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emanuel cleaver
US Supreme Court Declines to Halt Execution of Missouri Man With 'Severe Mental Illness'
"There is no place for the death penalty in a humane society," said Rep. Cori Bush, who urged the GOP governor to intervene in Johnny Johnson's case.
Aug 01, 2023
Update (9:58 pm ET):
The state of Missouri killed 45-year-old Johnny Johnson with a lethal injection of pentobarbital at 6:33 pm local time Tuesday after the right-wing majority of the U.S. Supreme Court declined to halt his execution.
Johnson expressed remorse in a handwritten statement released before he was executed. As The Associated Pressreported:
"God Bless. Sorry to the people and family I hurt," Johnson's statement said.
As he lay on his back with a sheet up to his neck, Johnson turned his head to the left, appearing to listen to his spiritual adviser shortly before the injection began. He then faced forward with his eyes closed, with no further physical reaction.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in a dissent joined by the Supreme Court's other two liberal members—Ketanji Brown Jackson and Elena Kagan—that "executing a prisoner who has lost his sanity has, for centuries, been branded inhumane."
"The court today paves the way to execute a man with documented mental illness before any court meaningfully investigates his competency to be executed," she continued. "There is no moral victory in executing someone who believes Satan is killing him to bring about the end of the world. Reasonable jurists have already disagreed on Johnson's entitlement to habeas relief. He deserves a hearing where a court can finally determine whether his execution violates the Eighth Amendment. Instead, this court rushes to finality, bypassing fundamental procedural and substantive protections."
Law Dork's Chris Geidner explained that "the trio dissented from the denial of the stay application, as well as the denial of certiorari. So, they not only are asserting that Johnson shouldn't die tonight; they also think SCOTUS should have taken up his case."
Earlier:
Unless the U.S. Supreme Court steps in on Tuesday, Missouri is set to kill 45-year-old Johnny Johnson by lethal injection at 6:00 pm local time after Republican Gov. Mike Parson declined to halt his execution despite concerns about competency.
Johnson's legal team has submitted three petitions to the nation's highest court. While "the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled repeatedly that a person cannot be executed if they lack an understanding of the reason for their pending execution, Law Dork's Chris Geidner noted Monday, "the six-justice conservative majority has not been receptive to death penalty stay requests."
Along with Johnson's attorneys, U.S. lawmakers, human rights campaigners including Amnesty International, and other opponents of capital punishment have long argued against executing the Missouri man, highlighting his mental health history.
Members of Missourians to Abolish the Death Penalty gathered at the Missouri State Capitol on Tuesday to protest Johnson's looming execution and delivered a petition with more than 3,000 signatures to the governor's office.
"It is egregious to execute someone who does not understand the reason for their execution," Elyse Max, the group's co-director, told the television station KRCG. "It's not a punishment if they don't associate them being murdered by the state with the crime."
Max added that "he should be kept in a medical institution, that could prevent further atrocities from happening and help Johnny to cope with his schizophrenia, command hallucinations, and other issues that come with his severe mental illness."
As two Missouri Democrats in Congress, Reps. Cori Bush and Emanuel Cleaver, wrote to Parson on Friday:
Mr. Johnson has suffered from severe mental illness and cognitive impairments his entire life. He has organic brain disorder and experienced a brutally traumatic and adverse childhood that involved psychiatric hospitalizations, and suffers from schizophrenia that consistently features hallucinations, delusions, and psychotic disorganized thought. He was in the grips of active psychosis when he committed the offense for which he is scheduled to be executed. He currently believes that the reason for his execution is that Satan is using the state of Missouri to bring about the end of the world.
Mr. Johnson has a lengthy history of seeking treatment, including through hospitalization, that establishes the long-standing nature of the diseases and inability of medication to adequately treat them. He has received numerous diagnoses, including schizophrenia, major depression, psychotic disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, and borderline personality disorder. Nothing about his life history suggests he is currently malingering or otherwise faking his symptoms.
There is extensive evidence that Mr. Johnson does not have a rational understanding of the reasons for his execution. As such, he is entitled by the Constitution to a "fair hearing" to assess his competency. This is true notwithstanding the Missouri Supreme Court's flawed ruling relying on a single affidavit by a prison therapist over the competency evaluation and report by a licensed psychiatrist.
Bush and Cleaver stressed "the moral depravity of executions" and warned that killing Johnson "would simply destroy yet another community while using the concepts of fairness and justice as a cynical pretext and likely in violation of the Eighth and 14th Amendments to the Constitution."
Parson on Monday rejected calls by the federal lawmakers and others that he halt the execution, order a competency hearing, and grant clemency, saying that "Johnny Johnson's crime is one of the most horrific murders that has come across my desk."
After being released from a mental hospital in January 2002, Johnson was staying with family friends in Valley Park that July and killed their 6-year-old daughter, Casey Williamson. A jury found him guilty of first-degree murder, armed criminal action, kidnapping, and attempted rape in January 2005 and two months later a judge sentenced him to death.
"Casey was an innocent young girl who bravely fought Johnson until he took her life," said Parson. "My office has received countless letters in the last few weeks seeking justice for Casey. Although this won't bring her back, we hope that carrying out Johnson's sentence according to the court's order may provide some closure for Casey's loved ones."
As The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported Monday after speaking with the child's parents, Angie Wideman and Ernie Williamson:
Williamson was quoted in a clemency application, filed by Johnson's lawyers, saying he did not want Johnson executed.
