Scott Panetti Case Roundup: Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Dallas Morning News, and more
Stefanie Faucher
Fort Worth Star-Telegram - Scott Panetti should not be executed
Dallas Morning News - A step toward judicial insanity
West Virginia Gazette - Pro-death values
Los Angeles Times - Ron Honberg: Texas execution of a severely mentally ill man would be an outrage
USA Today - Pete Earley: Don't execute the purple cowboy
Salon - Rob Smith and Charles Ogletree: Texas’ deranged “justice”: Why a planned execution will tarnish SCOTUS’ moral legitimacy
Associated Press - Texas Set To Execute Scott Panetti, Man Who Says He's Being Executed For Preaching Gospel
Associated Press - Texas death row inmate's case headed to US appeals court
Associated Press - Federal district judge refuses to stop execution next week of inmate said to be delusional
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel - Clock ticks toward Scott Panetti execution in Texas
Buzzfeed - This Is The Schizophrenic Man Texas Wants To Execute This Week
VICE - Texas Plans to Execute a Paranoid Schizophrenic Man This Wednesday
Daily Mail UK - Lawyers try to save ‘delusional’ death row murderer, 56, who tried to subpoena Jesus Christ and JFK at his trial, from Wednesday execution
San Antonio Express-News - Mentally ill inmate set to die Wednesday for Hill Country double slaying
Inquisitr - Texas To Execute Scott Panetti Despite Mental Illness, According To Panetti’s Attorneys
Press TV - Amnesty to US: Stop shameful execution of mentally ill man
Beta Wired - Case of Alleged Mentally Ill Death Row Inmate Heads To US Appeals Court
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Scott Panetti should not be executed
Nov. 28, 2014
There is no question that Scott Panetti brutally shot his in-laws to death in 1992.
And there is no question that Panetti, now 56, was mentally ill at the time he committed the murders and remains mentally incompetent and in need of treatment today.
But somehow, questions still linger over whether or not Panetti — who has been on death row since his 1995 conviction and who is scheduled to die by lethal injection on Wednesday — should be executed for his crimes.
The clear answer to those questions is no.
Panetti’s tragic and sometimes bizarre case has been winding its way through state and federal courts for more than two decades. His tortured life of mental illness has gone on much longer.
In the years before the murders, Panetti was hospitalized or involuntarily committed more than a dozen times. He collected federal disability checks because he could not work.
Why his commitment was only temporary is one of many tragedies in Panetti’s twisted case. It was clear years before his crimes that his illness rendered him capable of such atrocities.
Despite a 14-year history of emotional and psychological disturbances that could fill volumes, including diagnoses of “fragmented personality, delusions, and hallucinations” as well as schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder and homicidal tendencies, he was found competent to stand trial.
He insisted on representing himself, calling as witnesses the pope and Jesus Christ in his defense. He blamed the murders on one of his alternate personalities — a man named “Sarge” — whom doctors had identified years prior.
His conviction and subsequent attempts to appeal his death sentence prompted a U.S. Supreme Court decision in 2007 that changed the criteria under which states can execute inmates whose mental competency is in question.
Defendants, the court said, must have a “rational understanding” of the reason for their imminent execution and once an execution date is set, be permitted to litigate their competency in court.
The Supreme Court stopped short of overturning Panetti’s sentence, instead leaving that to the lower courts, which have thus far insisted that Panetti is competent enough to understand the reasons for his fate and his death sentence must stand.
It’s been seven years since Panetti’s last mental evaluation, but it seems obvious that his mental state has not improved, only worsened. His attorneys have said that he believes his execution is the result of his preaching the Gospel in prison.
One wonders what harm could come from the state granting the opportunity for doctors to reassess his mental state.
Still, on Tuesday the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals on procedural grounds declined to halt his executionand refused to appoint mental health experts to review his case again.
On Wednesday, it ruled a second time, rejecting Panetti’s appeal for clemency, leaving his lawyers with few available legal options.
His attorneys have petitioned the state’s Board of Pardons and Paroles to recommend him for clemency — one of the last avenues for relief.
Whether or not Texas carries out Panetti’s execution on Wednesday, there will have been fewer state executions in Texas this year than in almost two decades.
It’s clear the appetite for capital punishment is waning.
In his Wednesday dissent, Court of Criminal Appeals Judge Tom Price, a Dallas Republican who is not returning to the bench next year, wrote that he has “given a substantial amount of consideration to the propriety of the death penalty as a form of punishment for those who commit capital murder, and I now believe that it should be abolished.” His comments reflect the sentiment of a growing number of Texans.
Even those who support the death penalty should see that little good can come of executing a man so delusional he cannot truly appreciate his crime or understand its connection to his fate.
Panetti should remain imprisoned for life, separated from society, where he can receive treatment and not pose a threat to others.
But he should not be executed for his crimes.
If the courts will not stay his execution, Gov. Rick Perry should.
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A step toward judicial insanity
November 28, 2014
Severely mentally ill killer Scott Panetti lost his latest appeal to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals this week on technical grounds dealing with the court’s jurisdiction, bringing him closer to his Wednesday execution date. What madness that would be. Panetti’s lawyers wanted a stay so they could present the case that his decades of documented schizophrenia renders him mentally incompetent for execution, under Supreme Court guidelines against cruel and unusual punishment. The vote was 5-4 against him, showing at least that there’s some rational thinking on the court. Capital punishment advocates who want the punishment applied to the “worst of the worst” should think twice about taking the life of a person with a loose grip on reality.
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http://www.sundaygazettemail.com/article/20141201/ARTICLE/141209985/1103
Editorial: Pro-death values
December 1, 2014
Civilized governments should represent the finest values of humanity — so it’s repulsive that some conservative states still kill prisoners, a custom little different from medieval beheadings.
Advanced democracies around the world have abandoned the death penalty. Nearly half of America has done likewise, but hard-right places like Texas still put people to death. Such pro-death states make America seem brutal.
Occasionally, a death row prisoner is freed because DNA evidence shows that someone else committed the crime. Mostly, however, convicted murderers are bottom-feeders unfit to be at large among regular folks. Many are poor or minority, with deficient intellect.
Significantly, a large share of convicts — of all types, not just murderers — are mentally ill. Here’s a current example:
Scott Panetti of Texas became schizophrenic at age 20 and has been delusional ever since. He was committed to psychiatric hospitals repeatedly. In 1995, he was charged with killing his in-laws with a hunting rifle.
During his bizarre trial, he dressed in a cowboy suit, acted as his own attorney, and attempted to subpoena Jesus Christ. He said the case was “spiritual warfare” between “demons and the forces of the darkness and God and the angels and the forces of light.”
Jurors ruled him guilty, and he was sentenced to death. Volunteer reformer lawyers appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which said Panetti is “seriously mentally ill” and shouldn’t be killed unless it can be shown that he understands crime and punishment. The high court sent the case back to Texas for reconsideration.
Texas officials employed technicalities and argued that Panetti is exaggerating his insanity. They won a new execution order — without informing his volunteer defense lawyers, who read about it in newspapers. Now the schizophrenic is scheduled for death on Wednesday.
“A civilized society should not be in the business of executing anybody,” The New York Times commented. “But it certainly cannot pretend to be adhering to any morally acceptable standard of culpability if it kills someone like Scott Panetti.”
It added that he is “no different from the estimated 350,000 inmates around the country with mental illness — 10 times the number of people in state psychiatric hospitals.”
We’re proud that West Virginia halted the death penalty a half-century ago. It’s depressing to look at right-wing Texas, the killing capital.
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Texas execution of a severely mentally ill man would be an outrage
By Ron Honberg, November 29, 2014
On Wednesday, Texas plans to administer a lethal injection to Scott Panetti, a man with severe mental illness who was convicted of murder while representing himself in court wearing a cowboy costume. If the state does so, a miserable spectacle of a trial will have led to one of the most outrageous executions of our time.
When Panetti went on trial in 1995 in Kerrville, Texas, he had already been hospitalized more than a dozen times for psychosis related to his schizophrenia. With his life in the balance, he was permitted by the court to argue his own case. He did so in a Tom Mix-style purple cowboy costume and a 10-gallon hat. Among the famous witnesses he tried to call to the stand: President Kennedy, Pope John Paul II and Jesus Christ.
After Panetti took the stand to testify, he spoke to himself in different voices and assumed the persona of “Sarge,” the alter ego he believed was responsible for killing Panetti's mother-in-law and father-in-law with a hunting rifle.
The result of Panetti's circus of a trial was a death sentence.
It should never have happened that way.
The court could have stepped in and insisted on representation by outside counsel. It failed to do so. The court also refused to accept Panetti's highly relevant medical records into evidence because he had scribbled all over them with cartoons and ruminations.
