The Case of Preston Hughes III: Exceptional

In The Big Sleep, I listed a number of precautionary statements (i.e. assumptions) before I listed the implications associated with Shandra dying soon after having her carotid was severed. One of these assumptions was that Shandra was not exceptional in her ability to survive a severed carotid.

Since that post, I learned from a professional pathologist that some people do, rarely, survive a severed carotid without immediate medical intervention. The pathologist cited this case summary from the April 1988 issue of Journal of Laryngology and Otology. I must have missed it when I scanned my home delivered copy.

The Case of the Missing Carotid -- A Well Aimed Knife 

Abstract
A 20-year-old male presented with a small stab wound to the neck and with haemodynamic signs of significant haemorrhage, but no signs of local bleeding. On exploration, an intact vagus nerve and internal jugular vein were found, but the common carotid artery was not immediately apparent. Careful dissection confirmed a completely transected common carotid artery with the two ends contracted and retracted. A primary repair was performed and post-operatively the patient recovered completely and had no neurological deficit.

Carotid arteries are under tension in their normal state. When completely severed, the now exposed ends of the carotid retract. The lower portion pulls down towards the torso and it can be difficult to find. Through some combination of pressure from surrounding tissues, swelling, pseudoaneuysm, clotting, and other phenomenon of which I am clueless, the carotid may rarely self-seal, the patient may rarely not bleed out, and the patient may rarely survive without prompt medical intervention.

The point is that survival of a severed carotid is not an impossibility. It is a rare event, but it has happened. I don't know how frequently it happens, but I accept it happened at least in the one instance just cited.

To be thorough in our investigation of the case of Preston Hughes III, we must therefore consider whether or not Shandra Charles was one of those exceptional people who survived a severed carotid without immediate medical intervention.

The first characteristic of the exceptional person described above is that the person survived. Shandra did not. Still this does not completely rule out Shandra as being an exceptional case. She could have been even more exceptional. She could have been one of those cases not yet identified (as far as I know) whose carotid self-sealed long enough for her to make a dying declaration but then self-ruptured before receiving medical care.

A second characteristic of the exceptional person described above is that the physician found the self-sealing carotid so remarkable that he made note of it. The autopsy report made no note of Shandra's severed carotid being in any way unique or remarkable.

A third characteristic of the exceptional person described above is that he exhibited no external signs of local bleeding. Shandra not only had external signs of local bleeding, she spilled copious amounts of blood onto the dirt pathway. From Cook and Becker's report. The emphasis is mine.

Officers walked east along the path that Hunter eluded to and walked approx 30 yards when observing a black female laying face down in the path. She was positioned face west and feet east. There was blood along the neckline and she was breathing deep but was unconscious. Officers notified the west side dispatcher of the find. The blood appeared to be fresh ...

Here's some of that fresh blood.

There's no telling how deeply that blood soaked into the ground. It is obvious, though, that the stain did not form from blood merely dripping or oozing out of her neck. The blood spurted from her neck in an amount sufficiently copious to make that dark, elongated stain. That stain spans the trail and extends into the grass and weeds on each side.

That stain is compelling evidence of a severed carotid artery that did not self-seal.

There is no evidence that Shandra responded to a severed carotid in any exceptional fashion. Instead of surviving with no external evidence of a severed carotid, she spurted blood onto the trail, lost consciousness, and died.

Shandra was not exceptional, at least when it came to surviving a severed carotid artery.

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The Stayed Execution of Darien Houser

Darien Houser was scheduled to be executed by the people of Pennsylvania on 24 July 2012. His execution, however, has been stayed to allow him to file appeals in the federal courts.

I provide the following summary of his case from the adverse decision in Commonwealth v. Houser (2011):

A warrant was issued for appellant after he failed to appear for a rape trial. Sergeant Vincent DeSandro of the First Judicial District Warrant Unit was assigned the warrant and learned appellant was likely residing in Apartment 336 of a complex known as Fisher's Crossing at 4901 Old Stenton Avenue, Philadelphia. Sergeant DeSandro requested his partner Officer Eric Jones, Sergeant LeClaire, and Officer Carlo Del Borrello to assist him in executing the warrant. Sergeant LeClaire and Officer Del Borrello wore the required Warrant Unit uniform, which consisted of cargo pants, a shirt identifying them as officers in the Warrant Unit, a ballistics vest and cover containing the phrase "Warrant Unit" on both the front and back, and a baseball hat or wool cap with the phrase "Warrant Unit" on it. Sergeant DeSandro and Officer Jones, assigned to the FBI Fugitive Task Force, wore civilian clothing with ballistics vests with "Warrant Unit" on the front and back, along with their badges. 

