The Impending Execution of Michael Wayne Hall

Michael Wayne Hall is scheduled to be executed by the people of Texas on 15 Feb 2011 for the murder of 19-year-old Amy Robinson. I find no credible evidence that Hall might be factually innocent of the crime.

For those of you convinced that we execute only guilty people, I suggest you consider the many cases of people wrongfully executed. Examples of people executed though likely innocent include (but are no means limited to) Johnny Frank Garrett, Frances Elaine Newton, and Cameron Todd Willingham.

For those of you opposed to the death penalty under any condition, I suggest you familiarize yourself with the details of some of the crimes for which people are condemned to die. For the details of the crime committed by Michael Wayne Hall, I offer the following description taken from his appeal Hall v. State: 

Eighteen-year-old Hall and his friend Robert Neville decided to kill someone because Hall was angry that he had a "sucky-ass" life. They started searching for the right victim and preparing for their crime by obtaining rifles, pellet guns, a crossbow, and ammunition. After much looking, Hall and Neville finally chose nineteen-year-old Amy Robinson, a friend and former coworker, because she trusted them and they "didn't have to put bruises on her to get her in the car." The evidence also revealed that Amy had a genetic disorder that made her small and mentally and physically slow. She stood four feet five inches tall and had the mental capacity of a third or fourth grader.

On February 15, 1998, Hall and Neville went looking for Amy in order to carry out their murderous plan. They checked her schedule at the Kroger grocery store and then lay in wait for her to ride by on her bicycle on her way to work. When the pair saw Amy, they coaxed her into the car, promising to drop her at work after they circled around in the country. As Neville drove, Amy complained that she did not want to be late for work.

Neville then pretended to have a flat tire and pulled the car over on a dirt road by a remote field. Hall and Neville got out of the car and walked into the field carrying their weapons while an unsuspecting Amy waited in the car listening to the radio. At some point, Hall persuaded Amy to get out of the car, telling her she needed to go talk to Neville near a tree. As Amy walked toward Neville, he fired a crossbow at her several times. Neville missed each shot, but Amy became angry when the last arrow grazed her hair. When Amy started walking back to the car, Hall shot her in the back of her leg with his pellet gun. Hall and Neville laughed while Amy cried in pain.

Meanwhile, Neville returned to the car and got his .22 caliber rifle. When Hall managed to maneuver Amy back into the field, Neville shot her in the chest. Hall then shot her in the chest "three or four or six times" with the pellet gun. Amy fell to the ground making loud noises and shaking. Hall then stood over her and stared for five to ten minutes. The pair worried that someone would hear Amy, so Neville shot her in the head, killing her instantly. Hall and Neville then left Amy and her bicycle in an area where they would not be easily discovered.

A few days later, they returned to the scene. Neville fired shots into Amy's dead body, and Hall took keys and money from her pocket. When Amy's family and coworkers realized she was missing, a massive search ensued. More than two weeks later, authorities focused on Hall and Neville. Fearing they would be caught, the pair fled Arlington but were soon arrested when they attempted to cross the border into Mexico. The authorities found Amy's body on the day of the arrest.

Hall apparently gave an incriminating interview to the press while in custody. One basis for his appeal was the admissibility of the interview as evidence during his trial. Again from  Hall v. State:

Finally, Hall boasted in his media interview that he was the one who got Amy to trust him, and she would have escaped had Neville tried to commit the offense without him. Indeed, Hall told the media that he had no remorse for Amy's death. When asked how he felt about Amy dying the way she did, Hall snickered, "Well, I wouldn't want to be in her place. She had to take a lot of pain." After his arrest, Hall told law enforcement and the media that he and Neville had wanted to become serial killers and kill one to five people a week. They also wanted to become white supremacists and kill African Americans.

From the Texas Execution Information Center, we learn more based on  the execution (5 years ago) of Michael Wayne Hall's accomplice, Robert Neville:

That day [of the murder], a store employee called Robinson's family to notify them that she had not shown up for work. The family then called the police, who questioned Neville and Hall. Neville told the police that he worked with Robinson and knew her socially, but had not seen her in a couple of months.

