Monday, October 29, 2012

RE-EXAMINING LUCASVILLE: ESSAY 6

RE-EXAMINING LUCASVILLE: ESSAY 6
By Staughton Lynd

            Let’s try to visualize the most unfair criminal trial we can imagine.  Let’s make a

list of elements that might be part of such an unjust proceeding. 

The list might include the following elements.  

            1.  The judge excuses one potential jury member after another who states that he

or she could not in good conscience recommend the death penalty. 

2.      The evidence in support of convicting the defendant consists entirely of

testimony  by other prisoners.

Each of these elements was present in the trial of George Skatzes, who was found

guilty and sentenced to death for the aggravated murder of prisoners Earl Elder and

David Sommers.  In addition, in the portion of the trial concerning Mr. Elder’s death:

3.      Skatzes was sentenced to death for allegedly ordering prisoner Rodger

Snodgrass to murder Earl Elder.  But Snodgrass, a prosecution witness, testified that

Elder was still alive when he left Elder’s cell.

4.      The medical examiner testified that Elder’s fatal wounds were caused by a

broad blade.  However, Snodgrass himself as well as another prosecution witness, Tim

Williams, testified that the weapon supposedly carried by Snodgrass was a thin, icepick-

like shank that made small, round holes.
5.  Tim Williams was himself named by two other prisoners as one of the three men who actually killed Elder.  Williams is now on the street.
6.  Another prisoner, Eric Girdy, has confessed to being one of those three men. 

Girdy has repeatedly stated under oath that Skatzes was nowhere around at the time and

had nothing to do with what happened. 

7.  Girdy testified that the weapon he used was a piece of broken glass from an

officers’ restroom.  The medical examiner testified that he found a shard of glass in one

of the potentially lethal wounds made by a broad blade.

8.   Girdy’s belated confession was accepted as true by the special prosecutor

and Girdy was duly sentenced in the Scioto County Court of Common Pleas.

In the portion of the trial concerning the murder of David Sommers:

9.        Several weeks after Skatzes was convicted and sentenced to death for

Sommers’ homicide, prisoner Aaron Jefferson, in a separate trial, was found guilty of

allegedly committing the same murder. 
10.   As in the trial of Skatzes, when Jefferson was tried for killing Sommers the medical examiner testified once again that Sommers had died as the result of a single, fatal blow by an instrument like a baseball bat.  Thus two men were found guilty of striking the same lethal blow. 
11.  An Ohio Court of Appeals determined that there was no way to prove which man had struck the fatal blow, but Skatzes was guilty anyway because of his “complicity” in the murder and his sentence of death should be affirmed.
              Nothing has been done to vacate George Skatzes’ death sentence for the

aggravated murders of Elder and Sommers.

What Skatzes Says


            George Skatzes has written a statement from which the following are excerpts:

Twenty eight years and counting!  I am totally at my wits’ end!  Please let me explain!  Please hear me out!
            The testimony by the inmates in the Earl Elder murder was contradicted and undermined by the testimony of the forensic pathologist.  Yet all this means nothing to the courts!  George Skatzes was found guilty and that is that!  Justice?
            Ohio Jury Instructions 409.56, Other Causes, Intervening Causes, states:  “If the defendant inflicted an injury not likely to produce death, and if the sole and only cause of death was a fatal injury inflicted by another person, the defendant who inflicted the original injury is not responsible for the death.”  [George adds:  There is nothing true about Snodgrass’ testimony.  But if, for the sake of argument, we assumed that Snodgrass was telling the truth, since Snodgrass said Elder was alive when Snodgrass left his cell, under Jury Instruction 409.56 Skatzes could only have been guilty of attempted murder.] 
            In the case of David Sommers, there is no physical evidence to link George Skatzes to the crime.  The inmates who testified against George Skatzes are self-admitted participants in the murder!
            We have two people convicted for causing the death of David Sommers by dealing a single massive blow to the head.  Two people convicted for the very same act?  The object is, of course, to convict at any cost!

Summing up his trial and convictions, Skatzes declares:

We have a man convicted and sentenced to death only on the word of jailhouse snitches.  It was their word alone without any independent objective and corroborating evidence.

  Law Versus Justice

            In three aspects of the courts’ proceedings concerning Mr. Skatzes and others of

the Lucasville Five, prosecutors have been able to cite and rely on the law as pronounced

by state and federal courts.  But that doesn’t mean that these convictions and sentencse

are just!   It only means that Skatzes, like other Lucasville defendants, is a victim of what

he calls “the criminal injustice system.”

