Would have been 42 years old now.
Posted on 02/20/2006 9:41:49 PM PST by nickcarraway
SAN FRANCISCO Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has denied a request by an attorney for condemned inmate Michael Morales that the governor reconsider granting Morales a clemency hearing.
Morales, 46, was convicted of the 1981 sexual assault and murder of 17-year-old Terri Winchell of Lodi, and is scheduled to die by lethal injection at San Quentin State Prison at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday.
Schwarzenegger announced Friday that he had decided not to grant clemency to Morales, stating, "Morales' claim that he is a changed man does not excuse the brutal murder and rape of Terri Winchell."
On Sunday, Kenneth Starr, who is one of the attorneys representing Morales, wrote to the governor asking him to rethink his decision, citing reasons including that the judge who sentenced Morales now opposes his impending execution. Starr sent Schwarzenegger a follow-up letter on the matter today.
Shortly after 6:30 p.m. today, Schwarzenegger issued a statement denying Starr's request.
The governor did not make any further comments on the case, except to reiterate that every clemency decision "is made only after consideration of all the circumstances and careful deliberation."
Schwarzenegger's reply to Starr's request has likely sealed Morales' fate, as his legal options appear to have been exhausted.
This afternoon, the U.S. Supreme Court denied two requests by attorneys for Morales for a stay of execution.
The appeals involved two different arguments regarding the attorneys' allegations that California's current lethal injection process is unconstitutional cruel and unusual punishment, and that a key prosecution witness lied at Morales' 1983 trial.
Morales' attorneys were not available for comment about the Supreme Court's rejection of their appeals.
Nathan Barankin, a spokesman for the state attorney general's office, said he is not aware of any pending legal actions by Morales' attorneys.
"There are no more legal appeals outstanding," Barankin said. Condemned for torturing, raping and murdering the 17-year-old high school student 25 years ago, Morales appealed Monday to the justices to block his looming execution, claiming that the testimony of an inmate used in his conviction is false, and that California's three-drug death cocktail, and the way it is administered, amounts to cruel and unusual punishment.
Morales and his attorneys complained that the prisoner might feel too much pain if the sedative he is given doesn't make him unconscious before a paralyzing agent and the final heart-stopping drugs begin coursing through his veins.
The Supreme Court has never directly addressed whether death sentences carried out by lethal injection are cruel and unusual punishment. The justices have upheld executions in general despite the pain they might cause inmates, but have left unsettled whether alleged pain in lethal injections is unconstitutionally excessive and can be avoided.
U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel of San Jose recommended that California employ two anesthesiologists -- one to be in the execution chamber with Morales and another nearby -- to ensure the inmate is unconscious before the two remaining drugs are injected.
Fogel issued the order after studying the medical logs of executed inmates and finding that there were "substantial questions" about whether prisoners were conscious and feeling unacceptable levels of pain.
On Sunday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Morales' argument that Fogel's order is not enough, a decision that is being appealed to the Supreme Court.
"In addressing Morales' concerns about the anesthesiologists' monitoring role, the court explicitly clarified that the anesthesiologists will take all medically appropriate steps necessary to ensure that Morales is and remains unconscious," the appeals court ruled.
Although similar versions of the injection method are used in 36 of the 38 states with capital punishment, Morales' lawyers argued the lethal cocktail still amounted to cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment.
"The quick fix suggested by the district court is completely untested, has never been subjected to any comprehensive legal, medical or administrative review, and represents nothing more than a high stakes experiment with Mr. Morales' constitutional rights hanging in the balance," San Francisco attorney John Grele wrote in one appeal.
Dane Gillette, senior assistant attorney general, said Morales' rights would not be violated under the old protocol and won't with the new one.
"Because there is no doubt that he cannot and will not suffer pain if unconscious, the remedy crafted by the district court, though hardly necessary as a constitutional matter, provides Morales with precisely the form of assurance he demanded," Gillette said.
Another petition rejected by the appeals court, the subject of a separate appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, had the support of Ventura County Superior Court Judge Charles McGrath, who presided over Morales' 1983 trial after it was moved from San Joaquin County.
McGrath said he no longer believed the testimony of jailhouse informant Bruce Samuelson, who testified that Morales boasted of his assault and made obscene references to the victim. Samuelson told investigators that the two men spoke in Spanish, a language Morales said he doesn't speak.
"New information has emerged to show the evidence upon which I relied in sentencing Mr. Morales to death -- Mr. Samuelson's testimony -- is false," McGrath wrote in a statement Morales' lawyers submitted to the appeals court, to the California Supreme Court and in its petition for clemency to Schwarzenegger.
The California Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected that identical challenge without comment. Schwarzenegger, in denying clemency Friday, said ample evidence supported a death sentence despite the judge's concerns.
Mr. Morales doesn't speak Spanish? In California?
Yeah. Sure. Whatever you say.
Terminated! :^)
Hey Morales...give my regards to Tookie.
Yo Morales, say hi to Clarence Ray Allen too.
Would have been 42 years old now.
Don't think they'll be saying much to each other - they'll be too busy screaming...
That's even better.
Gee. That's too bad when you scream and no one hears you.
There are a lot of people of Mexican descent, even in the
SW who don't speak Spanish.
Arnold's hometown hasn't made a big deal about the last6 two.
and 25 years to execute the POS.
Morales and his attorneys complained that the prisoner might feel too much pain if the sedative he is given doesn't make him unconscious before a paralyzing agent and the final heart-stopping drugs begin coursing through his veins.
FGS! Murderous cretin is worried about HIS pain.
I think they should just drop a guy like him into an erupting volcano. Death and cremation. No muss, no fuss.
Kenneth Starr?! OMG!
Why does Scott Ritter come to my mind?
What's with Ken Starr? How many attorneys does this guy have?
Volcano, nah, to quick
the prisoner might feel too much pain ??
Are they kidding me ? This POS should feel all the pain he gave that girl PLUS
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