Two weeks later, Hall's mother reported to the police that Hall had been missing for several days. Hall's stepbrother told the police that Hall had told him he and Neville had abducted and killed Robinson. Neville and Hall were arrested on 3 March in Eagle Pass, as they were attempting to cross into Mexico.

Neville admitted killing Robinson and told police where to find her body. He said that one day when he and Hall were drunk, he told Hall that he "would just like to [go] out and kill somebody." They initially discussed killing a black person, but then changed their minds and agreed that Amy Robinson, being small and mentally challenged, was an easier target. Robinson was also part Native American.

After his arrest, Robinson told reporters that he and Hall wanted to become serial killers of racial minorities. "We had a bet going to see who could shoot and kill the most people between the two of us," he said. "No matter if it was blacks or Mexicans - anybody as long as they weren't our color."

Neville used his final words to apologize for his role in the crime.

Yes.  Ms. Carolyn Barker, and Tina, I would like to apologize to you all.  To Amy's sister, and everybody else here.  I love you all.  I hope you can find it in yourselves to forgive me and I hope all this here will kinda settle your pain and I hope the Lord will give you comfort and peace.  And I just want you to know I am very sorry for what I have done.  And if I see Amy on the other side, I will tell her how much you love and miss her and we will have a lot to talk about.  Mom, Dad, and Charlotte -- I am sorry for putting you through all this pain and stuff.  I did talk to Brandon and I think I got a little stuff stopped.  I love you all and I will see you on the other side. Okay.

I oppose the execution of people who might be factually innocent of the crime for which they are to die. I suspect that to prevent the execution of the factually innocent, we might have to ban the death penalty entirely.

With respect specifically to the execution of Michael Wayne Hall, I stand mute.

Too Many Waynes

One of the fine books ever written is The Sneetches and Other Stories. One story in that collection is "Too Many Daves." At the risk of a stop-and-desist order, I include the story below in its entirety.

Did I ever tell you that Mrs. McCave
Had twenty-three sons, and she named them all Dave?
Well, she did. And that wasn't a smart thing to do.

You see, when she wants one, and calls out "Yoo-Hoo!
Come into the house, Dave!" she doesn't get one.
All twenty-three Daves of hers come on the run!

This makes things quite difficult at the McCaves'
As you can imagine, with so many Daves.

And often she wishes that, when they were born,
She had named one of them Bodkin Van Horn.
And one of them Hoos-Foos. And one of them Snimm.
And one of them Hot-Shot. And one Sunny Jim.
And one of them Shadrack. And one of them Blinkey.
And one of them Stuffy. And one of them Stinkey.
Another one Putt-Putt. Another one Moon Face.
Another one Marvin O'Gravel Balloon Face.
And one of them Ziggy. And one Soggy Muff.
One Buffalo Bill. And one Biffalo Buff.
And one of them Sneepy. And one Weepy Weed.
And one Paris Garters. And one Harris Tweed.
And one of them Sir Michael Carmichael Zutt.
And one of them Oliver Boliver Butt.
And one of them Zanzibar Buck-Buck McFate . . . .
But she didn't do it. And now it's too late.

Chuck Shepard, at his blog News of the Wierd, notes that a disproportionate number of notorious murderers have the middle name of Wayne. I hadn't thought about it before, but he's right. John Wayne Gacy immediately comes to mind. At Chuck's site, he presents his list of 224 instances. He stopped counting in March of 2008.

I decided to check my database of people executed by Texas for people named Wayne. I found 21 out of 464. That's almost 5% of the total. In each case, Wayne was the middle name. Never the first name, never the last name, always the middle name.

If Texas executes Michael Wayne Hall on 15 February, as they are scheduled to do, he will be number 22.

The Impending Execution of Martin Link

Martin Link is scheduled to be executed by the people of Missouri on 9 Feb 2011 for the kidnapping, rape, and murder of 11-year-old Elissa Self. I find no credible evidence that Link might be factually innocent of the crime.