            Let’s consider three of the judicial doctrines that stand between Lucasville 

defendants and light at the end of the tunnel.

The Death Qualified Jury
           
            A jury’s recommendation of the death penalty must be unanimous.  It takes only

one juror in twelve to prevent a recommendation for death.

            But under current law in state and federal courts, any potential juror who states

that he or she opposes the death penalty under all circumstances will almost surely be

“excused,” that is, excluded, from jury service in a capital case.

            In contrast, a juror who indicates support for the death penalty is asked another

question, namely, Would you follow the instructions of the judge about the law?  If the

juror answers, Yes, then that juror may be seated even though he or she favors the death

penalty just as strongly as opponents of the death penalty oppose it.

            The following extracts show the doctrine of the “death qualified jury” at

 work during the “voir dire” (jury selection process) in the case of George Skatzes.

                                                                       Juror #1

THE COURT: . . . I have a question I want to ask you. . . . [I]n a proper case where the facts warrant it and the law permits it, could you join in with others in signing a verdict form which might recommend to the Court the imposition of the death penalty?

A:  No, sir.

THE COURT:  You don’t believe you could do so?

A:  I don’t believe so.

THE COURT:  Under any circumstances?

A:  No.

THE COURT:  Could you tell me why?

            A:  I had a brother who was murdered and I found it in my heart to forgive that man.  I would not have found him guilty to the extent that his life would be taken.

            THE COURT:  In other words, you feel that if you didn’t do it in your brother’s case, you wouldn’t do it in any other case, right?

            A:  Right. . . .

            [DEFENSE ATTORNEY]: . . . Do you feel that this is a teaching of your church?

            A:  Not so much a teaching of my church as it is an understanding of mine that I do not create life.  I am not giver of life, so I feel that it’s not my responsibility or within reason to expect me to take a life. . . .

            THE COURT:  You may step down.


                                                                       Juror #8

            THE COURT:  . . . In a proper case, where the facts warrant it and the law permits it, could you join in with the other jurors in signing a verdict form which would recommend to the Court the death penalty?

            A:  Yes, your Honor.

            [PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]:  . . . We brought you here because we want to discuss with you your views on capital punishment.  Can you share them with us, please?

            A:  I strongly believe in them.  I wish they were enforced more often.

            [PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]:  . . . Do you believe the death penalty is the only appropriate penalty in all cases of an intentional killing?

            A:  Pretty much. 

            [PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]:  Does that mean?

            A:  Yes.

            [PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]:  . . . You can think of the wors[t] crime that comes to your mind and if you find that person guilty at the first phase, we don’t go straight to death.  We have the second hearing at which point you would get additional evidence to consider in making your decision as to what punishment is appropriate. . . .
                        What we need to know is whether you could set aside your thoughts as to what you think the law should be and follow the law that the Judge gives you?

            A:  Yes.

            [PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]:  If you found someone guilty of a horrible, horrible crime, as bad as you can think of, would you be willing to keep an open mind and listen to the evidence at the second phase before making a decision as to which penalty is appropriate?           

            A:  Yes.

            [PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]:  No matter how bad the crime?

            A:  Yes.
            . . .

            THE COURT:  . . . We want you back [to serve as a juror in the case].

With the doctrine of the death-qualified jury before us, there should be no

difficulty in understanding why, in such a high percentage of  cases, Lucasville

prosecutors either won a favorable jury decision or entered into a favorable plea

agreement.  At one public forum concerning George Skatzes, known to fellow prisoners

as “Big George,” an attender who had read the dialogue between the judge and  potential

jurors  commented:  “Big George is in Big Trouble.”

            Studies cited by the American Bar Association and the American Law Institute

indicate that the process of selecting a death-qualified jury produces juries that are more

likely to convict the defendant during the guilt phase of the trial, and more likely to

impose the death penalty during the sentencing phase.  John Paul Stevens, retired Justice

of the United States Supreme Court, stated when he was on the bench that this rule

“deprive[s] the defendant of a trial by jurors representing a fair cross-section of the

community.”  He is convinced that “the process of obtaining a ‘death qualified jury’ is

really a procedure that has the purpose and effect of obtaining a jury that is biased in

favor of conviction.” 