There are multiple legal safeguards that are meant to protect the inherent dignity and civil rights of Americans with mental illness when they come into the criminal justice system. Most people assume — especially those informed by portrayals in television, books and movies — that the United States doesn't execute people with severe mental illness. They wrongly presume that people with mental illness are protected by our laws.
Unfortunately, as Panetti's case illustrates, the safeguards can and do fail. We do execute people with severe mental illness. And now Panetti, 56, may be the next horrifying example of this failure.
Panetti has been diagnosed with schizophrenia, a serious mental illness characterized by hallucinations and delusions. As is common, his schizophrenia began to manifest in his late adolescence, when he began hearing voices.
Although he had been repeatedly hospitalized, Panetti was delusional and not receiving treatment when he shaved his head in 1992, dressed in Army fatigues and took the lives of his in-laws. The afternoon of the killings, he turned himself over to the police.
Unfortunately, as Panetti's case illustrates, the safeguards can and do fail. We do execute people with severe mental illness. And now Panetti, 56, may be the next horrifying example of this failure.
Panetti has been diagnosed with schizophrenia, a serious mental illness characterized by hallucinations and delusions. As is common, his schizophrenia began to manifest in his late adolescence, when he began hearing voices.
Although he had been repeatedly hospitalized, Panetti was delusional and not receiving treatment when he shaved his head in 1992, dressed in Army fatigues and took the lives of his in-laws. The afternoon of the killings, he turned himself over to the police.
And now Panetti — who has a fixed delusion that Satan, working through the state of Texas, is trying to kill him to stop him from preaching Christ's word to other inmates — is just days away from death by lethal injection, unless his execution is stopped.
Before Panetti went to court, before the crime occurred, he was extremely ill and greatly in need of help. Trapped in his belief that the devil was hunting him, Panetti washed the walls of his home and buried his furniture in the backyard. He was hospitalized shortly before the crime but was released without follow-up care, a common occurrence for people living with serious mental illness.
There's no question that Panetti must be incarcerated. However, his execution — particularly as the product of an unreliable legal process — would be immoral and serve no purpose, either in retribution or to prevent similar crimes.
Either the courts must step in to stay this travesty or Texas Gov. Rick Perry must commute Panetti's sentence to life. Otherwise, the state will kill an individual who is so ill and delusional that he cannot begin to comprehend his fate.
Ron Honberg is national director for policy and legal affairs at the National Alliance on Mental Illness.
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Don't execute the purple cowboy: Column
Texas case highlights the perverse legal definition of 'mental competency.'
By Pete Earley, November 30, 2014
On Dec. 3, Texas plans to administer a lethal injection to Scott Panetti, a mentally ill inmate who attempted to call former president John F. Kennedy, the pope and Jesus Christ as witnesses while representing himself at his murder trial wearing a cowboy costume with a purple bandana.
Panetti's 22-two year odyssey through our U.S. legal system should never have gotten this far and while his case is especially egregious, up to 10% of the 3,035 inmates currently awaiting execution are thought to have a diagnosable mental disorder, such a schizophrenia, and a June study found that of the last 100 people executed in the U.S., 54% had a mental illness.
The state had to hold two jury trials — not to prove him guilty — but to prove that he was sane enough to prosecute him. At his trial, Panetti announced God had cured him, fired his attorneys and called "Sarge" as a witness, questioning himself on the stand using different voices.
'Cruel and unusual'
In 1986, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Ford v. Wainwright that executing the mentally ill violated the Eighth Amendment that prohibits cruel and unusual punishment. But the court never defined mental "competency." Without that guidance, pro-death states adopted a low bar written by Justice Lewis Powell that allows an execution if mentally ill defendants are aware of "the punishment they are about to suffer and why they are to suffer it" — regardless of how psychotic they might be.
Panetti's case eventually reached the Supreme Court but rather than clarifying its 1986 ruling, the justices ordered the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals to determine if Panetti realized he was about to be executed and why.
That three-judge panel oversees the busy "death belt" states of Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi and has never found a mentally ill defendant who it thought should be spared. Based on Panetti's medical records and expert testimony, a federal district judge in Texas already had ruled that Panetti wasn't sane enough but the appellate court bent over backwards to prove he had a "rational understanding" of what was happening to him. They cited secret tape recordings by prison officials who overheard Panetti discussing his case with visiting family members, ignoring the fact that he was largely regurgitating details his attorneys had told him.
Before the murders happened, before Panetti became entangled in the court system, he was already a sick man who'd been hospitalized for "homicidal tendencies" yet always had been discharged. Today, he believes the Devil is about to kill him for preaching the Gossip, not Texas for the murders.
Sentence him to life
Panetti's attorneys are not asking he be freed. They want Texas Gov. Rick Perry to commute his death sentence to life in prison — as does former Texas governor Mark White, who called Panetti's trial a "sham"; former congressman Ron Paul, the American Bar Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, 10 Texas state legislators, 33 former prosecutors and U.S. attorneys general and 55 evangelical leaders.
Panetti's life also could be spared if the courts intervened. Based on Panetti's lengthy history, he should have never been allowed to represent himself at trial and the 5th Circuit judges should not have allowed their fear of a possible malingerer avoiding execution to override their obligation to protect the truly insane.
For a penny in 16th century England, curiosity seekers were admitted into the Bedlam asylum to torment the insane by poking them with sticks. If neither Gov. Perry nor the courts stop this execution, it could be argued that the officials we have entrusted to ensure justice and mercy are the ones jabbing those sticks today.
Pete Earley is the author of Crazy: A Father's Search through America's Mental Health Madness.
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/11/30/-scott-panetti-execution_n_6243502.html
Texas Set To Execute Scott Panetti, Man Who Says He's Being Executed For Preaching Gospel
Michael Graczyk, November 30, 2014
HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) — No one disputes that Scott Panetti — heavily armed, head shaved and wearing camouflage — shot and killed his in-laws at their Texas Hill Country home, showering his estranged wife and 3-year-old daughter in blood.
Panetti himself acknowledged during his 1995 capital murder trial that he had killed Joe and Amanda Alvarado. Dressed as a cowboy, he acted as his own attorney, believing only an insane person could prove an insanity defense.
Jurors convicted him and sentenced him to death, and he is scheduled to die on Wednesday.
Panetti's attorneys are seeking to get him off death row or, in the very least, to get his execution date postponed so that he can undergo further psychological testing to determine if he's competent to be put to death. They believe his case raises questions about the legality of executing the mentally ill — an issue the U.S. Supreme Court has previously considered.
"From our perspective, this has been like a slow-moving train wreck since 1995," said Kathryn Kase, one of his lawyers.
A diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic, Panetti had been hospitalized for mental illness more than a dozen times in the decade leading up to the September 1992 killings of the Alvarados.
A 2007 Supreme Court review of Panetti's case tweaked the criteria for executing those with severe mental disorders by requiring inmates to not only know that they are being punished, but to also have a "rational understanding" of their punishment. Providing little guidance other than requiring a "fair hearing" for presentation of psychiatric evidence to consider insanity claims, the justices returned Panetti's case to lower federal courts, which ultimately found him competent.
Seven years since his last mental evaluation, Panetti is showing increasingly aberrant delusional behavior on death row, said Kase, who visited him a few weeks ago. He believes his punishment is part of a satanic conspiracy to prevent him from preaching the Gospel.
"He cannot appreciate why Texas seeks to execute him," Kase said. "You have to have a rational as well as factual understanding of why you're being executed.
"In Mr. Panetti's case, his understanding is the state wants to prevent him from preaching the Gospel on death row and saving their souls. And clearly that's not factual or rational."
Prosecutors argue that Panetti's claims are without merit and that defense attorneys have had years to arrange new evaluations.
Lucy Wilke, an assistant district attorney in Gillespie County, where Panetti was tried, said that as recently as Nov. 4, Panetti discussed Election Day politics during a prison visit with relatives.
"At the very least, it is clear that Panetti is oriented to time and place, a fact which his lawyers have disputed," she said in a filing last week to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, which refused to stop the execution.
Panetti's case now is back before a federal appeals court.
Court-appointed medical experts for the state have long said they suspect some of Panetti's bizarre behavior was contrived.
Panetti responded to a recent interview request from The Associated Press with the message: "I respectfully decline, Acts 28." The Biblical chapter in the Acts of the Apostles includes a reference to St. Paul as a prisoner of the Romans and of Paul successfully teaching the Gospel.
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Texas death row inmate's case headed to US appeals court
November 29, 2014
HOUSTON (AP) — Attorneys for a Texas death row inmate set for execution next week have said they will ask a federal appeals court to halt the punishment, arguing the prisoner is too delusional for lethal injection.
Lawyers for Scott Panetti, 56, filed notice they would appeal to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals after a district judge late Wednesday rejected their request to delay the execution, scheduled for Dec. 3 in Huntsville. They're seeking a new round of mental evaluations to bolster claims Panetti is incompetent for execution. Texas courts earlier this week also refused to stop Panetti's lethal injection.