But in an interview with the Post-Dispatch, Williamson said those quotes didn't accurately represent what he wants to happen.
"I never said I didn't want Johnny Johnson to die," he said. "I would love to see him die a miserable death."
Williamson said he doesn't support capital punishment. Having spent time himself as an inmate at Potosi Correctional Center, where Johnson is housed, Williamson said death row inmates suffer far more alive than dead.
Larry Komp, one of Johnson's attorneys, said their hearts go out to Casey's family but said "the clemency petition is faithful to the statements of everyone quoted in it."
The governor's denial came after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit on Saturday reversed a stay granted last week by a three-judge panel from that court.
If Johnson is executed Tuesday evening at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic, and Correctional Center in Bonne Terre, he will be the fourth person killed by Missouri this year, following Amber McLaughlin on January 3, Leonard Taylor on February 7, and Michael Tisius on June 6.
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Cori Bush, Emanuel Cleaver Implore Missouri Gov. to Prevent Execution of Amber McLaughlin
"The death penalty is cruel, barbaric, and inhumane," Bush wrote on Twitter.
Dec 27, 2022
Democratic Reps. Cori Bush and Emanuel Cleaver of Missouri sent a letter Tuesday urging their home state's Republican governor to prevent the execution of 49-year-old Amber McLaughlin and commute her sentence, pointing to the "horrific abuse and neglect" she has experienced over the course of her life.
McLaughlin was convicted in 2006 of raping and killing an ex-girlfriend, Beverly Guenther. After the jury failed to reach a decision on whether McLaughlin should face death or life in prison without parole, the trial judge exploited a legal loophole and unilaterally imposed a death sentence—a move that has drawn criticism from former Missouri judges.
If the January 3, 2023 execution goes ahead as planned, McLaughlin would be the first openly trans woman to be executed in the United States.
In their letter, Bush and Cleaver noted that McLaughlin "faced a traumatic childhood and mental health issues throughout her life."
"Court records indicate her adoptive father would frequently strike her with paddles and a nightstick, and even tase her. Alongside this horrendous abuse, she was also silently struggling with her identity, grappling with what we now understand is gender dysphoria," the lawmakers wrote. "The abuse, coupled with the persistent mental turmoil surrounding her identity, led to mild neurological brain damage and multiple suicide attempts both as a child and as an adult."
"Yet at the sentencing phase of Ms. McLaughlin's trial, the jury never heard crucial mental health evidence because her lawyers failed to present it. A psychiatrist was set to testify and provide expert insight into Ms. McLaughlin’s mental health at the time of the offense before her lawyers decided not to call him as a witness," Bush and Cleaver continued. "The lawyers had previously told the jury that this expert testimony would be a critical component in their decision, but the testimony was withheld and the jury deliberated without highly relevant information."
Bush made clear on social media that her effort to prevent McLaughlin's execution stems from her principled opposition to the death penalty, which she described as "cruel, barbaric, and inhumane."
\u201cMissouri plans to execute Amber McLaughlin next week. The death penalty is cruel, barbaric, and inhumane.\n\n@RepCleaver and I are urging @GovParsonMO to grant #ClemencyForAmber.\u201d— Congresswoman Cori Bush (@Congresswoman Cori Bush) 1672166324
Earlier this month, McLaughlin's lawyers filed a clemency petition urging Missouri Gov. Mike Parson to intervene and stop the planned execution, laying out in detail the abuse she faced as a child.
"McLaughlin developed in a womb poisoned by alcohol and she has borne the lifetime effects of fetal alcohol exposure," the petition reads. "This prenatal assault signaled the start of a path of trauma and neglect that would become the rule for McLaughlin’s life. McLaughlin faced an environment with parents ill-equipped to act as caregivers. Trauma, neglect, and abuse at the hands of her parents occurred from birth—until she was abandoned by her mother and placed into the foster care system. At one placement, McLaughlin had feces thrust into her face. The foster care placement was so bad, McLaughlin wanted to return to an abusive mother who neglected her."
The petition argues McLaughlin's execution should be called off for a number of "compelling reasons," including the fact that "executive clemency will not disturb a jury verdict imposing the death penalty because the jury did not vote to impose the death penalty."
"Second, McLaughlin consistently and genuinely expressed remorse for the death of Ms. Beverly Guenther. She remains tormented by memories of her death," the petition states. "Third, McLaughlin endured extensive childhood trauma at the hands of her biological, foster, and adoptive parents, abuse resulting in brain damage even before McLaughlin was born. Those with a moral duty to protect her wantonly inflicted this childhood abuse."
A spokesperson for Parson told NBC News earlier this month that the governor is reviewing the clemency request.
The United States, which recently voted against a United Nations resolution condemning the death penalty, had the most botched executions in its history in 2022, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
"Seven of the 20 execution attempts were visibly problematic—an astonishing 35%—as a result of executioner incompetence, failures to follow protocols, or defects in the protocols themselves," the organization noted in its year-end report. "On July 28, 2022, executioners in Alabama took three hours to set an IV line before putting Joe James Jr. to death, the longest botched lethal injection execution in U.S. history."
Bush has urged President Joe Biden to grant clemency to all federal death row inmates as a step toward ending capital punishment nationwide. Biden, who says he is personally opposed to the death penalty, has yet to heed Bush's call.
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