The Doctrine of Complicity


            A familiar hypothetical presents the problem of a group of bank robbers.

            Robber A is the driver of the getaway car.  While his companions enter the bank,

he stays at the wheel of their vehicle, perhaps listening to the car radio or reading the

newspaper.  Meantime, the men actually in the bank encounter difficulties, there is a

 scuffle, robber B uses his gun, and a bank teller falls to the floor, dead.

            What should be the punishment of robber A?  Under Ohio law he can be found to

be “complicit” in the entire criminal course of conduct, and presumed to be just as guilty

as the man who pulled the trigger.  Moreover, whereas under Ohio law someone guilty of

“conspiracy” to rob the bank would not be eligible for the death penalty, under the Ohio

law of “complicity” every one in the group would be exposed to the possibility of

execution.

After Aaron Jefferson was convicted of striking the same fatal blow for which

George Skatzes had been convicted, an Ohio Court of Appeals considered the case.    

The court began its explanation by stating:  “Skatzes contends that his due process rights

were violated because the state charged and convicted two inmates—Skatzes and Aaron

Jefferson—with the murder of David Sommers, when the evidence suggested only one

fatal blow.  He argues that these [were] ‘inherently factually contradictory theories’.”

            Not so, the court continued.  “The state’s theory was that both Skatzes and

Jefferson were complicit in the crime; there was no way to prove who had inflicted the

fatal head injury. . . .  A defendant charged with an offense may be convicted of that

offense upon proof that he was complicit in its commission.” 

The court may not have read the transcript of the Skatzes and Jefferson trials.  In

closing argument in the Skatzes trial, Prosecutor Daniel Hogan did not say, “there was no

way to prove who had inflicted the fatal head injury.”  Rather, Hogan asked the jury to

think “about David Sommers, . . . the one where [Skatzes] wielded a bat and literally beat

the brains out of this man’s head.”  State v. Skatzes, p. 6108.  And in the Jefferson trial,

Prosecutor Crowe told the jury:

            If there was only one blow to the head of David Sommers, the strongest evidence you have [is that] this is the individual—I won’t call him a human—this is the individual that administered that blow. . . .  If there was only one blow, he’s the one that gave it.  He’s the one that hit him like a steer going through the stockyard, the executioner with the pick axe, trying to put the pick through the brain.

State v. Jefferson, Tr. at 656-57.

            The court also failed to mention that whereas Jefferson was sentenced to many

years behind bars, Skatzes was sentenced to death.
           
Jason Robb was the victim of a prosecution theory about Sommers’ murder that

was equally bizarre.  According to prosecution witnesses, Sommers chased Robb from L-

2 to L-7, where Sommers was beaten to death by prisoners other than Robb.  Yet Robb

was convicted and sentenced to death for Sommers’ murder!   

Ineffective Prohibition of Snitch Testimony


            Heightened reliability is required in capital cases.  Convictions based on the

testimony of  informants, who are offered reduced charges, parole, or other benefits in

exchange for their testimony, are inherently unreliable in the absence of independent and

objective corroborating evidence connecting the defendant to the crime.

            In recognition of the unreliability of informant testimony, the House of Delegates

of the American Bar Association resolved on February 14, 2005, that the ABA “urges

federal, state, local, and territorial governments to reduce the risk of convicting the innocent, while increasing the likelihood of convicting the guilty, by ensuring that no prosecution should occur based solely upon uncorroborated jailhouse informant testimony.”  Likewise, the California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice declared in 2006:
A conviction can not be had upon the testimony of an in-custody informant unless it shall be corroborated by such other evidence as shall independently tend to connect the defendant with the commission of the offense . . . .  Corroboration of an in-custody informant cannot be provided by the testimony of another in-custody informant.

            The Lucasville prosecutions ignored the necessity for objective corroboration of
informant testimony.  The uncorroborated testimony of prisoner informants, so-called
“snitch” testimony, was the principal basis for every Lucasville capital conviction.
            One way in which Ohio seeks to guard against the perjury of snitches is by requiring the judge to give the following instruction to the jury.
The testimony of an accomplice does not become inadmissible because of his complicity, moral turpitude, or self-interest, but the admitted or claimed complicity of a witness may affect his credibility and make his testimony subject to grave suspicion, and require that it be weighed with great caution.