U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks ruled new claims that allege Panetti's mental condition is deteriorating are similar to those he considered and rejected in 2008.
Sparks said while Panetti's behavior "is certainly strange, it is not measurably different from behavior documented in the records scrupulously examined by this court" nearly seven years ago. He noted that he's twice approved money for expert examinations of Panetti's mental condition and twice held competency hearings.
One of Panetti's attorneys, Kathryn Kase, said that during a two-hour visit with her early this month he couldn't carry on a coherent conversation and talked of hearing voices.
"The symptoms of his psychotic mental illness have grown worse," she argued.
State attorneys said Panetti's competency has been thoroughly examined and his lawyers could have raised their issues earlier instead of waiting until his execution was approaching.
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that a condemned inmate must have a factual and rational understanding of why he's facing execution.
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http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/577e30cd4b874632b1b885e2856f459d/TX--Texas-Execution-Panetti
Federal district judge refuses to stop execution next week of inmate said to be delusional
By Mike Graczyk, November 28, 2014
HOUSTON — Attorneys for a Texas death row inmate set for execution next week have said they will ask a federal appeals court to halt the punishment, arguing the prisoner is too delusional for lethal injection.
Lawyers for Scott Panetti, 56, filed notice they would appeal to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals after a district judge late Wednesday rejected their request to delay the execution, scheduled for Dec. 3 in Huntsville. They're seeking a new round of mental evaluations to bolster claims Panetti is incompetent for execution. Texas courts earlier this week also refused to stop Panetti's lethal injection.
U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks ruled new claims that allege Panetti's mental condition is deteriorating are similar to those he considered and rejected in 2008.
Sparks said while Panetti's behavior "is certainly strange, it is not measurably different from behavior documented in the records scrupulously examined by this court" nearly seven years ago. He noted that he's twice approved money for expert examinations of Panetti's mental condition and twice held competency hearings.
One of Panetti's attorneys, Kathryn Kase, said that during a two-hour visit with her early this month he couldn't carry on a coherent conversation and talked of hearing voices.
"The symptoms of his psychotic mental illness have grown worse," she argued.
State attorneys said Panetti's competency has been thoroughly examined and his lawyers could have raised their issues earlier instead of waiting until his execution was approaching.
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that a condemned inmate must have a factual and rational understanding of why he's facing execution.
Sparks, in his ruling, referred to arguments from state attorneys pointing out Panetti's interactions differed when the inmate spoke with mental health experts, cooperating with those representing his interests but refusing state experts.
Panetti also has a clemency petition before the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles. No action is expected on that until at least Monday.
Panetti was convicted of fatally shooting his in-laws, Joe and Amanda Alvarado, in front of his estranged wife and young children. His wife was living with her parents, and a week before the 1992 shootings she obtained a court order to keep Panetti away.
His 1995 trial attracted notoriety when he chose to be his own lawyer, insisting only an insane person could prove insanity, then wore a cowboy outfit to court and sought to subpoena dozens of witnesses, including Jesus Christ and John F. Kennedy. He ignored a standby attorney ordered by his trial judge to be available to provide assistance.
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Clock ticks toward Scott Panetti execution in Texas
Wisconsin native has suffered from mental illness for decades
By Meg Kissinger, December 1, 2014
Scott Panetti has been here before.
The Hayward native awaits his imminent execution in a Texas prison as his lawyers frantically file their last-minute appeals.
To kill Panetti, who has suffered from delusions for more than 36 years and believes Satan is monitoring him through his teeth, would "cross a moral line" and prove to be a "miserable spectacle," they say.
His landmark case has drawn international attention for what mental health and human rights advocates say is a "profound injustice."
More than 75,000 people have signed a petition asking Texas Gov. Rick Perry to commute his sentence to life in prison without parole. The list includes former presidential candidate Ron Paul and several evangelical Christians who say the government is too inept to be trusted to carry out death sentences.
The state's lawyers maintain Panetti is faking his symptoms. They say he is sane enough to understand that he is being put to death as punishment for shooting his wife's parents to death in 1992.
Panetti, 56, is scheduled to die by lethal injection at 6 p.m. Wednesday at the federal prison in Huntsville. His sister, Victoria, has flown to Texas from her home in Switzerland. Panetti's parents, Yvonne and Jack, are hunkered down in their trailer outside Houston awaiting word.
Yvonne, a retired mail carrier in Rusk County, has spent hours talking about her son with a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter, showing his baby book and recalling his old high school football triumphs. Now 79, she is too frail to speak publicly.
They are closing ranks and clinging to the days they have left the way many families do before a death, said Kathryn Kase, who is appealing the case for the Texas Defender Service.
"These are difficult days for them," Kase said.
One day away in 2004
Panetti was a day away from being strapped to a gurney in February 2004 when the execution was put on hold by a federal judge who agreed to consider whether Panetti's execution would violate the Eighth Amendment's protection against cruel and unusual punishment.
Ultimately, his case was taken before the U.S. Supreme Court. Gregory Wiercioch, now a professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School, successfully argued that the courts had not properly examined Panetti to determine if he was a suitable candidate for execution.
It is not enough for a defendant to understand that he or she is about to be put to death, the Supreme Court said. Defendants must have a rational understanding of why they are being executed.
The decision was hailed by mental health and human rights advocates for establishing a higher threshold for executions. But it did not settle Panetti's fate.
His case was sent back to the lower courts to correct the errors. Panetti was examined by psychiatrists in 2008 and the court again found him to be competent enough to execute.
Now he is citing the standard established in his own case in the hopes of being spared again, this time for good. His lawyers call it a "bitter twist."
Last week, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state's highest court, voted 5-4 to deny his appeal a final time.
The case is now before the federal court.
High school standout
Square-jawed and strapping, Panetti was a standout football player at Poynette High School, where he dropped out of school before graduation in 1976 after getting into a fight with the vice principal. Panetti joined the Navy but was discharged after he began hearing voices and hallucinating.
He was diagnosed with schizophrenia and hospitalized 15 times over the next 14 years, including stays at the veterans hospital in Tomah. He moved to Texas and, in 1986, was declared disabled by mental illness by the Social Security Administration.
By Sept. 8, 1992, Panetti had been well-known around Fredericksburg, Texas, where he frequently strutted around in a cowboy suit. His wife, Sonja Alvarado, had taken out a restraining order against him when he started rambling nonsense and called himself by different names, like Sarge and Sgt. Ranahan Iron Horse.
He shaved his head, tracked her down at her parents' house and gunned down Joe and Amanda Alvarado with a sawed-off deer hunting rifle.
Panetti's case has been called an outrage from the beginning.
The first jury could not decide if he was mentally fit to stand trial. A second jury allowed it and the judge then let Panetti represent himself, even though Panetti had claimed to have an "April Fools' Day conversion" and had stopped taking his medication.
He wore a cowboy suit with a purple kerchief and a 10-gallon hat dangling from his neck. He scribbled cartoons on legal documents and refused to enter some of his medical records into evidence.
Spectators said he scared the jury by pointing at them with an invisible gun. He assumed the name of his alter-ego Sarge and berated his wife during cross-examination.
"Sonja, Joe, Amanda kitchen," he said. "Joe bayonet, not attacking. Sarge not afraid, not threatened. Sarge not angry, not mad. Sarge, boom, boom. Sarge, boom, boom, boom, boom. Sarge, boom, boom."
He paused, and then continued:
"Joe, Amanda lying kitchen, here, there, blood. No leave. Scott, remember exactly what Sarge did. Shot the lock. Walked in the kitchen, Sonja, where's Birdie? Sonja here. Joe, bayonet, door, Amanda. Boom, boom, blood, blood. Demons. Ha, ha, ha, ha, oh, Lord, oh, you."
The jury took less than two hours to vote to convict him. Life without parole was not an option before 2005. So, Panetti's conviction meant he was going to death row.
Panetti's lawyers maintain that he thinks he is being put to death by Satan working through the state to stop him from preaching the Bible to his fellow inmates.
Kase, the director of Texas Defender Services, said Panetti's medical records from the past few years show a clear sign of his deteriorating mental state.
Lawyers for the state say they have tapes of him talking to his parents where he clearly knows why he is being executed.
In a 1999 interview with the Journal Sentinel, Panetti said he knew he was mentally ill, but he babbled nonsensically much of the time, showing off his muscles and claiming he once was recruited to play football with the Green Bay Packers.
International attention
His case has drawn international attention and pleas for mercy. Even his ex-wife signed a petition to spare him.
The new order for his execution was signed on Oct. 16. His lawyers learned about it by reading a story in the Houston Chronicle.
John Blume, a professor at Cornell University Law School who studied the effect of the 2007 Supreme Court ruling, called Panetti's case a "tragedy."