The officers met near the apartment complex shortly before 2:00 a.m. on March 19, 2004. Philadelphia Police were called to assist and positioned themselves at the rear of the complex. As the Warrant Unit approached Apartment 336, they heard movement inside. After an initial knock on the door, the noise stopped. One of the officers covered the peephole, and the police pounded on the door, identifying themselves and their purpose. 

Appellant and his girlfriend, Naki Hutchinson, were inside the apartment, Hutchinson in the kitchen and appellant in the bedroom. Hutchinson told appellant someone was at the door, telling him it was either the police due to a noise complaint or an acquaintance playing a joke on them. Appellant instructed her not to open the door because it was the police. Nevertheless, Hutchinson heard the officers identify themselves and opened the door. 

Sergeant LeClaire entered first and informed Hutchinson he had a warrant for appellant. Sergeant DeSandro was directly behind him, followed by Officers Del Borrello and Jones. Inside the apartment, the kitchenette light was on, as well as a television and an aquarium light. Light from the exterior hallway also entered the apartment as Officer Del Borrello held the door open. The officers were only a few feet inside the door and approximately 14 to 15 feet from the bedroom when Sergeant LeClaire was heard to tell appellant to drop his weapon. At the same time, Sergeant DeSandro saw a barrel flash in the bedroom and sustained a gun shot wound to his left wrist. Sergeant LeClaire returned fire. Officer Del Borrello, at the threshold of the apartment, heard Sergeant LeClaire repeatedly direct appellant to put his gun down; he also heard him call for help, saying he was hit and "officer down." 

Officers Del Borrello and Evans removed Sergeant DeSandro to the exterior hallway. Officer Del Borrello later heard appellant reloading bullets into a magazine; appellant then attempted to run out the front door. As appellant neared the front door, he shot Officer Del Borrello in the abdomen. Officer Del Borrello returned fire as he ran past the front door on his way to seek cover and assistance down the hallway. As appellant extended his arm and gun into the hallway, Officer Jones began to fire, causing appellant to return into the apartment. At least one more shot was heard coming from inside the apartment. 

Philadelphia Police began arriving on the scene, including the two officers who were assigned to the rear of the apartment complex. Sergeant Frank Hayes arrived while gunfire was still being exchanged and positioned himself outside the apartment. After a lull in the gunfire, Sergeant Hayes entered the apartment; he found a living room window was open with its security bars wrenched from the wall. He also saw Sergeant LeClaire on his knees at the end of a sofa with a large blood spot on the left side of his head. Sergeant Hayes proceeded to search the apartment for appellant, while other officers attended to Sergeant LeClaire. Appellant was not found in the apartment. Another officer searched the alley below the open apartment window. He observed blood in the snow, which he was able to track to an apartment on the first floor. He radioed for the SWAT team, which subsequently entered the apartment and arrested appellant. 

Sergeant LeClaire sustained two gunshot wounds, each from a .45 caliber bullet. The first shot was to his abdomen, striking his external iliac artery. Without immediate medical attention, this wound was fatal; however, Sergeant LeClaire would have been able to speak and fire his weapon for several minutes before sustaining fatal blood loss. The second wound was also fatal; it penetrated the left side of Sergeant LeClaire's forehead, passing through the left side of his brain and lodging between his scalp and skull. 

Despite an extensive search of the area the day of the shooting, the gun used to kill Sergeant LeClaire was not found. Police attempted to search a drain near where appellant entered the lower-level apartment, but the magnet used to recover evidence stuck to the sides of the drain, rendering it ineffective. Police returned over a year later and lowered a camera into the drain, revealing what appeared to be a gun inside. The drain was cut, and a gun was recovered with the magazine still inside, the hammer cocked, and one bullet in the chamber. Due to corrosion, the Commonwealth's ballistics expert could not say conclusively that it was the gun used to kill Sergeant LeClaire, although it was a.45 caliber with a seven-round magazine and matched Hutchinson's description of a gun owned by appellant. A loaded .32 caliber revolver, 19 spent .45 caliber casings and 18 unfired .45 caliber bullets were recovered in the apartment. Blood found on a .45 caliber ammunition box located on the sofa near Sergeant LeClaire's location was matched to appellant through DNA analysis. 

The Commonwealth charged appellant with murder, three counts of aggravated assault, and related crimes. A jury convicted him of three counts of aggravated assault and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon; the jury could not reach a verdict on the murder charge. As a third-strike offender, appellant received two life sentences for two of the aggravated assault charges, 25 to 50 years imprisonment on the third aggravated assault charge, and five to 10 years imprisonment on the firearms violation. Retrial on the murder charge resulted in a conviction of first degree murder. ... 