For those of you convinced that we execute only guilty people, I suggest you consider the many cases of people wrongfully executed. Examples include (but are no means limited to) Johnny Frank Garrett, Frances Elaine Newton, and Cameron Todd Willingham.

For those of you opposed to the death penalty under any condition, I suggest you familiarize yourself with the details of some of the crimes for which people are condemned to die. For the details of the crime committed by Martin Link, I offer the following description taken from his appeal State v. Link.

On Friday, January 11, 1991, just before 6:30 a.m., eleven-year-old Elissa Self left her house at 3844 Humphrey Street in South St. Louis to walk less than three blocks to catch her bus to Enright Classical Junior Academy, a school for gifted children. It was a cold, rainy morning, and Elissa's mother insisted that she wear boots and carry an umbrella. Elissa never arrived at school, and at about 8:20 a.m. the school called Elissa's parents to tell them that Elissa was not present. Elissa's parents drove around the neighborhood looking for her, but they were unable to find her, and they went home and called the police.

During the next four days, police canvassed the neighborhood, interviewed possible witnesses, and investigated calls and letters on possible sightings. On Tuesday, January 15, 1991, two persons who were scavenging at the Black Bridge recreation area along the St. Francis River, 135 miles south of St. Louis in Wayne County, found Elissa's body in a large pile of debris that had washed up on the riverbank. Police soon searched the area and found Elissa's boots, but none of her other belongings. One of the small boulders that defined the perimeter of the parking area had been pushed out of place, and there was a tire rut in the gravel leading up to that boulder.

Elissa's body was autopsied twice. The autopsies revealed two fresh oval-shaped bruises on Elissa's upper left arm, which were consistent with someone grabbing her arm tightly. Her lips were bruised and torn on the inside from being pressed against her teeth. The autopsies also showed that she had been raped. Her external genitalia were bruised and swollen, and there was a five-millimeter tear in the area leading to her vagina. Her hymen had been torn as well. Inflammation had begun in her vagina, and blood in her panties had partially dried, indicating that she survived for some time after the rape.

The cause of death was ligature strangulation. There were two long, thin bruises, about five to seven millimeters wide, around her entire neck. These bruises were consistent with a cord having been wrapped completely around her neck, with each end of the cord held in front of her. A pathologist testified that Elissa had been strangled to death slowly, losing consciousness after about five to ten minutes and dying after about thirty minutes. Although she still may have been alive when her body was dumped in the river, the amount of brain damage she sustained from the strangulation indicated that she never would have regained consciousness. Because the cold water had preserved her body, the time of death could be established only during the interval between the time of her kidnapping to twenty-four hours before she was found.

At about 9:24 p.m., on January 26, 1991, eleven days after Elissa's body was found, a City of Kirkwood police officer saw Martin Link driving with a headlight out and attempted to pull him over. Link led the officer on a high-speed chase, eventually crashing his car into a telephone pole, and was then taken into custody. In a search of the car, officers found a jar of petroleum jelly with Link's fingerprints on the jar and flecks of blood embedded in the jelly. In addition, officers took tape lifts from the inside of the car in order to obtain fiber evidence.

During the investigation, officers discovered that Link had grown up five blocks from where Elissa was kidnapped and had attended the school near Elissa's bus stop. In the early 1980s, Link lived in a house less than a mile away from the Black Bridge recreation area, the place where Elissa's body was found. At the time Link was arrested, he was living in South St. Louis, about 1½ miles from where Elissa was kidnapped.

Officers also discovered that Link was registered at a motel just outside of St. Louis from January 9, 1991 to January 11, 1991. Link checked out at an unknown time on January 11, the morning that Elissa was kidnapped. That night, at about 1:55 a.m. on January 12, Link checked into a motel in Desloge, Missouri, which is about seventy miles north of Black Bridge on a direct route from Black Bridge to St. Louis. A witness noted that Link's car was loud, "like a car that had a bad muffler on it." At about 8:30 a.m., Link called the S & S Muffler shop and "was very insistent" that he get his car fixed that day. He was told to bring in the car that afternoon and did so at 2:30 p.m. He explained to the employees that he was coming from further south and that he had to get his muffler fixed or else he would get a ticket in St. Louis. While he was at the shop, he kept pacing in the waiting room and checking to see if the work on his car was finished.