"This train never should have left the station," he said. "Panetti should never have been found competent to stand trial and to represent himself and he shouldn't be allowed to be executed."
One Texas criminal appeals judge said he was so troubled by the handling of Panetti's case that he believes the death penalty should be abolished.
If the execution goes as scheduled, Panetti will be the 10th person to die in a Texas death chamber this year and the 519th to die by lethal injection since the practice began in 1982.
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This Is The Schizophrenic Man Texas Wants To Execute This Week
Scott Panetti, first diagnosed with serious mental illness 36 years ago, was sentenced to death in 1995 for the 1992 murders of his in-laws. BuzzFeed News looks at the timeline of Panetti’s illness, crimes, and legal fights since.
By Tasneem Nashrulla, November 30, 2014
Scott Panetti, 56, is scheduled to be executed in Texas on Wednesday, Dec. 3, for the 1992 murders of his wife’s parents. He believes the state wants to shut him up about corruption on death row.
Panetti was first diagnosed with schizophrenia 36 years ago. He has been untreated for the past 19 years.
Now, his attorneys are fighting to prove that he is too severely mentally ill to be executed. They argue it is unconstitutional to kill a man who represented himself at his trial wearing a cowboy costume and subpoenaed the Pope and Jesus.
The case has garnered nationwide attention and has brought Texas’ reputation as being the most execution-happy state into narrow focus. Huntsville Unit, the most active death chamber in the country, has executed 10 people this year, the fewest since 1996 — and yet still the most in the nation, with Missouri close behind.
Texas’s highest criminal court has refused to stop the execution. In federal court proceedings, his lawyers filed a motion to stop his execution in the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals on Sunday.
Panetti’s clemency petition is in the hands of Gov. Rick Perry, under whose time in office there have been more executions than any other governor in modern history.
Panetti has not been granted a competency hearing in seven years. His lawyers say his mental health has deteriorated considerably since then. Executing an extremely mentally ill man would violate the Eight and Fourteenth Amendments, his lawyers have argued, because it would offend the “the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society.”
The state has maintained, however, that Panetti has exaggerated his mental illness and is rational enough to understand the reason for his execution.
Here is a timeline of Panetti’s struggle with mental illness and its tragic repercussions.
July 1978 - July 1991: Panetti was hospitalized 13 times following his initial diagnosis with schizophrenia at the age of 18.
Panetti was first diagnosed with “early schizophrenia” 18 months after he was honorably discharged from the Navy in 1978.
He was then hospitalized 13 times before he committed the crime for which he is sentenced to death.
Various doctors over time characterized him as being paranoid, incoherent, and hostile. They said he had grandiose ideas and showed schizoid symptoms of depression, delusions, brain dysfunctions, and suicidal ideation.
In May 1986, his first wife, Jane Panetti, reported that after their baby was born in March, Panetti began to believe that the devil had possessed their home. He nailed the curtains shut, buried their furniture in the backyard, and conducted an exorcism he called “the devil’s birthday” by spraying water on a stack of their valuables.
He claimed that “he saw the devil on a wall and cut the devil with a knife and that blood had run out on him,” his wife stated in an affidavit.
Two years before murdering his second wife’s parents, Panetti began calling himself Sgt. Iron Horse and threatened to kill his baby, his wife, her father, and himself.
A 1986 doctor’s report said Panetti “appears to be on the edge of a psychotic break,” “feels he is controlled by an unseen power,” and “hears Bob Dylan music in his head.” He was also deemed disable and given Social Security benefits based on his schizophrenia.
In 1990, the hospital records showed Panetti assumed the name Sgt. Iron Horse and believed locals were plotting to kill him.
He also threatened to kill himself, his second wife, Sonja Alvarado, their baby and his father-in-law by burning the house down. He was involuntarily committed for homicidal behavior and was found to be suffering from delusions and psychotic religiosity.
September 8, 1992: Panetti murdered his wife’s parents at their home, changed into a suit and surrendered to police.
On Sept. 8, 1992, Panetti shaved his head, dressed in camouflage combat fatigues, armed himself with a sawed-off shotgun and a deer rifle, and shot his parents-in-law, Joe and Amanda Alvarado, at close range at their home. He then took his wife and daughter, both of whom witnessed the murders, to his bunkhouse.
According to court records, he released them unharmed. After a lengthy standoff with the police, he changed into a suit and surrendered to police.
He was off his antipsychotic medication that year.
1994-1995: Panetti was found competent to stand trial despite his mental illness.
During his competency trial, a court-ordered psychiatrist said Panetti did not know what year it was or who the president was. He said Panetti had hallucinations of seeing Jesus in his prison cell and described himself as several different people.
Another forensic psychiatrist, Dr. Richard Coons, testified that Panetti had schizophrenia.
Coons’ testified:
[Panetti] began to talk about scripture and then he began, with no prompting from me, no interjection from me whatsoever, he went from scripture to being in jail in Bell County to the way prisoners look, to the Waco Veterans Administration Hospital. He described patients. He talked about lightning, talked about having been drowned a couple of times, the Lord wants me to help a person, talked about the meaning of life, suicidal thoughts, his mother’s prayers, so much to be thankful for, problem marriages, women he’s dated, rodeo, drinking, tequila in old Mexico, the YO Ranch, his battle with the bottle, a mescal dream of a bottle with worms in it, dope dealer sitting in the courtroom, Luke, Chapter 13 Verse 33, new saddle, boots, boot maker is dead, hobbles for a horse, an old piece of cotton rope and riding with a lead shank.
A mistrial was declared after the initial jury in the competency phase proceedings deadlocked. A second jury found him competent to stand trial.
1995: Wearing a cowboy costume and a purple bandana, Panetti represented himself at his capital murder trial.
On April 1, 1995, before his trial, Panetti said he had a revelation that he was a “born-again April fool” and that God had cured his schizophrenia. He refused to take his antipsychotic medication. He fired his attorneys, represented himself at trial, and rejected the state’s offer of a life sentence in exchange for a guilty plea.
He wanted to sign his waiver of counsel form with what he said was his Native American name — “Wounded Sunbird, formerly He Who Never Cries.”
During his trial, Panetti wore a western cowboy costume and a purple bandana. He subpoenaed more than 200 people, including Jesus Christ, the pope, and John F. Kennedy.
He said he was not guilty by reason of insanity and told the jury that only an insane person could prove insanity.
During his trial, Panetti rambled incessantly about everything from his haircuts to castrating a horse.
He took the witness stand and gave the court excessive and irrelevant details about his life, including his birth, his mother’s milk sickness, his tattoo, a horse flipping over on him and his castrating that horse later, a school play, a girlfriend who got him into rodeo, his sexual experiences, his job as an artificial insemination technician for cattle, watching his friend who was a diabetic injecting insulin, his girlfriend’s abortion, being drugged with LSD and PCP in the Navy, his brother’s wedding, taking cocaine with a nurse after leaving the Navy, talking with a man who worked for Frederick’s of Hollywood who wanted him to model lingerie, killing a rattlesnake, being an extra in a movie, attending cosmetology school and cutting his sister’s hair, accidentally being shot in the leg, and seeing the devil.
He assumed the personality of “Sarge” while testifying and, in the third person, then described how he killed his wife’s parents:
His standby counsel Scott Monroe later said that Panetti pointed his hands at the jury like he was shooting while saying “Boom, boom, boom.” Monroe said the jury was visibly upset by his demonstrations.
“This was a show of a mentally incompetent man and did more to give him the death penalty than any other event in trial,” Monroe said.
September 22, 1995: The jury sentenced Panetti to death.
This was Panetti’s closing statement at the punishment phase of his trial:
“You know, just to touch on the spat and wasn’t cuffed, but I was bronc and Sheriff Kaiser and I had a talk, well, of the fact that I’m no longer American citizen, and because of my buckaroo case. I believe city people love horses, too, and I don’t consider myself anything above or below anyone, but I do consider myself me, and when I made my last confession at Veterans Hospital to Father De la Garza, I wasn’t Catholic.”
1995-2012: Panetti’s mental illness was consistently noted by federal courts considering his competency to be executed.
Over the years following his conviction, Panetti’s lawyers consistently have gone to federal court to challenge his competency to be executed because of his mental illness.
In 2004, the district court said it was a fact that Panetti suffered from mental illness and that his “cognitive processes are impaired” to such an extent that “by grandiosity and a delusional belief system in which he believes himself to be persecuted for his religious activities.”
In 2007, the Supreme Court, while remanding Panetti’s case for further proceedings, noted that there was “much in the record to support the conclusion that petitioner suffers from severe delusions” and that it was “uncontested that petitioner made a substantial showing of incompetency.”
2012-2013: Panetti received his first disciplinary writeup for a serious offense in prison; he was banging his bunk and cell door and yelling repeatedly at officers.
