« Courts: More on: "States urged to get abused kids' lawyers," Indiana receives "F" | Main | Ind. Law - An improvement to the current fireworks law? »
Thursday, April 26, 2007
Ind. Courts - David Leon Woods appeals to U.S. Supreme Court
From a story late yesterday by Tom Coyne of the AP:
SOUTH BEND, Ind. - Attorneys for an Indiana inmate sentenced to die by lethal injection next week asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday to block the execution, challenging the state Supreme Court's method of determining whether he is mentally retarded.More from the story:David Leon Woods, 42, is scheduled to die early May 4 for the 1984 slaying of his neighbor, Juan Placencia, in the northeastern Indiana town of Garrett. The state Parole Board voted Monday against recommending clemency for Woods.
"Indiana's refusal to articulate its own uniform definition of mental retardation makes it impossible for persons to know what standard they must meet in order to establish that they belong to the classification of people who are exempt from executions," said the petition filed with the high court Wednesday.
William Van Der Pol Jr., one of Woods' attorneys, said in a telephone interview Wednesday that the problem is the Indiana Supreme Court keeps changing the definition of how to measure mental retardation.
Woods attorneys contend that in finding Tommy Pruitt of Martinsville competent to be executed, the state court said in 2005 that standardized test scores were not enough. It said the IQ tests should be considered in conjunction with "other evidence of intellectual functioning."
But Woods attorneys said the Indiana Supreme Court refused to consider other evidence in Woods' case, claiming "nearly every examiner found evidence of serious brain damage, brain dysfunction, or at a minimum, a learning disability."
Woods has tested both above and below the generally accepted level of mental retardation, just as Pruitt had, said Van Der Pol, who represents both men.
"I don't think there's any question the Indiana Supreme Court is making some sort of distinction between Pruitt and Woods under identical circumstances. I just can't figure out what in the world the differences are," Van Der Pol said.
Also Wednesday, Woods asked U.S. District Judge Larry McKinney for the right to appeal the judge's ruling last week that he had no jurisdiction to hear arguments in the case because it was a "successive" petition.See earlier ILB entries on Woods here.Woods' attorneys argue that at the time of his first petition in 1999, the U.S. Supreme Court had not ruled that executing the retarded is unconstitutional. That 2002 ruling left it to the states to define retardation.
On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Richard Young is scheduled to hear Woods' request for a preliminary injunction to stop the scheduled execution because he contends the state's lethal injection method constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.
Woods contends the method "creates a substantial and unnecessary risk that Wood will be fully conscious and in agonizing pain for the duration of the execution process."
The state, however, contends that Woods did not first exhaust his administrative remedies and that he filed his request for preliminary injunction too late.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on April 26, 2007 08:57 AM
Posted to Indiana Courts