As part of the investigation, a special agent at the FBI crime laboratory compared three fibers found on the front passenger seat of Link's car with fibers from the sweater Elissa had been wearing when she was kidnapped. The agent determined that the fibers found in Link's car were "consistent with having come from the victim's sweater."

DNA tests conducted by two different labs showed that Link's DNA matched the DNA found in sperm cells on vaginal swabs taken from Elissa's body. The state's DNA expert set the odds of such a match at one in 6,600. The testing also revealed that Elissa's DNA matched the DNA in the blood found in the petroleum jelly jar seized from Link's car. The odds of that match were one in 48. The joint probability of both of these matches occurring by chance was less than one in 300,000.

Link did not testify at trial, but he called two witnesses who had reported seeing Elissa after 6:30 a.m. on January 11, 1991. He also called a detective who had worked with one of these witnesses to make a composite drawing of a man she allegedly saw with Elissa, but who did not resemble Link. He also called two witnesses who worked as buyers in the clothing industry to testify to the large number of cotton/ramie sweaters, like the one Elissa wore, that were imported every year. He called two DNA experts to testify that the DNA tests performed by the other two laboratories were faulty. In addition, one of the DNA experts and a third expert testified that the state's conclusions about the probabilities of Link's DNA being found in the sperm on the vaginal swab and Elissa's DNA being found in the blood in the petroleum jelly jar were incorrect. Finally, Link called an accident reconstructionist who testified that the boulder at Black Bridge could not have damaged the muffler on Link's car.

In rebuttal, the state presented its own accident reconstruction evidence. Investigating officers testified that they obtained a car of the same year and model, with the same kind of tires, bumper arrangement, and exhaust system as Link's car. They backed the car up to the boulder that had been moved out of place at Black Bridge, whereupon the tailpipe and muffler made contact with the boulder, thus showing that the boulder could have caused the damage to Link's car.

I oppose the execution of people who might be factually innocent of the crime for which they are to die. I suspect that to prevent the execution of the factually innocent, we might have to ban the death penalty entirely.

With respect specifically to the execution of Martin Link, I stand mute.

The Impending Execution of Roy Willard Blankenship

[Note: This post was written prior to the stay granted to Roy Willard Blankenship. His execution has been re-scheduled for some time between 23 and 30 June, 2011.]

Roy Willard Blankenship is scheduled to be executed by the people of Georgia on 9 Feb 2011 for the rape and murder of 78-year-old Sarah Mims Bowen. I find no credible evidence that Blankenship might be factually innocent of the crime.

For those of you convinced that we execute only guilty people, I suggest you consider the many cases of people wrongfully executed. Examples include (but are no means limited to) Johnny Frank Garrett, Frances Elaine Newton, and Cameron Todd Willingham.

For those of you opposed to the death penalty under any condition, I suggest you familiarize yourself with the details of some of the crimes for which people are condemned to die. For the details of the crime committed by Roy Willard Blankenship, I offer the following description taken from his appeal Blankenship v. Hall.

At around 4:15 p.m. on March 2, 1978, officers from the Savannah Police Department responded to a call at 404 West 44th Street. They were directed to the second-floor apartment of Sarah Mims Bowen. Several members of Bowen's family already had arrived, having been contacted by her downstairs neighbor. Inside the apartment, police found a blood-stained paper towel in the living room. In the bedroom, the body of 78-year-old Bowen lay dead and naked on her bed. She had bruises on her arms and hands, and her face was beaten and bloodied. A plastic bottle of hand lotion had been forced into her vagina.

There were footprints found on the porch outside Bowen's apartment. Police found similar prints inside the apartment. Outside the house, they traced the prints from the bannister supporting the porch southwest along the ground towards the street, in the general direction of the apartment of Roy Willard Blankenship.