After 17 years on death row, Panetti received his first disciplinary writeup for a serious offense — creating a disturbance and disrupting operations in the prison.
Later that month, he filed a grievance saying he had been falsely accused of that charge. After asking to be restored to his former cell, he wrote:
Well now nuff said as Jake the cow poke would quip in Cow pokes cartoons by Ace Reid from Kerrville Texas. You may see his cartoons in the old Dovers/Journals a news paper for stockmen. Were [sic] it was reported back in the 1940’s theArmy, yes the United States Army invaded Mexico to put a stop to a screw worm out break. The only case of scew [sic] worms i’ve ever encounted [sic] was in Montna [sic] USA 1970’s. also may I add the only time i’ve cused [sic] out anyone is when they have attacked my mother or son, daughter with verbal disrespect or made threats against my family for my being a preacher of truth although I’ve not been preaching as when Election 2000 to early 2012. Now i’m just try’n to keep my own personal Jesus to my self and wonder is it Bar-Jesus or Jesus of Nazareth! at times I’m confused some.
On Nov. 7, 2013, Panetti was charged with assault after he threw urine onto the walkway in front of his cell and told the officer who confronted him: “Your [sic] a crooked officer, Mr. Burks, and I’m going to smite you for your wickedness.”
Panetti complained that he was being persecuted for his religious beliefs and the appearance of Satanic graffiti in his cell.
November 6, 2014: His pro bono counsel said that during a meeting, Panetti spoke endlessly about disconnected topics from Coca Cola to his knowledge of horses.
Kathryn Kase, Panetti’s pro bono counsel from the Texas Defender Service, said that his mental condition had deteriorated over the years. During a two-hour meeting with him on Nov. 6, Kase said he gave her disjointed answers and went through several unconnected topics.
He told her that he thought the TDCJ was surveilling him by implanting a listening device in his gold tooth. He said he was being executed because TDCJ wanted him to “shut up” about corruption on death row and to prevent him from teaching the gospel.
When asked to elaborate on the corruption, he said the guards were stealing his care packages and the TDCJ wanted to “rub me out” because of what he knew.
According to Kase’s report, Panetti said he heard voices that had information about cheerleaders and friends from his high school. He said he read the Gospel to stop the voices from overwhelming him.
Kase said Panetti told her, “Jesus is my treatment program because I can’t afford mental health treatment.”
November 14 - 30: Panetti’s attorneys are fighting to stop his execution scheduled for Dec. 3.
Panetti’s lawyers filed motions in the state district court and then the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (CCA) to stay or modify the date of his execution in order to assess his competency to be executed.
Both the district court and CCA, on a 5-4 split vote, have denied the motions to stay his execution.
His lawyers also have filed a clemency petition with Gov. Rick Perry and the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, along with letters of support from various state and national mental health organizations and professionals, as well former Gov. Mark White and faith leaders.
Panetti’s clemency petition has also garnered support from Texas legislators, former U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, and the European Union.
In another appeal to CCA, which was rejected Wednesday, his lawyers challenged the use of the death penalty against persons with severe mental illnesses citing an empirical study that showed an emerging national consensus against executing such people.
The appeal also stated that imposition of the death penalty on those with severe mental illness offends the “evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society.” The stay request was rejected 6-3.
On Sunday, his attorneys filed an appeal at the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals to review the district court’s decision denying his motion to stay the execution, regarding their claim seeking appointment of counsel and funding for a mental health expert.
“Panetti’s serious mental illness has infected every stage of his case,” his attorney said. “He is not the worst of the worst for whom the death penalty is intended.”
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http://www.vice.com/read/meet-the-paranoid-schizophrenic-texas-plans-to-execute-wednesday-1201
Texas Plans to Execute a Paranoid Schizophrenic Man This Wednesday
By Katie Halper, December 1, 2014
Scott Panetti claims Selena Gomez is his daughter and that prison guards implanted a listening device in his tooth. He also believes his imminent execution is part of a conspiracy between the state of Texas and the devil to stop him from preaching the gospel on death row.
Texas officials, for their part, argue that Panetti—who murdered his in-laws in 1992—is mentally competent to be executed on Wednesday.
At this point, it's tough to say who's more delusional.
What is plenty evident is that Texas has gone to great lengths and cut countless corners in an effort to kill a man with a long and well-documented history of paranoid schizophrenia, which was first diagnosed by doctors in an army hospital in 1978. Over the next 14 years, Panetti would be hospitalized over a dozen times and diagnosed and re-diagnosed with schizophrenia and other mental disorders.
While Texas refuses to acknowledge Panetti's condition, a diverse group of individuals and organizations—beyond the usual prison reform suspects—are calling for clemency. These include 55 prominent Evangelical Christians and seven retired and active bishops from the United Methodist Church; former US Representative Ron Paul; former Texas Governor Mark White; ten Texas state legislators; nearly 30 former prosecutors and US attorneys general; Murder Victims Families for Reconciliation, the American Bar Association, and the European Union.
Michael Perlin, a lawyer, law professor, and world-renowned expert on mental health and the law, didn't mince words when asked about Panetti.
"The Panetti case is as shameful a stain on our legal system as I have observed in my 43-plus years as a lawyer," he told me. "There is no question as to the profundity of his mental illness and similarly no question that his execution mocks the notion that due process is truly available to all in the criminal justice system."
The legal issue at hand is Panetti's ability to understand and thus undergo his execution. But the only reason he faces execution in the first place is because Texas failed to acknowledge his mental incompetence at the time of the crime and subsequent trial.
In 1986, Panetti hallucinated that he killed the devil—who had apparently entered his home—and washed the walls of his house to remove the "blood." On another occasion, he buried his furniture and valuables because the devil was supposedly hiding in them. As his co-counsel Kathryn Kase told me, "It really can't be seriously disputed that he has schizophrenia. I assure you the Army doesn't go around casually diagnosing people with serious mental illnesses."
Nor does the Social Security Administration, which determined in 1986 that Panetti's schizophrenia was so debilitating it entitled him to disability benefits.
Like many people with psychotic illnesses, Panetti has not always taken his prescribed medications. In 1992, his mental health was so bad that his wife, Sonja Alvarado, took their three-year-old daughter and moved in with her parents. Alvarado obtained a restraining order against her husband but was unable to have him committed. She asked the authorities to take away his guns, but they claimed they lacked the right to do so. As Kase told me, "We wouldn't be here if the authorities had only taken away his guns. The authorities knew that he was mentally ill and that he had cycled in and out of the hospitals."
A few days after the police refused to confiscate his weapons, Panetti awoke before dawn, shaved his head, leaving strange patches of hair, and drove to the home of his wife's parents. Off his meds, and in front of his wife and daughter, Panetti fatally shot his in-laws at close range. He then put his wife and daughter in a bunkhouse he'd been living in. When police surrounded it, Panetti released his family unharmed, washed the blood off himself, changed into a suit, and surrendered.
It's hard to keep track of the number of times the court system failed Panetti, but let's start with his 1994 pre-trial competency hearing. Under Texas law, a person is considered competent to stand trial if he or she has "sufficient present ability to consult with his or her lawyer with a reasonable degree or rational understanding," and "a rational, as well as a factual, understanding of the proceedings against him or her."
Here's where Panetti's incompetence should have been a slam-dunk. One of Panetti's lawyers testified that his delusional behavior made any useful communication between them impossible. Psychiatrists called by both the defense and the prosecution agreed that he was schizophrenic. And yet, somehow, the doctor testifying for the state was able to claim that Panetti was competent. And the jury agreed.
Panetti kicked off his trial by firing his lawyers, whom he believed to be conspiring against him. His sister said in an affidavit that her brother "had a delusion that only an insane person could prove insanity." The judge allowed the man to represent himself even as he entered a not guilty by reason of insanity plea.
He certainly looked the part in his purple cowboy suit, bandana, cowboy boots, and spurs. Panetti called over 200 witnesses, including Jesus Christ, the Pope, and JFK. He aimed an imaginary rifle at the jury and explained that he had killed his in-laws while under the control of "Sarge," one of his auditory hallucinations that had been documented years earlier, when doctors noted that Panetti appeared to have suffered a "psychotic break" and had "started using assumed name Sgt. Iron Horse." In front of the jury, using the third person, Panetti testified:
Sarge woke up. Cut off Scott's hair. Sarge suited up. Shells, canteen pouch, 30.06, tropical hat, tropical top, bunkhouse, fast, haircut fast, suited up fast, boom, ready fast, fast, haircut, webgear, top, brush hat, boots, out the door, in the jeep, driving, wife, the bridge. Why is it taking so long? In front of Joe and Amanda's house . . . Sarge, everything fast. Everything fast. Everything slow. Tapped on the window, shattered window....Scott, what? Scott, what did you see Sarge do? ...Sarge not afraid, not threatened. Sarge not angry, not mad. Sarge, boom, boom. Sarge, boom, boom, boom. Sarge, boom, boom. Sarge is gone. No more Sarge... Boom, boom, boom, blood....Demons. Ha, ha, ha, ha, oh, Lord, oh, you.