We find the Commonwealth provided sufficient evidence to prove each element of first degree murder. Appellant opened fire on the Warrant Unit when they were only a few feet inside the door. Appellant shot Sergeant LeClaire twice in a vital part of the body. Two other officers were shot before retreating from the apartment. Despite the fatal wound to his abdomen, Sergeant LeClaire was able to call for help and yell "officer down" for a period of time; appellant reloaded his gun, and shot Sergeant LeClaire in the forehead. Appellant's blood was found in several locations in the apartment, including on a box of ammunition on the couch near where Sergeant LeClaire was found. 

To show motive for firing upon the officers, the Commonwealth introduced a letter appellant wrote to his wife while incarcerated in 2002. The letter stated, in relevant part, "I don't know where my road is going to lead to ... for I see my future on the run.... I don't believe I can do a long period of time in jail. ... I believe that the police will have to kill me before I come back to jail." ... 

Despite shooting Sergeant LeClaire twice, appellant argues the Commonwealth did not prove he acted with malice because his use of force was justified. Appellant maintains he fired upon the officers in self-defense, or at the least, imperfect self-defense. He claims he was in the bedroom counting money when he heard someone at the door. He asserts he did not know they were officers as they did not identify themselves as such. Additionally, citing the time of night, the low lighting conditions, and the fact that not all of the officers were in uniform or were in dark uniform, he claims he only saw shadowy figures enter his home. He also claims he saw someone place their arm around Hutchinson's neck and put a gun to her head. Appellant alleges these circumstances caused him to believe he was the victim of a home invasion. He claims, as he began moving to confront the shadowy figures, he was shot in the arm, then in the knee. The shot to the knee caused him to fall to the floor, where he happened to find a loaded gun, and returned fire. He tried to follow Hutchinson out the front door, but when he got to the doorway, two people on opposite sides of the hallway started shooting at him. He then heard one person say to the other, "You hit me, man," to which the other replied, "No, you shot me, man." At that point, he returned inside the apartment, shot the lock off the window, pulled the security bars off, and escaped to the ground below. ... 

Viewing the facts in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth, we find the Commonwealth disproved appellant's claim of self-defense beyond a reasonable doubt. The Warrant Unit knocked on the door, identified themselves, and announced their purpose for over a minute. All of the officers wore ballistics vests identifying who they were on both the front and the back. They were finally let in by Hutchinson, who stated she knew they were officers. Hutchinson also stated the officers never threatened her. Although there were only a few sources of light in the apartment at that time, the officers were able to see well enough without their flashlights. When the officers were only a few feet into the apartment, appellant opened fire on them, immediately wounding Sergeant LeClaire. The other officers retreated to find cover, and more shots were exchanged. Hutchinson testified that while she was still in the apartment she could hear Sergeant LeClaire yell "officer down." Appellant also refused to obey the officers' commands to drop his weapon. At some point, appellant reloaded his gun and continued firing, eventually shooting Sergeant LeClaire in the head. As appellant was the aggressor, he was not justified in using deadly force; accordingly, his self-defense and imperfect self-defense claims fail. 

Appellant claims the verdict was against the weight of the evidence because the evidence presented at trial demonstrated, at worst, he mistakenly believed his home was being invaded, causing him to use deadly force. He relies on the same facts discussed in his challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence: he claims he and Hutchinson were not aware it was the police knocking on the door; the lighting conditions made it difficult for him to ascertain who entered his home; and, due to the early morning hour and the fact that he was counting money in the bedroom, he believed he was the victim of a home invasion. Appellant argues his belief that his home was being invaded was reasonable and should negate the inference of malice used to convict him.

I oppose any execution in which the person scheduled to die might be innocent of the crime for which they are to die. In all other executions, I stand mute: I neither oppose nor support the execution. In the case of Darien Houser, I stand mute.

The Case of Preston Hughes III: Madness!

Reader Anonymous has left the following comment to my post The Big Sleep.

At about 11:00am CST on July 18, 2012 Texas District Judge Ruben Guerrero set a November 15, 2012 execution date for Preston Hughes, III.

I have not been able to confirm the report, but I have no reason to doubt it.

ADDENDUM (21 July 2012):
Having followed the instructions of the wizened commentor, I offer the following screenshot.

I also can independently confirm that Preston Hughes III has indeed been scheduled for execution on July 18, 2012. As usual, the Hughes execution is scheduled for any time after 6 PM that day. Typically, Texas wastes little time. The prisoner is usually declared dead by 6:20 PM.

The date does not yet appear on the Texas Department of Criminal Justice website.

The date does not yet appear on the Death Penalty Information Center website.

The date does not yet appear on the Amnesty International website.

ADDENDUM (24 July 2012):
Hughes' execution date now appears on the TDCJ website.

The date also appears on the Death Penalty Information Center website.

The date also appears on the Amnesty International website.

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The Case of Preston Hughes III: The Big Sleep

No one wrote better than Raymond Chandler. No one.