Dr. Rodrick Guerry performed an autopsy. He determined Bowen had been severely beaten, suffering repeated blows to her face. Bowen had preexisting chronic pericarditis and arteriosclerosis, and the autopsist attributed Bowen's death to heart failure precipitated by a severe assault. The autopsy also revealed she had been vaginally raped. Semen was found in her vagina, which tests demonstrated came from a blood type-O individual. Both Blankenship and Bowen were type-O. In addition, Dr. Guerry stated the inside of Bowen's mouth and throat were red and bloodied, injuries consistent with oral rape. However, tests did not reveal the presence of semen. Scrapings beneath the nails on Bowen's right hand also tested positive for type-O. Based on the condition of the body, the coroner concluded Bowen had been raped while alive, was beaten, and suffered heart failure as a result.

A fingerprint lifted from glass broken in from the balcony and found inside the apartment matched Blankenship. On March 11, an arrest warrant for Blankenship was prepared, as well as search warrants for his apartment. Inside the apartment, police found shoes belonging to Blankenship whose tracks matched those found in and around Bowen's apartment.

Police arrested Blankenship and he waived his right to remain silent. Blankenship spoke with police and described his presence in Bowen's apartment in the early morning of March 2, 1978. His oral statement was transcribed, and he signed the transcription. In it, he confessed to the following:

I went up on the iron rail on the side of the porch and climbed over the banister. I stood up there for a few minutes thinking, what the hell, I really didn't know what to think. I had to be drunk. Stoned. And I kicked the window in and I waited. When I kicked the window in to see if anybody heard it, I could've got shot or something. I guess I should have. It would have been better. I went in through the window, I think. I scraped my arm on the window. I don't think it cut it. I went into the next room, I saw no one. Just the bedroom. I looked around there and the door was opened into the next room. I went up to the door and started to go through when I saw a mirror straight ahead in the next room where the lady was. I seen her reflection through the mirror sitting in a chair so I stood beside the door for awhile watching her pray or something. Moaning. I don't know. Then I grabbed her. I think her mouth so she did not scream. [sic] I covered her mouth and her nose and then she slid down in the chair. She fell on the floor and I fell on top of her. After I fell over on top of her I didn't have to hold her mouth or anything. She was not screaming or kicking or anything. So this blood was coming out of her head, I think, on the right side. I think. I pushed this little stool back and I picked her up and I carried her and laid her on the bed. All right. I put her on the bed. She had some pajamas on, I think. I took them off. It's crazy. When I put her on the bed and took her clothes off, I was drunk, I guess. I said I may as well go ahead and get some pleasure. That's when I had the relationship with her. As far as I know, I thought I was in the right hole. After that I got up and was afraid that I might have hurt her. I thought I'd better get out of there. I left as soon as I did that shit. I left. I went the same way I came. I was wearing the same shoes that the police confiscated from my house today. I watched her about 10 minutes. After I grabbed her she fell to the floor and I put her on the bed. Right after that I shot off or got my pleasure or whatever you want to call it. I put back on my clothes and left. It probably was not long. I was in the house maybe 45 minutes or an hour all together. I don't know why I did it. I was drunk. I know I had to be drunk. That time in the morning I had to be just coming back from the Orential [sic] Lounge. I came by myself. I had been at the bar with Joe and Alex. They left the bar about 1:30 or 2:00. I know I stayed until closing, 3:00. I walked from the bar to the house. The Orential [sic] Lounge on Abercorn Street. I shoot pool all the time. It takes me about five to seven minutes to get to my house walking. I never did make it home. I stopped at her house and went upstairs before I went home. I know the witnesses in the bar—waitresses, sorry. I know the waitresses in the bar. I don't dance. I just shoot pool and get high and get drunk. I was drinking that night. I was drinking burbon and coke. I don't remember anything about the plastic bottle.

In the footnotes, we find this insight regarding the confession.

Blakenship did not simply give a narrative account of the evening. His statement was a mixture of his narrative and responses to questions and comments from the interrogating officers. Only his statements were recorded, typed and signed as a confession.

During his trial, Blankenship testified that he did enter the apartment and assault the victim, but did not rape or murder her.

