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California’s
death penalty debate got personal on Thursday. Family members of murder victims
gathered in Sacramento to urge Governor Gavin Newsom to change his mind and
once again allow executions in California.
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On 13 March 2019, Newsom announced that he has ordered a
moratorium on the state's death penalty, preventing any execution in the state
as long as he is still in office as governor. We, the comrades of Unit 1012:
The VFFDP, want you to hear from murder victims’ families who are unhappy about
the decision. They united to slam him again on Thursday March 11, 2019.
We recommend following the Georgian Crusaders’ example, where the fiercest serpent may be overcome by a swarm of ants.
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Two mothers whose sons were murdered embrace after meeting with
Sacramento District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert. Phyllis Loya, left, and
Sandra Friend, right, met with Schubert, far right, in response to California
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s moratorium on the death penalty on Wednesday, March 13,
2019 in Sacramento. Loya is the mother of slain Pittsburg police officer Larry
Lasater Jr. and Friend is the mother of 8-year-old Michael Lyons, who was
abducted in Yuba City, then tortured, raped and murdered.
Renee C. Byer rbyer@sacbee.com
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Family members
of murder victims slam California Gov. Newsom's moratorium on death penalty
A group of
family members of murder victims in California, along with a number of district
attorneys from across the state, gathered in Sacramento on Thursday to denounce
Gov. Gavin Newsom's recent moratorium on
the death penalty.
At a press
conference led by Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer, the family
members and district attorneys slammed Newsom’s move to put a moratorium on the executions of
the 737 inmates currently incarcerated in the Western Hemisphere’s largest
death row and called on the California governor to rescind his executive order.
“Governor
Newsom took a knife and stabbed all the victims and all the victims’ families
in the heart,” Spitzer said.
Spitzer also
criticized Newsom for travelling to El Salvador this week instead of meeting
with murder victims’ families. Newsom is in the Central American nation in an
attempt to counter the Trump administration’s harsh immigration stance and
recent moves to cut millions of dollars in U.S. aid to the country.
“The
governor decided to spend the week out of state, out of country, to meet with
people he thinks are victims, when he could have met with victims in his own
state,” he said.
Newsom’s
office did not immediately return Fox News’ request for comment.
The press
conference comes a day after prosecutors in the state announced they will seek
the death penalty if they convict the man suspected of being the notorious
"Golden State Killer," who eluded capture for decades.
Prosecutors
from four counties, including Orange County, announced their decision on
Wednesday during a short court hearing for Joseph DeAngelo. He was arrested a
year ago based on DNA evidence linking him to at least 13 murders and more than
50 rapes across California in the 1970s and '80s.
Ron
Harrington, whose brother Keith Harrington’s murder is one of those linked to
the alleged Golden State Killer, castigated Newsom’s decision. Keith
Harrington, along with his wife, Patti, were found bludgeoned to death in
August of 1980 inside their home in a gated community just outside Dana Point,
Calif.
“The
Golden State Killer is the worst of the worst of the worst ever,”
Ron Harrington said Thursday during the press conference. “He is the poster child for the death penalty.”
Harrington
added: “Gov. Newsom, please explain to the Golden State
Killer’s victims how they should be lenient and compassionate.”
Steve Herr –
whose son, Sam Herr, was murdered and then dismembered by Daniel Wozniak in May
2010 inside an apartment in Costa Mesa, Calif. – also criticized Newsom.
Wozniak, who
was sentenced to capital punishment in 2016, killed Herr and his college friend
and tutor, Julie Kibuishi, as part of a plan to steal money Herr had saved from
his military service in Afghanistan so that he could pay for his upcoming
wedding and honeymoon.
Wozniak then
staged the crime scene to make it appear as though Kibuishi had been sexually
assaulted by Herr and that Herr had gone on the run.
The convicted
murderer also dismembered both victims by cutting off the hands of
both and removing Herr’s head.
“Gov.
Newsom wasn’t there when I walked into my son’s apartment and found the body of
Julie Kibuishi absolutely defiled,” Herr’s father said. “He wasn’t there when I walked into the mortuary and saw my
son all sewed up.”
Newsom’s
moratorium, which he signed last month, is seen as largely a symbolic move as
California has not executed an inmate since 2006 amid legal challenges,
but it still marked a major victory for opponents of capital punishment
given the state’s size and its national political influence.