From the conclusion of Chandler's The Big Sleep

Outside, the bright gardens had a haunted look, as though small wild eyes were watching me from behind the bushes, as though the sunshine itself had a mysterious something in its light. I got into my car and drove off down the hill. 

What did it matter where you lay once you were dead? In a dirty sump or in a marble tower on top of a high hill? You were dead, you were sleeping the big sleep, you were not bothered by things like that. Oil and water were the same as wind and air to you. You just slept the big sleep, not caring about the nastiness of how you died or where you fell. Me, I was part of the nastiness now.

I'm part of the nastiness now. For Marlowe, it was Rusty Regan lying at the bottom of an oil sump. For me it is a suicidal young woman lying in a lonely graveyard, a bullet hole in her face. It is a one-year-old boy, lying in his crib, asphyxiated by an electrical fire. It is a fifteen-year-old girl and her three-year-old cousin with stab wounds in their necks, bleeding out in a dark, overgrown field.

The Big Tension in the case of Preston Hughes is Shandra's time-of-death. Having learned from her autopsy report that her left carotid artery and left jugular vein had been transected, it seems impossible she survived her neck wound for more than a couple minutes, much less remained conscious long enough to provide a dying declaration. On the other hand, it is painful to accept that the police would actually frame someone for capital murder.

The implications associated with Shandra's neck wound are therefore numerous, startling, and ugly.

The Wound
From Shandra's autopsy report (Brain Teaser #2):

The stab wound track perforated the soft tissues and muscles of the neck, transected the left jugular vein and the left common carotid artery and the track ended in the soft tissues and muscles of the neck with an approximate depth of penetration of 3-1/2 inches.

Survivability
Ice hockey goalie Cling Malarchuk survived a nearly severed carotid. (Pools of Blood) Malarchuk survived, however, only because someone stuck their fingers into his neck wound and pinched the artery.

Malarchuk's life was saved by the team's trainer, Jim Pizutelli, a former Army medic who had served in Vietnam. He reached into Malarchuk's neck and pinched off the bleeding, not letting go until doctors arrived to begin suturing the wound. ... It is estimated that if the skate had hit 1/8 in (3mm) higher on Malarchuk's carotid, he would have been dead within two minutes.

The brain needs a constant supply of freshly oxygenated blood. Judoka have known this for more than a century. They know they can render an opponent unconscious within 14 seconds by restricting the flow of blood through both carotids. (Shime-Waza)

If only one carotid is blocked, the other carotid can still provide blood to the brain via the Circle of Willis. (Where's Willis?) The problem with a severed (rather than a blocked) carotoid is the rapid blood loss: the remaining carotid will have insufficient blood (and blood pressure) to supply the Circle of Willis.

As an aid to understanding how long a human might survive severed carotids, sheep provide a valuable analog. They have nearly the same blood volume and cardiac output as humans, they are routinely slaughtered by severing one or both of the carotids, and people have studied how long the sheep maintain brain function after their neck injuries. (Where's Willis?)

If both carotids (and jugulars) are severed, sheep will maintain brain function for 14 seconds. That is the same amount of time a judoka can remain conscious while being properly choked. If the carotid and jugular are severed on one side only, sheep lose brain function in 70 seconds. (Silence of the Lambs)

If we assume sheep are as good an analog for a single, non-functioning carotid as they are for two, then it is exceptionally unlikely that Shandra Charles survived more than 90 seconds after her carotid was completely severed.

The majority of medical expert witnesses recognize that humans cannot survive severed carotid for more than a few minutes. I base that on my survey of expert witness testimony from murder trials involving severed carotids, one side only. (Cases Involving Carotid Arteries)  In the summary chart below, the label "Several" represents several minutes, a couple of minutes, and within minutes.

Fifty percent of the medical expert witnesses put the maximum survival time as no more than several minutes, or a few minutes. Seventy-five percent of the experts place the survival time as no more than five minutes.

For what it is worth, the prosecution-friendly, fill-in medical examiner testified during Hughes' trial that he could not rule out the possibility Shandra was stabbed as early as 8:30 PM and died as late as 12:58 AM. In other words, he left open the possibility that Shandra might have lived for 268 minutes after having her carotid separated. That would make him a serious outlier.

Consciousness
Neither the prosecution nor the defense bothered to ask how long Shandra might have remained conscious after having her carotid severed. Once again, the experts agree it couldn't have been very long. (Cases Involving Carotid Arteries)

Not a single expert believed someone could remain conscious for more than three minutes after suffering a severed carotid. No one any where at any time, as far as I know, has suggested that someone with a severed carotid could regain consciousness without medical treatment, without at least first aid.

