I read this article and realized
that the Abolitionists in Kansas use their convenient propaganda tool, innocent
convicted to ask for the abolition of the death penalty. Please read the whole
article below and I will give my rebutting facts to them.
Posted on
Sat, Aug. 25, 2012
Cheever case marks fourth
time court has invalidated a Kansas death sentence
By Hurst
Laviana
The
Wichita Eagle
When the
Kansas Supreme Court overturned the capital murder conviction of Scott Cheever
on Friday, it marked the fourth time in four tries that the state’s highest
court has invalidated a Kansas death sentence.
The
decision was quickly heralded by death penalty opponents.
“This
case is another example of just how flawed the Kansas death penalty is,”
officials with the Kansas Coalition Against the Death Penalty said in a news
release. “We can’t eliminate the possibility of error. It’s time for Kansas to
replace the death penalty with life without the possibility of parole.”
But local
prosecutors said Saturday that the Cheever ruling is likely to have no impact
on the state’s death penalty law or on the appeals of two Sedgwick County death
penalty cases that have yet to be considered by Kansas Supreme Court.
Sedgwick
County District Attorney Nola Foulston, who is finishing her sixth term in
office but is not seeking re-election, said she doesn’t expect the appeals of
Douglas Belt and Jonathan and Reginald Carr to be resolved before she leaves
office in January. But she said she is confident that both cases will survive a
test by the state Supreme Court.
“I am
optimistic on the Belt case; I’m also optimistic on State v. Carr,” she said. “We
worked long and hard on those cases to make sure there were no problems.”
Deputy
District Attorney Marc Bennett, who will take over for Foulston in January,
said the Cheever decision arose from an evidentiary problem that had nothing to
do with the death penalty law.
“As I
understand the ruling, it had nothing to do with the death penalty or the
manner in which it was applied,” he said. “It could have happened in any murder
trail.”
The court
said in its ruling that prosecutors in the Cheever case improperly allowed a
witness to testify about the results of a mental exam that Cheever was required
by a federal judge to take.
“It was
an error by the prosecutors who tried the case,” Foulston said. “I didn’t see
anything in that case that would lead me to believe that the court did anything
other than apply the law correctly.”
Although
the Supreme Court has now reversed four death-penalty convictions, Bennett said
it also has upheld several capital murder convictions that did not result in a
death sentence. He said the court recently upheld the convictions of Elgin Ray
Robinson Jr. and Ted Burnett, who both escaped death sentences after they were
convicted of capital murder in the June 9, 2006, strangulation death of
14-year-old Chelsea Brooks.
Donna
Schneweis of Topeka, who issued the news release on behalf of the Coalition
Against the Death Penalty, said the Cheever ruling, if nothing else, shows that
the courts are not perfect.
“The
reality is that in Kansas, when a life is on the line, courts are making mistakes,”
she said.
Reach
Hurst Laviana at 316-268-6567 or hlaviana@wichitaeagle.com.
© 2012
Wichita Eagle and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved.
Comments:
“This case is another example of just how flawed the Kansas death
penalty is,” officials with the Kansas Coalition Against the
Death Penalty said in a news release. “We can’t
eliminate the possibility of error. It’s time for Kansas to replace the death
penalty with life without the possibility of parole.”
Response: Life without the possibility of parole has even more flaws. Please see
this label.
Truth is that Scott Cheever got his death sentence overturned,
does not mean that he is factually innocent. He could be only legally innocent.
Donna Schneweis of Topeka, who issued the news release on behalf of the
Coalition Against the Death Penalty, said the Cheever ruling, if nothing else,
shows that the courts are not perfect.
“The reality is that in Kansas, when a life is on the line, courts are
making mistakes,” she said.
Response: No, I do not buy that. The courts have taken massive safeguards to
ensure that only the guilty go to death row and are executed. Scott Cheever is
alive and not executed. Life without the possibility of parole has its own
flaws too, beware of the wrongfully freed. Please see violent criminals,
recidivist murderers, terrorists and serial killers. By abolishing the death
penalty, you will let all these violent killers walk free, look at those on
Kansas Death Row now:
Sentenced
to death in Kansas
To
date, Kansas juries have sentenced 13 defendants to death. They are listed here
chronologically in order of their crimes.
• Gary Kleypas: Convicted in Crawford
County of the March 30, 1996, killing of Pittsburg
State University student Carrie Williams. The Kansas Supreme Court overturned
his sentence in 2001, but another jury resentenced him to death in 2008.
• Gavin Scott: Convicted in Sedgwick
County of the Sept. 13, 1996, shooting deaths of Doug
and Beth Brittain in their rural Goddard home. The Kansas Supreme Court
overturned Scott’s death sentence, and he was resentenced to two life prison
terms after reaching a plea-agreement with prosecutors.
• Michael Marsh: Convicted in Sedgwick
County of shooting and killing Marry Ane Pusch on June 17,
1997, and setting a fire that killed her 18-month-old daughter. The
Kansas Supreme Court overturned Marsh’s capital murder conviction, and he was
sentenced to life in prison after reaching a plea-agreement with prosecutors.
• Stanley Elms: Convicted in
Sedgwick County of the May 1998 rape and murder of his
neighbor, Regina Gray. He was resentenced to life in prison in November 2004
after reaching a plea-agreement in which he agreed to drop his appeal if
prosecutors would take the death penalty off the table.
• John Robinson: Convicted in Johnson
County of murdering three women, including two whose bodies were found stuffed
into barrels near his rural home in June 2000. He also
pleaded guilty in Missouri to five killings, receiving sentences of life
without parole for each.
• Jonathan and Reginald
Carr: convicted in Sedgwick County of killing Jason Befort, Brad Heyka,
Aaron Sander and Heather Muller in a northeast Wichita soccer field on Dec. 15, 2000. Reginald Carr also was convicted in the death
of Ann Walenta.
• Douglas Belt: Convicted in Sedgwick
County of sexually assaulting and decapitating Lucille Gallegos on June 25, 2002, in a west Wichita apartment.
• Phillip Cheatham: Convicted in Shawnee
County of the December 2003 shooting deaths of two
women and the wounding of a third.
• Sidney Gleason: Convicted in Barton
County of taking part in the Feb. 24, 2004, killing of
a Great Bend couple. Prosecutors said Gleason was afraid that one of the
victims might tell police about his previous crimes.
• Scott Cheever: Sentenced to death
for the J anuary 2005 shooting of Sheriff Matt Samuels
at a home near Virgil. His conviction was overturned Friday by the Kansas
Supreme Court.
• Justin Thurber: Convicted in Cowley
County of the January 2007 abduction, sexual assault
and killing of 19-year-old college student Jodi Sanderholm.
• James Kraig Kahler: Convicted in November 2009 in Osage County of the fatal shootings of his
estranged wife, their two daughters and his wife’s grandmother.
Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/2012/08/25/2462719/cheever-case-marks-fourth-time.html#storylink=cpy
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