Larry Wooten to die despite retardation claim

Larry Wooten

By Elizabeth Stein
Producer, Execution Watch

HUNTSVILLE, Texas -- The state will end a more than two-month hiatus in executions Thursday by putting to death Larry Wooten of Paris, Texas, whose claim of mental retardation was credible enough for the state Court of Criminal Appeals to grant him a retrial.

Execution Watch  will broadcast the details live at 6 p.m. Central Time on KPFT HD2-Houston, streaming at executionwatch.org, with reporter Gloria Rubac outside the death house, legal analyst Jim Skelton in the studio and a featured interview with Scott Cobb, an organizer of the upcoming March to Abolish the Death Penalty.

RADIO PROGRAM PREVIEW

EXECUTION WATCH
Oct. 21, 2010, Thurs., 6-7 pm Central Time
Listen on KPFT's HD2 channel, 90.1 FM Houston, or …
Go to www.executionwatch. org at 6 p.m. Central Time, click on “Listen.”

SCHEDULED TO BE EXECUTED
   LARRY WOOTEN was sentenced to death in 1998 at age 39 following his conviction in the robbery-murders of an elderly couple in Paris, Texas, who’d hired him as a handyman. The state's highest criminal court in 2004 granted him a new trial on his claim that could not be executed because he is mentally retarded. The trial, held in the same Lamar County District Court where he had been convicted and sentenced to death, found that he was not retarded. The last execution in Texas was Aug. 17. (More at www.executionwatch.org > Backpage on Larry Wooten.)

SHOW LINEUP
  Host: RAY HILL is an ex-convict who has lost many friends to the death chamber. His civil rights activism has included shepherding several cases to the U.S. Supreme Court. He is also host-founder of the Prison Show, now in its 31st year, (www.theprisonshow.org.)

  Legal Analyst: JIM SKELTON, a retired attorney and native Texan, contributes to the profession by teaching weekly continuing education seminars in appellate law. He has worked as a prosecutor and as a defense attorney in capital cases.

  Featured Interview: SCOTT COBB, president of the Texas Moratorium Network and an organizer of the 11th Annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty, planned for Oct. 30 in Austin. His anti-death penalty activism has included organizing lobby days, conducting grassroots training, drafting anti-death penalty legislation and putting together numerous other protests. He has lobbied every Texas legislature since 2001 to declare a moratorium on the death penalty. (More at http://marchforabolition.org)

  Reporter, Death House, Huntsville: GLORIA RUBAC, a leader of the Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement, she is also an organizer of the Annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty (more at http://abolitionmovement.org).

  Reporter, Vigil:  TBA.

NEXT SCHEDULED EXECUTION
  Dec. 1 – six days after Thanksgiving, two weeks before Christmas -- Texas is to execute STEVEN STALEY. Execution Watch will broadcast (see http://executionwatch.org).

  PRODUCER: Elizabeth Ann Stein, eliza.tx.usa @gmail.com.
  TECHNICAL DIRECTOR: Otis Maclay, omaclay @gmail.com.
  THEME MUSIC: “Death by Texas,” Victoria Panetti, www.myspace. com/shemonster

Facts of Capital Punishment and Mental Disability or Mental Illness

A collection of clips created by five students at The University of Texas at Austin showing how the media portrays mentally ill or mentally disabled persons facing capital punishment. This video hopes to correct the misrepresentation of the said subject by bringing out the facts. Link to Youtube video.

Produced by:
William Brown
Ken Stambaugh (video editor)
Taha Ahmed
Shreya Sigdel
Steven Rodriguez



Click here to join the Texas Moratorium Network page to stay informed about the Texas death penalty.

Video from Death Row: Possibly Retarded Prisoner Faces Execution

Renée Feltz of the Texas Observer has the following article and video interview on the case of mentally retarded death-row inmate Bobby Woods. Woods is scheduled to be executed next Wednesday.

When Texas reopens its execution chamber after a Thanksgiving break, the first man set to die may be mentally retarded. A 2002 Supreme Court ruling bans the execution of mentally retarded prisoners. But after years of being represented by a discredited attorney who ruined any chance for an appeal based on his disabilities, the fate of Bobby Wayne Woods rests with the state Board of Pardons and Paroles which can recommend clemency or a reprieve to Gov. Perry. "It's a long shot at best," Woods' attorney Maurie Levin says of the clemency request, "but I think it's very important to do."

Test scores during his childhood and incarceration show Bobby Woods has an IQ that hovers at or below 70 — the cut-off point for mental retardation. He reads at a second grade level and writes childlike letters — many of which are photocopied and presented as evidence in his clemency request. Levin asked the board to grant a 60-day reprieve so that she can produce a videotape of Woods "to adequately present a full picture of his limitations." She has sued Texas prison officials over their refusal to allow her to record such a video herself. The Texas Observer captured Woods on tape last week during an on-camera interview, and now you can watch the video that Levin wants the clemency board to see.

Bobby Woods Describes Where He Grew Up

Woods was sentenced to die in 1998 for kidnapping, raping and murdering 11-year-old Sarah Patterson. He disputes his guilt, saying his cousin is responsible for cutting Patterson's throat. But the cousin committed suicide the week following Woods' arrest. Levin acknowledges "the facts of this crime are very difficult," but she notes the ban on executing the mentally retarded applies no matter how heinous the offense. Levin and students with the Capital Punishment Center at the University of Texas Law School began working on Woods' case just before he was scheduled to be executed in October 2008. Their efforts followed years of cringe-worthy legal representation by Richard Alley, one of just two attorneys the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has removed from its list of lawyers qualified to represent death row prisoners in their appeals. He visited Woods only once during the nearly 10 years he represented him.

"For the state of Texas to appoint a lawyer who they then removed from the list — who was being taken to task in a federal court at the very same time he's being appointed to represent Bobby in his federal proceedings, and then for Bobby — a mentally retarded man — to suffer the consequences of that appointment is atrocious. It infuriates me," Levin says.

Alley had a habit of recycling direct appeal claims in his state capital habeas cases. While he raised 28 issues in Woods' state habeas appeals, just two were actually new and neither was backed by useful evidence. In contrast, Levin and her students were able to contact family members who described how Woods was a slow child who suffered from learning disabilities and was called "retard" by his classmates, and "always needed to live with someone who could take care of him" when he was older. Their investigations revealed that while Woods had held a steady job as a short-order cook at Waffle House, he had to have the orders read aloud to him.

Alley did file an appeal claiming Woods was mentally retarded, but it was poorly put together and the court rejected it. Levin won a rare second chance to present new evidence in October 2008, but she was unable to reach a higher bar set by the court because it was his second time making the appeal. This second appeal had to overcome the previous legal record established on almost no investigation of Woods' mental capacity.

Levin could not claim that Woods suffered from ineffective assistance of counsel either. While a Texas statute guarantees Woods an attorney to file his habeas appeals, it doesn't require him to be competent. So Woods remains scheduled to be executed on Dec. 3 pending a decision by the Board to recommend that Perry have mercy and grant him clemency or a reprieve. Below are additional videos that may be used in evidence. Woods has reached the end of the legal process. His only opportunity now resides with Perry and the parole board.

Bobby Woods Describes His Previous Jobs


Bobby Woods Describes His Reading and Writing Abilities