“I’ve gotten
a sense over many, many years of the disparity in our criminal justice system,”
Newsom said during a press conference on Wednesday. “We can make a more
enlightened choice.”
Newsom also
ordered in March that the equipment used in executions at San Quentin State
Prison – the facility where capital punishment was carried out for men in
California – be shut down and removed.
“We cannot
advance the death penalty in an effort to soften the blow of what happens to
these victims,” Newsom said. “If someone kills, we do not kill. We’re better
than that.”
Despite recent
polling indicating that support for the death penalty is at its lowest
level since the early 1970s, Newsom’s order still bucks the will of most
California residents. California voters previously rejected an initiative
to abolish capital punishment in the state and instead, in 2016, voted in favor
of Proposition 66 to help speed up executions.
Newsom’s move
to halt executions was panned last month by President Trump, who has
been a harsh critic of Newsom's ever since the governor took office earlier
this year.
“Defying
voters, the Governor of California will halt all death penalty executions of
737 stone cold killers. Friends and families of the always forgotten VICTIMS
are not thrilled, and neither am I!” Trump tweeted.
California
has executed 13 inmates since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death
penalty in 1976 and the state has the most people on death row in the country.
Since the 1970s, 79 death row inmates have died of natural causes in the state
and 26 by suicide. The last execution held in California occurred in 2006 when
76-year-old Clarence Ray Allen, who was convicted of killing three people, was
executed.
Since then
a series of stays of execution issued by the Federal District Court in San
Francisco have held up any executions in the state, but there are now 25
inmates on death row who have exhausted all their appeals. Newsom said that
none of the inmates currently on death row will have their sentences
commuted, but will possibly be transferred back into the state’s general prison
population.
“I believe
I’m doing the right thing,” he said. “I cannot sign off on executing hundreds
and hundreds of human beings knowing that among them there will be innocent
people.”
INTERNET SOURCE: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/family-members-of-murder-victims-slam-california-gov-newsoms-moratorium-on-death-penalty
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In
this Oct. 30, 2015 file photo, Marc Klaas, far left at podium, father of Polly
Klaas, who was kidnapped and slain in 1993; Scott Jones, Sacramento County
sheriff; L.A. County District Attorney Jackie Lacey and Sheriff Jim McDonnel
join other victims' rights advocates, community leaders, and elected officials
to announce efforts to place an initiative on the 2016 ballot to streamline the
death penalty in California. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)
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Victims’
Parents Urge Newsom to Stop Death Penalty Reprieve
POSTED
3:39 PM, APRIL 11, 2019, BY ASSOCIATED PRESS
SACRAMENTO (AP) — Parents of Californians murdered
by people now on death row shared gruesome details of their loved ones’
killings Thursday as they launched a statewide tour to urge Gov. Gavin Newsom
to reverse his moratorium on executions.
“He was like a thief in the night that
stole justice from us,” said
Phyllis Loya, whose son Larry Lasater Jr. was killed on duty as a police
officer.
Newsom last month issued a reprieve to the more
than 700 people sitting on California’s death row, meaning none will be executed
as long as he is in office. He also ordered the state to withdraw its lethal
injection regulations and dismantled the “death chamber” at San Quentin State
Prison.
California’s death row is the nation’s largest, but
the state has not executed anyone since 2006. Voters in 2016 approved a ballot
measure to speed up executions, and district attorneys and the families of
victims’ accused Newsom of defying the voters’ will.
Todd Spitzer, Orange County’s district attorney,
said the “Victims of Murder Justice” tour will travel to all 80 Assembly and 40
Senate districts. He did not announce new legal actions aimed at stopping Newsom’s
moratorium. But Spitzer requested that Newsom review each case individually to
make clemency decisions rather than issuing a blanket reprieve. He also said
the tour is designed to pressure lawmakers; a proposal has been introduced to
again put a measure to permanently stop the death penalty on the 2020 ballot.
Families criticized Newsom for saying he couldn’t
sleep at night knowing an innocent person might be killed, saying they could
not sleep because they had seen their children’s bodies defiled and, in one
case, sewn back together.
“A real leader would say let me listen to
this case by case,” said
Steve Herr, whose son Sam Herr was murdered in 2010 by Daniel Wozniak, who shot
Herr in the head, made it look as if he raped a female victim and dismembered
him. Herr said Newsom will never know what it was like to see the murder scene
and, later, his son’s body sewn back together so it could be buried in one
piece.