While the time-of-death summary might provide a minuscule glimmer of hope for those who really, really, really want to trust the HPD, the time-of-consciousness summary must shatter any thought that Shandra Charles could have been conscious when she allegedly named "Preston" as her attacker.

Implications
Stand by for precautionary statements.

IF Shandra Charles' left carotid artery was in fact transected, as per the autopsy report, AND

IF by "transected" the autopsy report means "severed" as I have so frequently used the word, AND

IF someone who suffers a severed carotid will lose (and not regain) consciousness within three minutes and/or dies within five minutes unless provided medical care, AND

IF that person is not provided medical care within such five minutes, AND

IF Shandra Charles was not exceptional with respect to succumbing to a severed carotid, AND

IF the HPD reports which I have frequently referenced are accurate representations of the actual HPD reports in this case, AND

IF the first officers on the scene did not arrive within five minutes of Shandra having her carotid severed,

THEN ...

HPD Officers Cook and Baker ...
knowingly or unwittingly filed a false police report. Shandra Charles could not have been alive and breathing deeply when they discovered her on the trail. This would explain why they did not bother to apply first aid to Shandra, though they applied CPR to Marcell, who they admitted was already dead.

If Cook and/or Baker testified similarly at a preliminary hearing or at trial or anywhere under oath (and I do not know that they did), then they knowingly or unwittingly provided false testimony. ... AND

HPD Sgt. D. Hamilton ...
knowingly filed a false police report. Shandra Charles could not have been alive, much less conscious, when he arrived on the scene. Shandra Charles could not, therefore, have provided a dying declaration. Shandra Charles could not have identified Preston as her attacker. This would explain why Sgt. Hamilton did not apply first aid to Shandra. It would also explain why Sgt. Hamilton strangely sat with Shandra all by himself, as Cook and Becker stood watching from Marcell's body.

If Hamilton testified similarly at a preliminary hearing or at trial or anywhere under oath (and I do not know that he did), then Sgt. Hamilton perjured himself. ... AND

HFD Ambulance Driver M.S. Miller and HFD Paramedic M. Atkinson ...
knowingly or wittingly transported a dead person while leaving a second dead person at the scene. I suspect, but cannot prove, that Shandra Charles died not long before she was discovered, that she was not displaying incontrovertible signs of being dead for a lengthy period, and that Sgt. Hamilton informed them she had spoken with him just recently. ... AND


HFD Ambulance Driver M.S. Miller and HFD Paramedic M. Atkinson ...
knowingly or wittingly delivered a dead person to the emergency room of West Houston Medical Center. This might help explain why the hospital refused to accept Shandra Charles. It's certainly less odious than turning away someone bleeding out from a neck wound. ... AND


HFD Ambulance Driver M.S. Miller and/or HFD Paramedic M. Atkinson ...
lied about Shandra being alive when they arrived on the scene and lied about Shandra saying something about her cousin, ASSUMING HPD Officer J.L. Waltmon was accurate when reporting what they told him. ... AND

HPD Officer J.L. Waltmon
filed a false police report when he claimed that Miller and/or Atkinson told him Shandra was alive when they arrived on scene and that she said something about her cousin, ASSUMING Miller and Atkinson never said any such thing.

If Miller and/or Atkinson did not say such thing, and if Waltmon testified under oath that they did (and I do not know that he did) then Officer Waltmon perjured himself. ... AND

HPD Sergeants Gafford and Bloyd
may have filed a false police report when they reported that they located Preston Hughes because Shandra told Hamilton that she had been attacked by someone named Preston, and that Preston lived in the Lakeside Apartments.

Even given all the qualifications I have already made abundantly clear, it is possible that Hamilton deceived Gafford and Bloyd about Shandra's dying declaration. That would leave unexplained, however, why the three began their search in the Lakehurst apartments, though Shandra allegedly told Hamilton her attacker lived at Lakeside. It would leave unexplained, also, why the three called off their search for the Preston who lived at Lakeside without searching for a Preston who lived at the Lakeside Green apartment complex, located just north of the lot where Shandra was found murdered. It would leave unexplained also why the three did not search for any Preston living in the Lakewood Village apartment complex, easily visible from Preston Hughes' bedroom widow.

Someone seemed familiar with the names of the apartment complexes in the area. Though Shandra allegedly said Lakeside, the three searched Lakehurst and only Lakehurst.

If Sergeants Gafford and/or Bloyd were aware that Shandra Charles did not provide a dying declaration, and if they testified at a preliminary hearing or at trial or anywhere under oath as per their police report, then Sergeants Gafford and/or Bloyd perjured themselves.

Why Preston Hughes?
The 64 Thousand Dollar Question becomes: Why did the HPD so quickly home in on Preston Hughes if Shandra did not identify him in a dying declaration. You need look no further than Sgt. Gafford's views of the Hartleys to understand why. I offer this reminder.