The trial transcript suggests Judge Stephen Ables was more interested in getting on with the case than in justice. Particularly heartbreaking is an exchange in which Panetti repeatedly asked for a continuance so he could go to the doctor and get his medication: "I'm not looking for a long delay, but I'm going to definitely need a couple of days to get the medicine, to see my doctor and to prepare my case." The judge refused, responding, "All right, we need to go ahead and stop and kind of catch our breath and we will be starting here in about ten minutes." Ables was more than happy to talk to Panetti like he was an intellectual and emotional child. He just didn't want to try him like one.
Kase, who now represents Panetti, was shocked by how often "Scott was in distress... and how he was allowed to represent himself and how he was allowed to continue to represent himself after showing his mental illness. Why didn't the judge say, 'I'm going to require you to have counsel'?"
It took the jury only two hours to find Panetti guilty in 1995. In the sentencing hearing that quickly followed, Dr. James P. Grigson testified that Panetti would kill again unless executed and that psychotropic drugs would have no effect on him. Grigson's penchant for predicting the dangerous behavior of defendants he'd never met earned him the nickname "Dr. Death" and got him expelled from the American Psychiatric Association that very year. It took the jury four hours to determine that Panetti deserved to die by lethal injection.
Fast-forward three decades. Panetti's lawyers have appealed his death sentence, arguing that he should never have been found competent to stand trial, should not have been permitted to represent himself, should have been found insane, and should not have been sentenced to die. But courts have denied all appeals, which is why his lawyers are focusing on his current mental incompetence.
In 2007, Panetti's lawyers argued in front of the US Supreme Court that Texas failed to prove that he met the standard of competence required by Ford v. Wainwright (1986), which established that "the Eighth Amendment forbids the execution only of those who are unaware of the punishment they are about to suffer and why they are to suffer it." While Panetti's lawyers claimed that Ford defined competence as having a "rational understanding," Senator Ted Cruz, then the state's Solicitor General, argued that a factual understanding was sufficient. It was, according to Cruz, irrelevant that Panetti was so delusional that he believed that his execution was part of "spiritual warfare" between Satan and himself. The Supreme Court disagreed with Cruz and established that competence required rational and not merely factual awareness in itsPanetti v. Quarterman decision.
But instead of finding Panetti incompetent, the Supreme Court sent the case back down to the lower courts. All the Fifth Circuit—which has jurisdiction over Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas—had to do to move forward with the execution was find that Panetti was indeed competent under the new precedent, which it did last year. Now the clock is ticking.
Meanwhile, Texas law enforcement figures haven't done much to hide their disregard for Panetti. Neither the district attorney who sought an execution date—nor the judge who granted it, nor the Attorney General, nor the Texas Department of Criminal Justice—thought it important to let Panetti's lawyers know that their client would be executed this Wednesday, December 3. As Kase explained to me, this is bizarre.
"The most active user of the death penalty in Texas is Harris County," she said. "That DA office routinely advises defense that it plans to seek an execution date and invites the defense lawyer to the hearing so that they lawyer can say if there is anything that's a barrier to setting an execution date."
It was a full two weeks after the hearing that Kase found out the client she'd been representing for nearly ten years had a date for execution. She read about it in the newspaper.
Panetti's lawyers lost two weeks of work in what is literally a matter of life and death. Kase told me that "mental health cases are extremely paper-heavy and we've been inundated with more than 8,000 pages of material regarding records for Mr. Panetti. I can't begin to describe how overwhelming that is and to have to do this all in a short period of time."
Since learning of the execution date, Panetti's lawyers have filed a clemency petition, as well as two other motions. One asks for a stay or modification of the execution date so they can assess his competence. Given that Panetti hasn't been evaluated or received any medical treatment in seven years, Texas can't even claim it's killing a man who is competent at this moment. While Panetti hasn't been competent since 1992, his mental health has also seriously deteriorated since then.
Though the Texas Department of Criminal Justice has failed to provide Panetti's lawyers with all the requested records, the ones that have been sent over reveal a change in behavior. After nearly 20 years of refusing to take psychotropic medication, Panetti is now seeking it. A staff member reported that Panetti is requesting medication because he is no longer able to cope through prayer and Bible reading. Notes from prison guards indicate he is misbehaving in ways he never has and his paranoia has increased.
"He's just getting worse and worse," Kase said. "In our last visit he heard voice in front of me which was extremely disconcerting. I'm not a mental health professional and I could tell something was happening and when I asked him if he was hearing voices, he very reluctantly admitted it. He tried to hide it."
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals denied the first motion, and an appeal was filed at the Fifth Circuit on Sunday.
The other motion filed could change the way this country deals with capital punishment and the mentally ill. Disturbingly, though the Supreme Court has prohibited the execution of the intellectually disabled (formerly called "mentally retarded"), it has not categorically banned the execution of people with severe mental illness. Last week, Panetti's lawyer's filed an Eighth Amendment Challenge arguing that the execution of the mentally ill is prohibited by the Constitution, thanks to an emerging consensus that it is wrong to execute those with severe mental illness.
Unfortunately, if not surprisingly, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCC) denied this motion as well. But a TCC judge made history in his dissenting opinion. Tom Price became the first TCC judge ever and the first state-wide Republican judge anywhere to publicly oppose the death penalty from the bench. Panetti's lawyers have filed an appeal to the Fifth Circuit on this motion as well. While a ruling that the death penalty in itself should be abolished is highly unlikely, it is conceivable that the Fifth Circuit would at least recognize the cruel and unusual nature as well as the inhumanity of executing people who not only suffer a painful and debilitating disease, but have been utterly failed by the American criminal justice system.
When I asked Kase how she felt about the task of staving off the execution this week, she replied, "Determined."
Katie Halper is a writer, filmmaker, comedian and sometimes history teacher born, raised and still living in New York City. She has appeared on MSNBC and writes for Salon, Jezebel, The Nation, and Comedy Central. Follow her on Twitter.
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Lawyers try to save ‘delusional’ death row murderer, 56, who tried to subpoena Jesus Christ and JFK at his trial, from Wednesday execution
Scott Panetti killed his in-laws at their Texas Hill Country home in 1992
His attorneys want to get him off death row or his execution date postponed
His legal team want to determine if he's competent to be put to death
Jurors convicted him and sentenced him to death on December 3
But his attorneys said he thinks he's being executed for preaching the Bible
By Belinda Robinson, November 29, 2014
A 'delusional murderer' who killed his in-laws with such ferocity that he showered his estranged wife and three-year-old daughter in blood will be put to death on Wednesday despite opposition.
Scott Panetti was heavily armed with his head shaved and wearing camouflage when he shot and killed his in-laws at their Texas Hill Country home in 1992.
But his attorneys want to get him off death row, or, in the very least, get his execution date on December 3, postponed so that he can undergo further psychological testing.
His legal team want to determine if he's competent to be put to death.
Yet no one disputes that he is highly dangerous and delusional.
Panetti himself acknowledged during his 1995 capital murder trial that he had killed Joe and Amanda Alvarado.
Dressed as a cowboy, he acted as his own attorney, believing only an insane person could prove an insanity defense.
Jurors convicted him and sentenced him to death, and he is scheduled to die on Wednesday.
However, Panetti's attorneys believe his case raises questions about the legality of executing the mentally ill — an issue the U.S. Supreme Court has previously considered.
Kathryn Kase, one of his lawyers said: 'From our perspective, this has been like a slow-moving train wreck since 1995.'
A diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic, Panetti had been hospitalized for mental illness more than a dozen times in the decade leading up to the September 1992 killings of the Alvarados.
A 2007 Supreme Court review of Panetti's case tweaked the criteria for executing those with severe mental disorders.
It required inmates to not only know that they are being punished, but to also have a 'rational understanding' of their punishment.
Providing little guidance other than requiring a fair hearing for presentation of psychiatric evidence to consider insanity claims, the justices returned Panetti's case to lower federal courts, which ultimately found him competent.
Seven years since his last mental evaluation, Panetti is showing increasingly aberrant delusional behavior on death row.
Kase, who visited him a few weeks ago believes his punishment is part of a satanic conspiracy to prevent him from preaching the Gospel.
'He cannot appreciate why Texas seeks to execute him,' Kase said.
'You have to have a rational as well as factual understanding of why you're being executed.
'In Mr. Panetti's case, his understanding is the state wants to prevent him from preaching the Gospel on death row and saving their souls. And clearly that's not factual or rational.'
Prosecutors argue that Panetti's claims are without merit and that defense attorneys have had years to arrange new evaluations.
