Sapp was also convicted for the 1993 attempted murder of Hazel Pearson. Sapp confessed to the crimes against Martha, Phree, Ms. Anderson and Ms. Pearson. Sapp received a death sentence for the aggravated murders of Martha, Phree and Ms. Anderson. At the time of his trial in 1997, Sapp was serving a prison sentence for assaulting and attempting to rape another Springfield woman in 1993.

ORANGEBURG, S.C. (Aug. 16) -- The bodies of two toddlers were pulled Monday from a car submerged in a South Carolina river, their mother arrested and authorities were investigating whether their deaths were accidental.

Two-year-old Devean C. Duley and 18-month-old Ja'van T. Duley were dead by the time divers got to the car in the North Edisto River near a rural boat landing, Orangeburg County Sheriff Larry Williams said. County Coroner Samuetta Marshall would not speculate on a cause of death until autopsies were completed Tuesday.

The boys' mother, Shaquan Duley, 29, was being held Monday on a charge of leaving the scene of an accident. It was not immediately clear whether she had a lawyer.

Williams said the Highway Patrol was notified about 6:15 a.m. that a woman needed help getting her children out of the car. The children were still strapped in their child seats when divers found them about 45 minutes after being called to the scene.

"Early in the investigation, the state patrol felt there was not enough indicators to substantiate that there was an automobile accident," Williams said. "We are looking into all possibilities as to what happened."

The woman, who did not have a cell phone, had walked some distance down the country road by the boat landing and flagged down a passing motorist to call the Highway Patrol.

"She showed some emotion, but I can't say she was overly distraught," the sheriff said. "Through her statements, there are some things we think are not believable."

Williams said authorities were attempting to contact the children's father, who did not live with the family.

The sheriff said investigators are considering how a traffic accident could have happened at the boat ramp, about 20 yards upstream from a main road that crosses the slow-moving river in Orangeburg, about 35 miles south of Columbia, the state capital. A mobile home, a house and mechanic's shop are a short distance away.

Shakeyia Baxter said the main road was heavily traveled in the mornings and would have been especially busy on Monday - the first day of school. Baxter stopped by the boat ramp, which is littered with empty beer cases and discarded soda bottles, on her way home from work at a McDonald's to tuck silk flowers into a sign that warns of high levels of mercury in the fish.

"My heart goes out to them," said Baxter, a 30-year-old mother of two. "I would have been doing everything I could to get those kids out of that car seat."

The case was reminiscent of a famous South Carolina case in 1994. Susan Smith left her 3-year-old and 14-month-old sons strapped in their car seats as she rolled her car into a lake in Union County in the northwest part of the state.

She was convicted in their deaths and is serving a life prison term.

http://www.aolnews.com/nation/article/bodies-of-two-children-pulled-from-submerged-car-in-south-carolina-river/19595644
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Still to this day I do not understand how Susan Smith escape the DP.

With this NC Racial Justice Act filing deadline, we intend to create or update the threads on those that have filed. I am going to do the cases and Heidi is going to be nice enough to do the mugshots. I will try to spread it out over the next few days and with an X tomorrow probably won't do much to clutter up the site. There are 135 that have filed and will be quite a bit of work. This will be great data concerning the NC Inmates. Those of you that may not be interested in reading each on "your show unread post link" just read the threads that you have interest in and mark read on the rest. All of ya'll are the best.  ...Jeff

The Cali Supremes Upheld the Conviction for Cowan in an Opinion dated 05 Aug 10.

Facts of the Crime:

Crime date: Sept. 4, 1984
Clifford Merck, 75, and Alma Merck, 81, liked to putter around the house, took occasional fishing trips and looked forward to visits from their children. They were killed by Robert Wesley Cowan in their southeast Bakersfield home. Alma had four children by her first husband. Clifford had no children. They were married in the 1960s.

Further information on the facts of the Crime and the opinion is here:

http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/opinions/documents/S055415.PDF

Death-row inmate Daniel M. Saranchak does not deserve a new trial for the murder of his grandmother and uncle in 1993 in East Norwegian Township, a three-judge federal court panel has ruled.

In a 45-page opinion filed Wednesday in Pottsville, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel decided Saranchak, 42, of Pottsville, was properly convicted of two counts of first-degree murder, and that any error made by his lawyer did not affect that determination.

"The commonwealth presented overwhelming evidence of Saranchak's specific intent to murder Edmund (J. Saranchak) and Stella (T. Saranchock)," U.S. Circuit Judge D. Brooks Smith wrote in the opinion, which U.S. Circuit Judges Anthony J. Scirica and Dolores K. Sloviter joined.