The uniformed patrol officers had detained a male, and knew the location of the males [sic] wife, who had called the police a short time before the compls were discovered. These witnesses are known in the area from past incidents,and are known by the area officers to be somewhat unstable, a condition which Sgt observed this date as well. The information provided by these witnesses does not appear relevant to this case.

Many police have little use for people they consider to be low-lifes, unless of course they need to purchase accomplice or snitch testimony. Drew Hartley and Barbara Szekely were on the HPD list of low-lifes, and so was Preston Hughes.

Recall this segment from Guest Blogger Al's introductory posts to this series:

This is a difficult matter. Hughes states that he ‘plead out’ this charge even though he was innocent of the crime. Do we believe this, especially considering the assault of Shandra Charles would be the second time this charge had been leveled at Hughes within a three year period?

Putting myself in place of a juror, I would be inclined to at least maintain some doubt about the conviction, and side with Hughes. First reason, Hughes serves no jail time, but is released on probation for sexually assaulting a 13 year old girl and then of threatening her with a gun after she filed a complaint with the police. In a law and order state like Texas, I don’t believe the state would release a violent criminal unless the prosecution’s case was exceptionally weak. Second, Hughes was 20 at the time, so the possibility that the relationship with his accuser was consensual is plausible. Lastly, as a young man without the resources to defend himself, it’s highly probable that he would take a plea deal like to this since it involved no jail time rather than risk a trial.

Now from Hughes v. Quarterman (2008)

At the punishment phase, the State called Tracy Heggar. She testified that Hughes had raped her in 1985, when she was thirteen years old. She testified further that Hughes had threatened her with a gun in an attempt to prevent her from testifying against him about the rape. The State also presented evidence that, at the time of the murders, Hughes was serving two ten-year probated terms for the aggravated sexual assault and aggravated assault of Heggar.

My hypothesis (and it is only that) follows immediately.

The HPD considered Hughes a child molester, the lowest of the low-lifes. They believed also that he had threatened his victim with a gun, yet he walked around free. (The evidence against him must have indeed been weak.) Hamilton arrives on the scene and finds a girl about the age of Tracy Heggar dead on the trail, her pants pulled part way down her hips. He knows Preston Hughes lives in the apartment nearby, but mis-remembers the name as Lakeside. (There were three complexes in the immediate area with "Lake" in their names.)

Shandra is dead, but not yet showing incontrovertible signs of being dead. He turns her over and sits alone beside her, instructing others to perform such tasks as keep watch over Marcell or run back to the Stop N Go to round up Drew Hartley.

When the paramedics arrive, he tells them that the boy is dead but the girl just spoke to him. They begin medical treatment by applying pressure to her neck wound, inserting an airway, and forcing blood into Shandra's right carotid artery.

They begin CPR. Once they begin, they cannot stop until their patient is declared dead.

They rush her to West Houston Memorial, just a mile away, and they roll her into the critical care unit. West Memorial, however, realizes that Shandra Charles is sleeping the big sleep, and they refuse to admit her. A quarrel ensues. That quarrel accounts for the missing 13 minutes in the paramedics' futile search for a hospital. Even as they arrive so late at Ben Taub, they continue to apply CPR.

HFD Ambulance Driver M.S. Miller and HFD Paramedic M. Atkinson stand out as the only players in this nasty, ugly case to perform their jobs professionally and heroically.

While Miller and Atkinson relentlessly try to save Shandra's life, Hamilton, Gafford, and Bloyd home in on Preston. They go through the motions of checking the resident list at Lakehurst, but they make no effort to check the resident lists at Lakewood Village or Lakeside Green. They knock on Preston's door then take him in for questioning.

Gafford makes it a point to note in his report that Hughes was the last person to leave his apartment and that Hughes locked the door with his keys. Nice touch. Gafford does not anticipate that the complex manager Joseph Casler will testify that at around 1:00 AM, he gave Gafford a set of master keys and pointed out three that would open Hughes' apartment door.

While Hughes is being transported to the station, or while Hughes is cooling his heels at the station, Gafford and/or Hamilton and/or Bloyd and/or Hale and/or others return to Preston's apartment and search it. They find a bloody knife in Preston's closet. The figure they have the right man. They don't realize that Preston's knife cannot be the murder weapon. They plant a pair of glasses in his couch, collect some evidence and have Officer F.L. Hale come in, take photographs, and collect the evidence.

Hale is not completely clued into what is going on. He takes a photograph of Preston's entry. That photo reveals he was there at night.

Hale records most, but not all of the evidence collected and turns it into the property room.  Property Officer  F.L. Martin puts Hale's typewritten property invoice into his own typewriter, enters a time of 2:58am and types his name. His typewriter has a fresher ribbon than does Hale's and the 2:58am stands out like a sore thumb. His typewritten text does not line up with Hale's typewritten text. Officer Martin signs his name to the invoice, as did Officer Hale.