Lucy Wilke, an assistant district attorney in Gillespie County, where Panetti was tried, said that as recently as November 4, Panetti discussed Election Day politics during a prison visit with relatives.
'At the very least, it is clear that Panetti is oriented to time and place, a fact which his lawyers have disputed,' she said in a filing last week to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.
It has refused to stop the execution and Panetti's case now is back before a federal appeals court.
Court-appointed medical experts for the state have long said they suspect some of Panetti's bizarre behavior was contrived.
Panetti recently declined to be interviewed.
He said: 'I respectfully decline, Acts 28.'
The Biblical chapter in the Acts of the Apostles includes a reference to St. Paul as a prisoner of the Romans and of Paul successfully teaching the Gospel.
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Mentally ill inmate set to die Wednesday for Hill Country double slaying
By Michelle Casady, November 29, 2014
In 1992, frustrated that his wife and 3-year-old daughter had left him, Scott Louis Panetti burst through the sliding glass door of his in-laws’ Fredericksburg home and shot both of them in the chest with a .30-06 hunting rifle.
Estranged wife Sonja Alvarado and their child looked on in horror as they were splattered in her parents’ blood, she would later testify.
Panetti, now 56 and garnering attention across the United States and beyond because of his history of mental illness, is scheduled to be executed Wednesday in Huntsville. His case spotlights whether a defendant has to be sane enough to understand why he is being put to death.
Panetti was diagnosed as schizophrenic in 1978 and was hospitalized for psychosis and delusions 14 times in 11 years before the murders. Two juries were empaneled solely to decide whether he was competent to stand trial — the first hung and the second decided he was.
He was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death in 1995, after a trial in which he was allowed to represent himself and occasionally spoke in the third-person as an alter-ego named Sgt. Ranahan Ironhorse.
His execution was stayed in 2007 by the U.S. Supreme Court, which overturned a lower-court decision that supported arguments by Ted Cruz, the Texas U.S. senator, who, as the state solicitor general then, argued Panetti was competent and understood his punishment.
A diverse list of people and organizations have gone on record opposing his execution, including former Gov. Mark White, a Democrat, former Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, the nearly 400,000-member American Bar Association, dozens of evangelical leaders, the European Union and more than 90,000 people who have signed a Change.org petition.
Through his attorney, Panetti has declined a Death Row interview request. Attempts to reach his ex-wife and his now-grown daughter were unsuccessful.
Neighborhood 'Rambo’
In the days that followed the murders of Jose Alvarado, 55, and Amanda Alvarado, 56, neighbors who declined to be identified spoke to the San Antonio Express-News about their prior interactions with Panetti.
“He’s a very intense person,” one neighbor said, explaining the suspect had been prone to abrupt mood swings. “He was a Rambo-type character if there ever was one. But when things were going good for him, he was the nicest guy you ever met.”
Panetti's attorney at the time — Meridel Solbrig, who represented him for five years prior to the murders, including in divorce proceedings from his first wife — said her client “fancies himself as a cowboy in a too-modern world. He is a very dangerous man, especially when he drinks a lot on his medication.”
Another unnamed neighbor recounted that on the night the U.S. invaded Panama in December 1989, Panetti came to his house dressed in fatigues and wearing camouflage paint on his face. Panetti claimed the president had personally called him and placed him on 10 days active duty to fight in the conflict, the neighbor recalled.
“The guy was very unstable,” he said.
A third neighbor expressed frustration that police hadn’t taken action sooner.
“It took a killing before they did anything,” the neighbor said. “He was always doing crazy things. Everyone knew he was dangerous.”
At the time, Gillespie County Sheriff Milton Jung defended his department against those claims, saying the laws concerning mental illness prevented him from acting further.
The days before
A week before Panetti killed his in-laws, a judge signed a protective order meant to keep him away from the property.
The order, signed Sept. 2, prevented him from going to the Alvarado home to see his wife or child. A hearing on the order was set for Sept. 15.
On Friday, Sept. 4, he left his attorney, Solbrig, a message on her office phone. She wouldn’t receive it until she returned from the Labor Day holiday on Tuesday, Sept. 8 — the day the double slaying took place.
Referring to himself as a “nonpaying-pain-in-the-ass client,” he pleaded for help purchasing medication and said he needed someone to talk to.
“I am going bird hunting to get my head together,” he said. “But my wife sold me out to the cops with that restraining order, and now I’m worried about getting to see my little Birdie.”
Birdie was his nickname for his daughter, Amanda, who was named after her grandmother.
“I’m trying to get out of town to work so I won’t bother anyone,” he continued on the answering machine message. “With my medication, everything will be all right enough to not scare anybody and not get run off.”
Sheriff Jung told reporters that two weeks prior to the shootings, deputies had been called to the Alvarado home for a disturbance and that shortly thereafter, Sonja Alvarado obtained the restraining order against Panetti, forcing him to move into a hunting cabin just a few miles away.
Killings and standoff
The murders of Jose and Amanda Alvarado were the first in Fredericksburg in 23 years.
Sonja Alvarado testified at Panetti’s capital murder trial that he pointed the sawed-off rifle at her, too, and fired but the gun jammed.
“He was asking us if I wanted to see my parents die first or if they wanted to see me die first,” she recounted to jurors, describing in detail how he first shot her father and then her mother when she ran to her husband’s side. “Blood spurted out all over me and my daughter.”
The Alvarados had lived in the brown, wood-frame home for more than 20 years.
Sonja Alvarado testified that she slipped on her parents’ blood as Panetti hurried her and their daughter out of the house around 5:30 a.m., forced them into his pickup at gunpoint and drove them five-or-so miles back to his hunting cabin.
Police were called to the Alvarados’ home by neighbors who reported gunshots. They surrounded Panetti’s cabin within an hour.
Soon thereafter, officers communicating with Panetti via bullhorn convinced him to release Sonja Alvarado and his daughter from the cabin. His estranged wife emerged with a black eye. The child was unharmed.
After more than eight hours locked inside, with helicopters buzzing in to “unnerve” him, Panetti came out with his hands up. But he had first crudely shaven his head and put on a black suit and tie.
“Very strange man,” Sheriff Jung told reporters at the scene, adding that Panetti recently had received treatment at the Veterans Administration hospital in Kerrville for mental illness. “This whole thing is bizarre.”
Jung said Panetti, no stranger to police, had been in trouble frequently for alcohol-and-drug-related incidents.
“. . . When he doesn’t take his medication properly, he gets violent,” the sheriff said.
Panetti told several residents he had fought in Vietnam and was shot in the leg while serving, but he was too young to have been involved in the conflict and was in the Navy for less than 11 months, Jung said.
Murder trial
Three years later, after the second jury found he was aware enough of his surroundings to stand trial, Panetti attempted to subpoena nearly 250 witnesses to testify before the third jury, which was tasked with determining his guilt or innocence. The subpoena list included Jesus Christ, John F. Kennedy and the pope, but he later dropped those names and about 200 others.
Panetti — who claimed he was controlled by multiple personalities that he named as Sgt. Ironhorse, Texas Will, Montana Will and Chaplain — had fired his appointed counsel and demanded to represent himself.
He wore a purple handkerchief around his neck, pants tucked into his boots, a cowboy hat and suspenders. A reporter who covered the trial described the ensemble as closely resembling one worn by John Wayne in the 1939 western movie “Stagecoach.”
District Attorney Bruce Curry said shortly after the trial that the legal skills displayed by Panetti in the courtroom had been surprising to him.
He did not return messages seeking comment for this story.
“I would say that Bruce Curry stands alone in his high estimation of Scott Panetti’s legal abilities at trial,” said Panetti’s current attorney, Kathryn Kase, who has represented him since 2007.
Scott Monroe, then a Hill Country defense lawyer who now serves as district attorney of the 198th Judicial District in Kerrville, was appointed by the presiding judge to be standby defense counsel for Panetti during his trial.
It was an unusual position to be in, he recently recalled in an interview with the San Antonio Express-News, adding that he knew of no other lawyers who had been appointed standby for a death penalty case where the defendant represented himself.
Monroe said he was there only to answer procedural questions Panetti had, though he didn’t ask many. Panetti demanded Monroe sit in the gallery rather than at the defense table with him.
In Monroe’s estimation, two things greatly shaped the outcome of the trial: Panetti’s cross-examination of his wife, when he repeatedly asked her to detail the slayings and seemed not to understand why she was angry with him, and his own “third-person narrative” testimony of how he committed the murders, which he conducted under the persona of “Sarge.”
“It was as though he is observing this event happening before him and it was very bizarre and very unsettling,” Monroe said. “That was in the old courtroom in Kerr County, the witness chair wasn’t three feet from the jury.”
It took the panel 90 minutes to determine he was guilty of the killings, and two hours to sentence him to death.
Panetti delivered a rambling 20-minute closing argument that included his reading of a poem during the punishment phase of his trial.