As a result, the panel reversed the Jan. 4, 2008, ruling of Senior U.S. District Judge Sylvia H. Rambo, who had granted Daniel Saranchak a new trial on the grounds that his lawyer, Kent D. Watkins, Saint Clair, did not represent him effectively. The panel returned the case to Rambo for consideration of other issues Saranchak raised.

"Our office is pleased with the ruling," Schuylkill County District Attorney James P. Goodman said Wednesday.

State police at Schuylkill Haven charged that Saranchak and Roy W. Miles Jr., New Philadelphia, entered the Five Points home of Stella Saranchock, 78, and her son, Edmund Saranchak, 57, between 10 p.m. Oct. 15, 1993, and 2 a.m. Oct. 16 and shot them. Miles pleaded guilty in October 1994 to third-degree murder and received a sentence of 11 to 40 years in a state correctional institution.

Saranchak pleaded guilty to criminal homicide, burglary, aggravated assault, robbery, theft and conspiracy on Sept. 1, 1994, before county Judge Cyrus Palmer Dolbin.

Dolbin then presided over a nonjury degree of guilt hearing with respect to the criminal homicide charges and, on Sept. 8, 1994, convicted Saranchak of two counts of first-degree murder.

Saranchak opted to have a jury decide his sentence; jurors ruled on Sept. 16, 1994, that Saranchak should get the death penalty.

Dolbin sentenced Saranchak on Sept. 9, 1994, to 25 to 50 years in prison on the burglary, robbery and conspiracy charges, making that term consecutive to the death sentence.

Saranchak was to be executed at 7 p.m. Nov. 8, 2000, at SCI/Rockview, Centre County, but the 3rd Circuit issued an order at 6:15 p.m. staying the death sentence to allow for additional appeals.

He is serving his sentence at SCI/Greene, Waynesburg.

In his appeal, Saranchak is not challenging his original guilty plea, only his conviction for first-degree murder.

In the opinion, Smith wrote that while Watkins made errors in his representation, Saranchak failed to show that he would not have been convicted of first-degree murder if he had not made them. That made the errors legally harmless and barred federal courts from reversing the conviction, he wrote.

"Saranchak has failed to establish a reasonable probability that, but for counsel's unprofessional errors in failing to investigate and present a proper diminished capacity defense, he would not have been convicted of first-degree murder," Smith wrote.

Similarly, Smith wrote that while statements Saranchak made to the state police probably should not have been admitted into evidence, they were merely repetitive of other evidence. Their exclusion, therefore, would not have led to a different result, according to Smith.

Smith also ruled that a county Children & Youth Services caseworker was not interrogating Saranchak when he made statements about the murders to her, and that they were admissible against him.

"There was no interrogation of Saranchak because there was no compulsion of incriminating statements for use in a prosecution," Smith wrote.

Nils Frederiksen, deputy press secretary in the state attorney general's office, expressed satisfaction Wednesday with the result.

"We argued the appeal, so we're obviously pleased ... with this clear decision," Frederiksen said. "These were matters of law that were addressed."

Stuart B. Lev, Defender Association of Philadelphia, Saranchak's lawyer, could not be reached Wednesday for comment.Defendant: Daniel M. Saranchak

Age: 42

Hometown: Pottsville

Crimes committed: First degree murder, burglary, aggravated assault, robbery, theft and conspiracy

Prison sentence: Death, plus 25 to 50 years in a state correctional institution, with sentence being served at SCI/Greene.

http://republicanherald.com/news/panel-no-new-trial-for-death-row-inmate-1.923479

Tobin and Letner's convictions were upheld in a Cali Supreme Opinion dated 29 July.

Facts of the Crime:

Sentenced to Death for the murder of Visalia nurse Ivon Pontbriant on March 1, 1988.
Co-defendant Richard Letner also sentenced to Death.

Opinion is here:

.http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/opinions/documents/S015384.PDF

The Following Washington DR Inmates have been Denied through at least the 9th as of 10 September 2010:

Name                                                      Status
Cal Coburn Brown                                      Executed
Darold Stenson                                       Execution Scheduled for 12/3/08 Stayed

TOKYO – Japan hanged two convicted killers Wednesday, including a man who burned six women to death, in the country's first executions in a year, the government said.

The justice ministry said Kazuo Shinozawa, 59, was hanged at the Tokyo Detention Center. Shinozawa set fire on a jewelry shop in 2000, burning six women to death.