Believing that they have the murder weapon in hand, Gafford and Bloyd begin their interview with Hughes at 4:10 AM. Preston acknowledges that he knows Evelyn Brown, Shandra's friend. Strangely, Gafford claims that acknowledgment convinced them to arrest Hughes.

Sgts then asked Hughes if he knew a female by the name of Shawn. Hughes stated that he knew one girl name Shawn ... that he last saw her when she came by his apartment about two months ago with a girlfriend named Evelyn. ...

It now became clear to Sgts that, due to: the naming of "Preston" by the #1 compl as the suspect, the close proximity of Preston Hughes residence to the murder scene, and the fact that Preston Hughes does know both the compl and Evelyn, Sgt. Gafford now arrested Preston Hughes as a suspect in this case.

I suggest they did not arrest Hughes because he acknowledged meeting Evelyn Brown two months earlier. I suggest instead that they arrested him because they found what they believed to be the murder weapon during a surreptitious, illegal search of his apartment.

The police type out their police reports after Hughes has confessed twice. They know names of the victims and know of their relationship. They incorporate that information into their story that Shandra as concerned about her cousin Marcell.

Shandra, however, could not have told them such a thing because she lapsed into unconsciousness within minutes of having her carotid severed, and she died soon thereafter. That means also that the paramedics could not have heard her say anything about her cousin. According to this hypothesis, because it is still a working hypothesis, Officer Waltmon joined in the conspiracy to frame Preston Hughes by reporting that the paramedics told him that Shandra Charles mentioned her cousin.

Not surprisingly, the HPD did not take a signed statement from the either ambulance drive D.S. Miller or paramedic M. Atkinson.

Gafford and others would also file a false police report (and possibly perjure themselves) when they wrote (or swore under oath) that they searched Preston's apartment only after securing a Voluntary Consent for Search and Seizure form around 5:30 AM. That form was pretty clearly manufactured.

-----

The HPD decided Preston Hughes should die. Now the State and people of Texas want to see him sleep the big sleep.

And now they are part of that nastiness.

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The Impending Execution of Yokamon Hearn

Yokamon Laneal Hearn sits on death row awaiting execution by the people of Texas, tomorrow, 18 July 2012. It seems unlikely he will survive the day.

I do not find a good summary of his case in any appellate decision available online. I therefore excerpt from a lengthy Amnesty International article about Hearn's case. 

On 26 March 1998, the body of Frank Meziere, a 23-year-old finance graduate from Texas A&M University who had been working with Merrill Lynch in Dallas for the previous eight months, was found in a field near a water treatment plant in Oak Cliff, southwest Dallas. He had last been seen alive the previous evening at a restaurant in the Upper Greenville area in the north of the city. After leaving the restaurant, he had apparently gone to a coin-operated carwash to wash his car and had been spotted by a group of youths in a nearby 7-Eleven store who were looking to steal a car. Two hours after his body was discovered, Frank Meziere’s abandoned Ford Mustang was found in the car park of a shopping centre about five miles (eight kilometres) away in East Kiest, Dallas. 

Yokamon Hearn and Delvin Diles were arrested at a motel in Dallas on 29 March 1998. 

In an interview that weekend, Yokamon Hearn’s mother described Yokamon, her only child, as “a little slow, to be honest… He’s like a 15-year-old”. Having spoken to him by phone on 29 March after his arrest, she said that he was “trying not to break down, but I could hear the scaredness in his voice”. 

Yokamon Hearn could not afford a lawyer so he was appointed one by the trial judge. 

Yokamon Hearn’s current lawyers have argued that his conduct following the crime – including what the prosecution portrayed to the jury as remorselessness and a reason for the death penalty – provide an insight into his mental deficiencies:

Mr Hearn drove the murder victim’s car back to the house of one of his co-defendants. Someone told him to leave the car somewhere else, and another person directed him to leave it in the parking lot of a shopping center. Mr Hearn left the car in a shopping center parking lot, as directed, but failed to take minimal steps to ensure that the car would be inconspicuous. The lights were left on and the trunk was left open, thereby drawing attention of an individual who notified the police. In addition, Mr Hearn left the victim’s wallet with a friend, Aaron Runnels, who was himself impaired. A relative of Mr Runnels found the wallet in Mr Runnels’ room, where it had been left in plain sight. 

After the commission of the crime, Mr Hearn boasted to others that he had killed someone. One person explained [at the trial] that Mr Hearn, ‘was trying to make himself look… like a big person… [He] was talking loud, walking around, smiling. He kept repeating what they did and he said he killed a white boy…’ Aaron Runnels testified that the day after the murder, Mr Hearn was waving a newspaper article about the case, ‘telling everybody that he killed the man.’