However, common sense suggests that reading to a jury a long sentence that begins with

a double negative and is made up of polysyllabic and unfamiliar words is unlikely to 

protect a defendant.  Prosecutors have many ways to make perjured testimony appear

convincing to a jury. For example, an informer may describe the scene of a crime with

seeming truthfulness since,  after all, often the witness was actually there and simply

ascribes to others the actions he himself committed. 

The Lucasville prosecutors used a variety of techniques to procure compliant

prisoner informants and prepare them for trial.  In Skatzes’ trial, prosecutor (now Ohio

judge) Daniel Hogan admitted that Daniel Stead, who prosecuted  the trial with him, had

told a wavering prisoner, “you are either going to be my witness, or I’m going to come

back and try to kill you.”  In preparing prisoner Robert Brookover as a witness, 

prosecutors hit him with a rolled-up newspaper until he stopped beginning each sentence

of his testimony with the words, “I’m not going  to lie to you.”  And by bringing potential

prosecution witnesses together at the so-called “snitch academy” in Lima, Ohio,

prosecutors sought to ensure that their witnesses at trial would tell consistent stories. 

Ohio court opinions also emphasize, as a second shield against unreliable snitch
testimony, the right of the defense to cross-examine prosecution witnesses.  But this right
was systematically obstructed by Lucasville prosecutors.  Typically, officers of the Ohio
State Highway Patrol interviewed potential prosecution witnesses as many as half a dozen times before trial. Summaries of these interviews were then entered into a computer database.  But only when the witness began to provide the narrative that the
prosecution desired were his remarks likely to be preserved in the form of a tape-recorded
interview or deposition.  This prosecution-friendly final product could then be provided  to the defense in “discovery.”  The database entries might have revealed how much the testimony of the witness had changed over time as it was shaped by interviewers from
the state. These entries were often not produced.  But in Keith LaMar’s case, prosecutors successfully impeached the testimony of defense witness Gino Washington by using
 interview records that had not been produced in discovery.

Defense Alternatives

           
Lucasville capital defendants were faced with an excruciating choice. 

If they had not killed anyone during the eleven days, they had the right to go to
trial and try to convince a jury of their innocence.  But their juries would be made up of
men and women willing to recommend the death penalty; their trials would be governed
by the doctrine of complicity;  and their trial court judges would have no way to assure defendants of the good faith and credibility of prosecution witnesses. 
However if, recognizing that the dice were loaded, the defendant elected to plea

bargain, the best possible outcome was likely to be imprisonment for life.

Tuesday, October 9, 2012

RE-EXAMINING LUCASVILLE : ESSAY 5


By Staughton Lynd

            Representation on behalf of the five Lucasville defendants condemned to death has been frustrated by the prosecution’s unwillingness to turn over to lawyers for the defense the records of its own interviews with potential witnesses.  Finally, during the winter of 2011-2012, lawyers for four of the five capital defendants won the right to see summaries and transcripts of investigators’ interviews (for the most part conducted by officers of the Ohio State Highway Patrol) with Lucasville prisoners.  The labor of collecting and evaluating this material has barely begun.
What this, and the several following essays, will report is what can be concluded at this time as to each of the ten murders and the case against each of the five capital defendants.

21 Point Agreement

 This document, signed by Arthur Tate, is the 21 point agreement that ended the uprising in a peaceful surrender. The State of Ohio almost immediately violated essential points of the agreement, when it pursued legal action against alleged leaders and others who refused to cooperate with investigators.

RE-EXAMINING LUCASVILLE: Essay 4


By Staughton Lynd

Summary So Far

            So far, I have been discussing the Lucasville uprising as a whole.  I’ve asked:  Why should we doubt the accuracy of the trial court verdicts?  What caused this rebellion, anyway?  In what sense can these events be called “tragic”?
Let’s sum up where we have arrived.
            In Essay 1 we offered some examples of the unreliability of conclusions asserted by prosecutors in trials after the end of the uprising.  Particularly dramatic was the statement of one of the prosecutors (now a state court judge), Daniel Hogan, that we would never know  “who hands-on killed the corrections officer, [Robert] Vallandingham. . . .  I don’t know.  And I don’t think we’ll ever know.”  How can the State of Ohio propose to execute three men (Siddique Abdullah Hasan, Jason Robb, and James Were) for the murder of Officer Vallandingham when it doesn’t even know who killed him?