Jeri Oliver, whose son Danny Oliver was killed
while on duty as a Sacramento sheriff’s deputy, had perhaps the harshest words
for Newsom. Luis Bracamontes was convicted last year for Oliver’s murder and
said during the trial he wished he had killed more cops. Oliver said Newsom
owed her a one-on-one meeting to discuss the case.
“You turned the knife again in my heart,” Oliver said. “I dare you
to meet with me and I can give you some facts that you don’t want to hear. I
challenge you Gov. Newsom — come meet with me.”
Newsom has said the death penalty is applied
unevenly and often discriminates based on race and class and creates the possibility
of an innocent person being executed.
Spokesman Jesse Melgar said Newsom sends his
“heartfelt condolences to survivor families.”
“The Governor sought out and heard from many
survivor families as he was making his decision on the death penalty,” Melgar
said in an email. “Some supported the death penalty while others strongly
believed the state shouldn’t take another life in the name of their loved one.”
National Crime Victims’ Rights Week began Monday,
and several attendees said Newsom should have spent it meeting with crime
victims in California rather than traveling to El Salvador. Newsom spent three
days in the Central American country to learn about the poverty and violence
driving migrants to come to the United States.
Newsom’s office did not offer comment on that
criticism.
INTERNET SOURCE: https://fox40.com/2019/04/11/victims-parents-urge-newsom-to-stop-death-penalty-reprieve/
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A woman holds up a sign with ‘Too many
terrorists in prison’ written on one side and ‘Kill them all’ written on the
other during a rally in Tel Aviv on April 19, 2016 to support Elor Azaria.
(Photo: Jack Guez/AFP)
[PHOTO SOURCE: http://mondoweiss.net/2017/08/israelis-palestinian-attackers/ ….. ….. http://victimsfamiliesforthedeathpenalty.blogspot.com/2017/10/a-group-of-50-families-in-israel-for.html] |
Protest against
death penalty moratorium
Californians
voted to approve the death penalty in 2012 and re-affirmed their stance again
in 2016.
SAN DIEGO — The father of a
murder victim on Thursday voiced outrage over Governor Gavin Newsom’s recent
decision to put the death penalty on hold.
Steve Herr’s 26-year old son Sam and his 23-year-old college friend Julie Kibuishi were murdered and dismembered by Dan Wozniak in 2018.
“Dan Wozniak took the lives of Sam Herr and Julie Kibuishi. Governor Newsom took away their justice. And that governor, is immoral,” said Steve Herr.
Sam's parents were part of a passionate coalition
of victims’ family members and district attorneys who spoke out against
Newsom’s recent moratorium on the death penalty – urging him reverse course.
Earlier this week and despite the moratorium, prosecutors said they will seek the death penalty in the case of the Golden State killer, Joseph Deangelo, who killed 13 people.
Family pleas come during National Crime Victims Rights week.
During the candlelight tribute in San Diego for crime survivors, District Attorney Summer Stephan voiced concern for victims and their loved ones dealing with the drastic shift in the justice system.
However, not all victims’ family members are opposed to the governor’s decision.
Carlos and Elizabeth Munoz’s only son, Juan Carlos, was murdered in National City in 2015. His alleged killers were brought to justice, but they are not pushing for the death penalty.
In response, Governor Newsom on Thursday said he sent his ‘heartfelt condolences’ to family members of victims killed by people now on death row. The governor further said that he met with many survivor families before making his decision.
Californians voted to approve the death penalty in
2012 and re-affirmed their stance again in 2016.
INTERNET SOURCE: https://www.cbs8.com/article/news/local/protest-against-death-penalty-moratorium/509-73b7d7f6-1934-4efe-a37a-a615a9a31160
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Protesters gathered in central Tbilisi the evening of May
31 after a high-profile murder case resulted in an acquittal and suspicions of
official impunity. (Photo: Giorgi Lomsadze)
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OTHER LINKS:
A coalition of
California District Attorneys and family members of murder victims respond to
the state's death penalty moratorium imposed by Governor Gavin Newsom last
month. [VIDEO SHARED]
MURDER VICTIMS’ FAMILIES AGAINST GAVIN
NEWSOM IDEA OF A MORATORIUM ON THE DEATH PENALTY IN CALIFORNIA
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video
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