Blankenship testified in his own defense. During the time of his arrest, he worked at the Guerry Lumber Company. He said he was an alcoholic and also took Qualudes, a tranquilizer.

Blankenship knew Bowen; in fact, he had been inside her apartment prior to the night of her death, performing odd jobs such as replacing blown light bulbs. He would frequently talk with her on weekends when he would pass by her apartment and she was sitting on her porch.

Discussing the events of March 1 and 2, Blankenship noted he began drinking soon after he returned home from work. After some time, he went to the Oriental Bar. From 7:30 that evening until the bar closed at 3:00 a.m., Blankenship continued to shoot pool, drink, and ingest Qualudes. After the bar closed, Blankenship headed home alone.

Instead of returning home, however, Blankenship scaled the balcony of Bowen's apartment. Once on the balcony, he knocked on Bowen's door. There was no answer. He kicked in a window and crawled into the apartment. As he made his way through the apartment, Blankenship saw Bowen in a mirror sitting in her chair. Bowen was speaking to someone near the area of her kitchen. Blankenship said he reached out to grab Bowen and she jumped, tripped over a foot stool, and fell to the floor.

Bowen was now bleeding from her head and was unconscious. Blankenship picked her up and moved her into the bedroom. Once he placed her on the bed, he pulled her pajama bottoms partially off her body. He did not remove her pajama top, which Blankenship said already was unbuttoned. He tried to have sex with her, but could not achieve an erection. At this time, Bowen appeared to be regaining consciousness, so Blankenship left the apartment the same way he entered.

Hendrix asked Blankenship whether the pictures of the crime scene matched his recollection of how he left it. He insisted they did not; he testified that, when he left her, her pajamas where still partially on, whereas in the photos she was completely naked. The plastic bottle was also not there when he said he left. In addition, he said her face was not in the same condition it was when he left it, and that she had not been beaten up.

Blankenship also testified as to his confession. He had been drinking before being arrested by the police in his apartment. He said he did speak with the police, and he did sign the statement. He said, however, that he had pointed out several errors in the typed statement to the interrogating officers, who told him to go ahead and sign it despite the errors. The errors he pointed out—including, for example, that instead of "slid[ing] down in the chair" she actually jumped up from the chair—essentially coincided with the story he had told the jury. In general, his testimony was that the story he told the detectives was the same as what he told the jury, and the typed confession was riddled with errors. He denied having intercourse with Bowen or ever hitting her.

I oppose the execution of people who might be factually innocent of the crime for which they are to die. I suspect that to prevent the execution of the factually innocent, we might have to ban the death penalty entirely.

With respect specifically to the execution of Roy Willard Blankenship, I stand mute.

Oklahoma or Aljazeera: Which is More Rational?

An online program called Fault Lines has an extended (23 minute), reasonably balanced, and well done video about the death penalty. One of the interesting things about the program is that it is produced by Aljazeera, the Arabic news station that came into US awareness during the Second Gulf War. The quality of the video is such that had they used the narrator from Frontline, and had they published the video anonymously, there would be no reason to believe it wasn't a Frontline product.

Aljazeera focused on the death penalty in Oklahoma. They interviewed, among others, Frank Keating. Keating was governor of Oklahoma for eight years beginning in January of 1995.  He presided over 54 executions. At one point, Keating offered this insight into our justice system:

"Nobody goes to court because they're misunderstood. Nobody goes to court because they're accused of a crime they didn't commit. They go to court because they did something."

Well there you go. According to Oklahoma's ex-governor, not only do we not imprison any innocent people, we do not even take them to trial. Those people found not guilty must be not guilty only in a technical sense, not in an actual sense. After all: "Nobody goes to court because they're accused of a crime they didn't commit."

Keating also offered this insight.

"In my case, any recommendation, unless it had to do with guilt or innocence, I ignored. I always brought the defense attorney in, the prosecutor in. The question I asked was 'Did this person do it?' In no case was the answer 'No.'"

I believe I'll look into the executions that took place under Frank Keating's watch. Unfortunately, I suspect I will find some egregious cases.

Stay tuned.