The second death row inmate, Hidenori Ogata, 33, also was hanged at the Tokyo Detention Center. He strangled a woman and stabbed a man to death in 2003.

Justice Minister Keiko Chiba witnessed the double executions, the ministry said.

Japan's media are not allowed to cover executions. But following Wednesday's executions, Chiba said that should change.

Criminals can be left on death row for years in Japan, and executions — all carried out by hanging — are highly secretive. Inmates do not know when they will be executed, while lawyers and family are only told after the fact.

Japan, along with the United States, is one of the few industrialized countries that still has capital punishment. Japan has 107 death row inmates, the ministry said.

There is little public outcry against the death penalty in Japan, but the country has been criticized by rights groups such as Amnesty International and the main Japanese bar association.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100728/ap_on_re_as/as_japan_execution_1
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Sayonara scumbags!!

This one is an interesting case and made the headlines of AOL news.

(July 26) -- Saber Kushour's media blitz continues with an interview in The Guardian Observer. The Palestinian was sentenced to 18 months in jail last week for "rape by deception" -- specifically, for having consensual sex with an Israeli Jew who says she wouldn't have done it if she had known Kushour was an Arab. Now he's hitting the newspaper circuit, slamming Israel for what he views as unjust and patently discriminatory treatment.

"I am paying the price for a mistake that she made," Kushour told the Observer today. "I was shocked at the sentence -- it shows a very vivid and clear racism."

It is the second time Kushour has characterized the verdict in his case as racist. Last week, he told Israel daily newspaper Haaretz that a clear double standard was in effect in his case.

To recap, the encounter that caused all the trouble came in 2008, when, Kushour says, he was approached by woman at a shop, who then came on to him. Kushour said his name was "Dudu," a common Israeli name that was also his nickname. "Since I was a kid, everyone calls me Dudu -- even my wife calls me Dudu. It's a nickname." The sole misrepresentation he gave the woman, only identified as Maya, was that he was single.

The two went to the roof of a nearby building and had sex. He took her cell phone number and later called her, which gave her the necessary contact information for the police to find him when she lodged her complaint of rape.

Kushour is under house arrest pending his appeal.

http://www.aolnews.com/surge-desk/article/palestinian-saber-kushour-accused-of-rape-of-deception-speak/19568421

A request to set an execution date for Hawkins was submitted on 2/18/10.

Facts of the Crime:

On 6/12/89, Hawkins murdered 18-year-old Terrance Richard and 19-year-old Diamond Marteen in Mount Healthy. Mr. Richard and Mr. Marteen had driven to the residential neighborhood to purchase marijuana. Before they had an opportunity to do so, Hawkins shot them both in the head "execution-style" and stole their money and jewelry.

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Cert was Denied by the US Supremes 11/9/09.

The following PA DR Inmates Have Been Denied through at least the 3th Circuit as of 23 July 2010:


Inmate                                    Case Status
Alfred Albrecht                         Cert Denied 1/7/08
Robert Cook                            Cert Denied 1/11/10
Jermont Cox                             Execution Scheduled for 7/22/10 Stayed (Cert Denied 10/30/06)
Daniel Jacobs                           Cert Denied 10/30/05
Reginald Lewis                         3rd Circuit Denied COA 1/6/10
Jerry Marshall Jr.                       3rd Circuit Denied COA 2/2/10
Daniel Saranchak                      3rd Circuit Denied COA 8/4/10
Andre Stevens                          Cert Denied 2/26/07
Paul Taylor                                Cert Denied 10/6/08

HARRISBURG — Gov. Edward G. Rendell has signed an execution warrant for Brentt Michael Sherwood, 31, for the murder of his 4-year-old stepdaughter in Dec. 2004.

Sherwood, currently being held at the State Corrrectional Institution at Greene, is now scheduled to be executed on Sept. 16.

The jury of 10 men and two women deliberated for 80 minutes in May, 2007 before announcing guilty verdicts for first-degree murder, aggravated assault and recklessly endangering the welfare of children.

The jury will reconvened the next day and agreed that the death penalty should be imposed.

Sherwood admitted at trial that he punched and kicked Marlee Rose Reed repeatedly at their residence in Northumberland on Dec. 7, 2004, causing her death the following day.

However, he pleaded a diminished capacity due to voluntary intoxication, claiming he was high on cocaine and not mentally able to form an intent to kill.

http://dailyitem.com/0100_news/x1255108704/Governor-signs-death-warrant-for-Brentt-Sherwood
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Another Administrative Date.