“The Texas Department of Public Safety tamed the Iron Horse,” he said. “I think they went beyond taming, and I think they broke him.”
High court argument
In 2007, the debate over whether Panetti was competent to be executed made its way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Ted Cruz, as solicitor general, argued to the court that Panetti, who said he believed the state was going to kill him to prevent him from preaching the Gospel, was competent to be executed.
“You have an individual who knows he committed a crime, knows . . . the state is going to execute him because he committed the crime, but he doesn’t belive that reason,” Cruz told the justices. “He at least asserts that he believes something else is going on. But nothing in this court’s precedents or nothing in the principles behind the Eighth Amendment (prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment) require a person to believe the state’s motivation.”
Referencing the Supreme Court case of Ford vs. Wainwright, in which the court in 1986 determined it was unconstitutional to execute a man who didn’t understand why he was being executed, Cruz said Panetti’s case was different.
“His understanding of that is in marked contrast to Alvin Ford’s,” he argued. “Alvin Ford didn’t know he was going to be executed. He was unaware of what was going on. . . . Here, Panetti knows he’s going to die and he also knows he’s guilty.”
Conceding that Panetti “plainly has some mental illness,” Cruz said six psychiatrists concluded he was exaggerating his symptoms, that he was “acting bizarre in order to appear more insane.”
The justices disagreed, and in a 5-4 decision reversed the 5th U.S. Circuit Court’s decision — sending the case back for review.
“The 5th Circuit held, based on its earlier decisions, that (Panetti’s) delusions are simply not relevant to whether a prisoner can be executed so long as he is aware that the state has identified the link between his crime and the punishment to be inflicted,” the majority opinion read. “This test ignores the possibility that even if such awareness exists, gross delusions stemming from a severe mental disorder may put that awareness in a context so far removed from reality that the punishment can serve no proper purpose.”
In 2013, after reviewing the case again under orders by the the Supreme Court, the 5th Circuit justices again agreed with the state that Panetti was competent to be executed.
Among other things, the 5th Circuit panel cited 11 hours of secretly recorded prison calls Panetti made to his parents in which he was said to demonstrate “a remarkably sophisticated understanding of his capital case, supporting the state’s allegations of malingering.” Panetti also expressed in the calls that he understands the link between his crimes and the punishment, they ruled.
Impending execution
Monroe, Panetti’s former standby counsel, said he’s struggled to come to terms with Panetti’s execution after learning he had received a date last month.
“Clearly, Scott is mentally ill and he had a lengthy history of mental illness,” he said. “I’m not so sure that in the end that wasn’t his worst enemy, that the jury was just afraid of him.”
In 1995, he added, life without parole wasn’t a sentencing option. The group’s only options were execution or a life sentence, but with parole possible after 35 years.
“Obviously, the jury could tell that this was not a guy putting on a show, this was not an act. He really was ill. I don’t think any of them had any doubt in their mind,” he said. “But is this going to end up where one of these days they look back and say this was handled correctly? I don’t know. I’m real unsettled on that point.”
Last week, in 5-4 and 6-3 decisions, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals declined twice to grant a stay of execution for Panetti. U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks also declined to halt the process. Panetti’s attorney said she plans to appeal the rulings.
Monroe said he believes Panetti was allowed to represent himself at trial because he met the minimum requirements to do so according to laws at that time, and the judge didn’t want to infringe on his constitutional right to do so, which would mean risking a reversal on appeal.
“I wish the system could have worked the way it was supposed to work and the way all of us were trained for it to work. And in my opinion, it did not,” he said. “I think everybody followed the law that existed at that time, but that doesn’t mean it feels any better.”
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Texas To Execute Scott Panetti Despite Mental Illness, According To Panetti’s Attorneys
November 29, 2014
Scott Panetti dies on Wednesday.
The convicted killer, pictured behind the glass in the photo above, murdered his in-laws, Joe and Amanda Alvarado, in 1992. This is a fact that he and his attorneys don’t dispute.
However, according to NBC News, there are serious questions as to whether the state of Texas should follow through with the lethal injection.
For starters, Panetti has been diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. He was sentenced to die in 1995 after a disastrous defense in which he represented himself, dressed as a cowboy, believing that only the insane could pull off an insanity defense, the news site notes.
Since that time, his attorneys describe increasingly delusional behaviors and believe that the execution should be called off and reverted to life in prison, or at the very least it should be postponed until more mental evaluation can occur.
“He cannot appreciate why Texas seeks to execute him,” said attorney Kathryn Kase, who represents Scott Panetti. “You have to have a rational as well as factual understanding of why you’re being executed.”
Still, the state isn’t buying it, stating that the defense had almost two decades to get the kind of testing they’re wanting to get for Panetti.
The crime, described in vivid detail by the Christian Science Monitor, noted that Panetti, “heavily armed, head shaved and wearing camouflage — shot and killed his in-laws at their Texas Hill Country home, showering his estranged wife and 3-year-old daughter in blood.”
But the horrific nature of the crime, the report states, doesn’t tell the whole story. Panetti, prior to taking that deadly action, had been placed in a hospital close to a dozen times in the years leading up to the double murder. Michael Graczyk of the Associated Press notes a Supreme Court review of the Scott Panetti case in 2007 “tweaked the criteria for executing those with severe mental disorders by requiring inmates to not only know that they are being punished, but to also have a ‘rational understanding’ of their punishment.”
“Providing little guidance other than requiring a ‘fair hearing’ for presentation of psychiatric evidence to consider insanity claims,” Graczyk notes, “the justices returned Panetti’s case to lower federal courts, which ultimately found him competent.”
Texas is certainly not timid when it comes to carrying out the death penalty, but what do you think, readers? Should they stay the execution of Scott Panetti pending further review, or has the inmate had all the chances he deserves? Share your thoughts in our comments section.
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http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/11/30/388119/amnesty-to-us-stop-executing-ill-man/
Amnesty to US: Stop shameful execution of mentally ill man
November 30, 2014
The global human rights organization, Amnesty International, has said that the United States should halt the execution of a man with mental problems in the state of Texas.
In a press release on Friday, the organization said Texas should “immediately halt its shameful plans to execute” Scott Panetti.
The 56-year-old inmate is on death row for the murder of his wife's parents in 1992.
The man is scheduled to be executed on December 3.
The severe mental illness impacted the inmate’s trial and he has spent about 20 years on death row.
USA Researcher at Amnesty International Rob Freer said that a majority of countries have stopped executing anyone, especially individuals with profound mental illness.
He added that the Amnesty believes that the death penalty has never been just and it is never too late to stay an execution until the lethal injection is administered.
Freer called on the Texas governor to stop the execution and said that killing Panetti would “put down another shameful marker in the ugly history of the death penalty” in the United States.
The inmate is suffering from schizophrenia and other mental illnesses.
In 2007, a federal judge ruled that Panetti was seriously mentally ill and he “was under the influence of this severe mental illness” at the time of his crime.
Panetti’s lawyer Kathryn Kase said the prisoner was showing increasingly aberrant delusional behavior seven years since his last mental evaluation.
AGB/HRJ
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Case of Alleged Mentally Ill Death Row Inmate Heads To US Appeals Court
By Jessica Smith, November 30, 2014
The case of a Texas death row inmate who is set for execution next week is heading to the U.S. Appeals Court, his lawyers said.
Scott Panetti’s lawyer filed notice they would appeal to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals after a district judge late Wednesday rejected their request to delay the execution which is scheduled for December 3 in Huntsville, Texas.
The defense lawyers said they will argue for a new round of mental evaluations to strengthen claims that Panetti is incompetent for execution.
Panetti, 56, was convicted of fatally shooting his in-laws, Joe and Amanda Alvarado, in front of his estranged wife and his three-year-old daughter. His wife was living with her parents, and a week before the 1992 shootings she obtained a court order to keep Panetti away.
Texas courts earlier this week also refused to stop Panetti’s lethal injection. U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks ruled new claims that allege Panetti’s mental condition is deteriorating are similar to those he considered and rejected in 2008.
He noted that he twice approved money for expert examinations of Panetti’s mental condition and twice held competency hearings.
One of Panetti’s lawyers, Kathryn Kase, said that the symptoms of his psychotic mental illness have grown worse as seen during a two-hour visit to him early this month.
Kase said her client could not carry on a coherent conversation and talked of hearing voices.
A Supreme Court review of Panetti’s case in 2007 stated that the criteria for executing those with severe mental disorder by requiring inmates to not only know that they are being punished, but to also have a “rational understanding” of their punishment.
Panetti himself acknowledged during his 1995 capital murder trial that he had killed the victims.
His trial became a shame when he dressed as a cowboy and acted as his own attorney, believing only an insane person could prove an insanity defense.
Jurors convicted him and sentenced him to death.
Panetti also has a clemency petition before the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles. No action is expected on that until at least Monday.
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