Kite from Hasan

This kite was written by Siddique Abdullah Hasan and received by Warden Arthur Tate just a few days before the riot.

Monday, October 8, 2012

Letter written by Warden Arthur Tate


This is the letter referenced in Staughton Lynd's second Re-Examining Lucasville Essay as evidence that Tate would benefit from causing a riot at SOCF.

RE-EXAMINING LUCASVILLE: Essay 3

by Staughton Lynd


A Tragedy?


When people use the word “tragedy,” they ordinarily mean something completely bad and sad, like the mass killings in the movie theater in Aurora, Colorado.
            Almost as many human beings were killed during the eleven-day uprising in Lucasville (ten) as in the Aurora movie theater (twelve).  But does the word “tragedy” adequately describe what happened at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility?
            I think the correct answer is, Yes, but in two different ways.  One of the meanings the dictionary gives for “tragedy” is “a lamentable, dreadful, or fatal event or affair,” a “calamity,” a “disaster.”  The dictionary gives an example:  “the tragedy of the President’s assassination.”
            And certainly the Lucasville Uprising was such a tragedy.  The ten persons murdered were unarmed and outnumbered.  They never had a chance.
            But the dramatic presentations in ancient Athens or in Shakespeare’s London were tragedies in a second sense.  The “tragic hero” in these plays, like the Greek king Oedipus, or Hamlet and Othello in the plays of Shakespeare, was a well-intentioned person who had a “tragic flaw.”  The flaw was some aspect of the hero’s character that brought him down and caused his destruction.
            One can look at the Lucasville events in this way, too.  When prisoners sought to occupy L block they did not intend to kill anyone.  The prison administration cannot be fairly accused of desiring the death of Officer Vallandingham.

RE-EXAMINING THE LUCASVILLE UPRISING: Essay 2


by Staughton Lynd

What Caused the Uprising?


          History books often contain a chapter that tries to answer the question:  What caused such-and-such a revolt or revolution? 
            For example:  What caused the “Boston Massacre” in 1770 when British troops stationed in Boston fired on a crowd that was pelting them with frozen snowballs and oyster shells?  What caused the “Boston Tea Party” of 1773 when chest after chest of tea imported from Great Britain was thrown into Boston harbor?  (Hint:  There had not been a new tax.)  What caused the beginning of actual warfare at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775?
            The truth is that it is very difficult to be sure why human beings suddenly throw caution to the winds, and, knowing that there may be enormous consequences, take a stand and risk everything.   Unsure as to the real causes of a rebellion, the historian may take refuge in a chapter title like “The Gathering Storm.”
            Let’s see if we can do better regarding the causes of the longest prison uprising in United States history in which lives were lost, at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility (SOCF) in Lucasville, April 11-21, 1993.

RE-EXAMINING THE LUCASVILLE UPRISING: Essay 1

By Staughton Lynd

April 2013 will be the 20th anniversary of the 11-day uprising at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility (SOCF) in Lucasville.  This is the first in a series of articles that will appear monthly  in the Columbus Free Press and on the website “lucasvilleamnesty.org” in preparation for a conference at Columbus State Community College on April 19-21, 2013, devoted to “Re-Examining the Lucasville Uprising.”
Unlike a case where there is one homicide and one defendant, such as the Troy Davis and Mumia Abu Jamal cases, the Lucasville events involve ten homicides and  approximately fifty indictments.  The reader may be helped by the chronology that appears together with this essay, compiled by Alice Lynd.

CHRONOLOGY BASED ON TESTIMONY AND EXHIBITS

Sunday, April 11, 1993

3:00 p.m. As prisoners returned from the yard at the end of recreation period,

disturbance began in L-block.

4:45 p.m. Prisoners released Officer Harold Fraley through the end of L-8 stairwell with
severe head injuries.

6:46 p.m. Johnny Fryman, a prisoner, was put on the yard, severely beaten.

8:05 p.m. Prisoners placed Officer John Kemper on the yard, severely beaten.

9:17 and 9:27 p.m. The dead bodies of prisoners William Svette, Bruce Vitale, Franklin
Farrell, Albert Staiano, and Darrold Depina were placed on the yard. Prisoners “Itchy” Walker
and Andre Stockton were placed on the yard with severe injuries.

11:02 p.m. Officer Robert Schroeder was placed on the yard with severe injuries.

First night, time unknown. Prisoner Earl Elder died of stab wounds in L-6-60.