In 2006, Yokamon Hearn’s current lawyers obtained sworn statements from his three codefendants, Delvin Diles, Teresa Shavonn Shirley, and Dwight Paul Burley, all serving sentences at that time in various facilities in Texas for their roles in the abduction and killing of Frank Meziere. 

Delvin Diles said: “The night Mr Meziere died, it was Dwight’s idea to go jacking. Jacking meant to take someone’s car. Before we got to the 7-Eleven, there was no plan to kill Mr Meziere or anyone else. Once we were at the 7-Eleven, the fact that we didn't have masks to cover our faces came up. I said that we should kill Mr Meziere and Yogi [Yokamon] said he was cool with it. It was never Yogi’s idea to kill the man”. 

Teresa Shirley said:“Yogi was an ‘impressionist’. When I say that Yogi was an ‘impressionist’, I mean that he did things to impress the guys in the group… The night Mr Meziere got shot, the plan was to go to North Dallas and ‘hit a lick’. To ‘hit a lick’ means to rob someone. I know that the plan was not to kill anyone because when we returned to Dwight’s house after Mr Meziere got shot, Dwight and Yogi got into a fight. Dwight was yelling at Yogi asking him why he shot the guy, why he did that”. 

Dwight Burley said: “Yogi rolled with the flow. Yogi followed along with what the group decided… Yogi was a follower. He didn't have the skills to be a leader. When we went to North Dallas the day Mr Meziere got killed, the plan was not to kill anyone. We only planned to get money. The whole thing wasn’t supposed to be like it happened. There was no plan, it just happened. He never said he was going to shoot the guy”. 

On 10 December 1998 – the 50th anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – the 12 jurors deliberated for about 50 minutes before rejecting Yokamon Hearn’s not guilty plea and finding him guilty of the murder of Frank Meziere. “We’re pleased with the verdict and the speed of the verdict”, the prosecutor was quoted as saying afterwards.  

The speed continued. The sentencing hearing began on that same day and ended on the next, 11 December 1998. The jury deliberated for about an hour before handing down a death sentence. 

At the conclusion of the sentencing phase, the jury had been asked to consider a question, namely: “Do you find from the evidence beyond a reasonable doubt that there is a probability that the defendant, Yokamon Laneal Hearn, would commit criminal acts of violence in the future that would constitute a continuing threat to society?” A jury’s affirmative response to the so-called “future dangerousness” question is a prerequisite for a death sentence in Texas. Such a sentencing scheme asks a jury to engage in little more than crystal ball gazing – predicting human behaviour based on an individual’s past conduct. Prosecutors encourage jurors to vote for death by painting a picture of a dangerously irredeemable defendant, and perhaps by stoking fear of crime. Arguing for the death penalty at the 2011 murder trial of teenaged offender Cortne Mareese Robinson, for example, a Texas prosecutor told the jury that a razor blade had been found in Robinson’s possession while in pre-trial custody. “The World Trade Center was brought down by a razor blade,” the prosecutor said. 

The jury voted for death. 

In Yokamon Hearn’s case, the prosecution presented evidence that the defendant had boasted to friends that the killing had made the headlines. The case “proved that criminals read the paper”, the lead prosecutor said immediately after Hearn’s trial. “Hopefully, the next group of would-be criminals will read this paper about Yokamon Hearn getting the death penalty and it will be a deterrent”. 

In the absence of proof of any special deterrent effect of the death penalty, hope – rather than any guarantee – that the death penalty will deter murder is all there can be for its advocates. Hope is an unsafe platform on which to base an irrevocable punishment. 

Forty years ago, concurring in the decision to end the death penalty in the USA as then being applied, US Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall referred to this absence of proof: “Despite the fact that abolitionists have not proved non-deterrence beyond a reasonable doubt, they have succeeded in showing by clear and convincing evidence that capital punishment is not necessary as a deterrent to crime in our society. This is all that they must do. We would shirk our judicial responsibilities if we failed to accept the presently existing statistics and demanded more proof. It may be that we now possess all the proof that anyone could ever hope to assemble on the subject.”

For a complete explanation of Amnesty International's opposition to Hearn's execution, visit their summary at the link provided above.

It is my public and unwavering strategy to oppose only those executions in which I feel the person to be executed may be innocent of the crime for which he is to die. In all other case, I stand mute regarding the propriety of the execution. I neither support it nor oppose it.

In the case of Yokamon Hearn, I stand mute.

ADDENDUM (18 July 2012):
Yokamon Hearn was executed by the people of Texas on 18 July 2012. He was pronounced dead after an injection of pentobarbital. Cause of death will be recorded as "Homicide", the killing of one human by another.