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Deus Ex Machina
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This guy is wasting our tax money, and wasting our air by breathing it. He murdered two adults, and two children, and attempted to kill another one 
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Appeals court bars Cooper execution
U.S. Supreme Court can still lift Ninth Circuit's stay
Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer
Tuesday, February 10, 2004
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A federal appeals court intervened dramatically Monday afternoon to block the execution of Kevin Cooper, less than eight hours before he was to die by lethal injection for the murders of two adults and two children in 1983.
The 9-2 ruling by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals left Cooper's fate up to the U.S. Supreme Court, which had the power to lift the appeals court's stay of execution. Even before the appeals court acted, California Attorney General Bill Lockyer's office asked the high court to undo a temporary stay of execution that the appellate court had imposed Monday morning.
The appeals court ordered the case returned to a federal judge in San Diego for Cooper's lawyers for testing of evidence that, Cooper claimed, would demonstrate his innocence.
"No person should be executed if there is a doubt about his or her guilt and an easily available test will determine guilt or innocence,'' the court majority wrote, adding that the tests should be conducted promptly.
One piece of evidence was a T-shirt, found near the crime scene that contained blood from the victims as well as Cooper's DNA. Cooper contends the DNA was planted. Another piece of evidence consists of blond or light brown hairs, found in the hand of one of the murder victims, which could not have come from the African-American defendant. The defense wants the hairs tested for DNA to see if they implicate others as the killers.
Cooper, who has spent 19 of his 46 years on death row, has maintained his innocence and argued he was framed. Until Monday, no state or federal court had ruled in his favor.
He was convicted of hacking and stabbing to death Doug and Peggy Ryen, their 10-year-old daughter, Jessica, and 11-year-old Chris Hughes, who was spending the night at the Ryens' home in Chino Hills (San Bernardino County). The Ryens' 8-year-old son, Joshua, had his throat slashed but survived.
Cooper had escaped two days earlier from a nearby state prison, where he was serving a burglary sentence, and had hidden in a house near the Ryens'. He said he fled to Mexico the night of the killings and never approached the Ryens' house.
Chris Hughes' mother, Mary Ann Hughes of Chino Hills, was with her family in the Bay Area when they received word of the stay and expressed disappointment that the justices lent credence to "a new crazy theory from the defense" that she said is based upon testimony and evidence that was discredited at Cooper's trial.
But she expressed confidence that Cooper's execution will go through.
"It's still a waiting game," she said. "If it doesn't happen this time, it will happen next time or the time after that, and we'll come back up here when it does."
And with the hours until Cooper's execution counting down, Hughes and other relatives of those killed 20 years ago held out hope that the U.S. Supreme Court would send Cooper to his death.
"We hope the saner minds at the Supreme Court will prevail," she said.
The Supreme Court has lifted several other stays of execution imposed by the Ninth Circuit in recent years. Such an action requires votes from five of the nine justices.
In seeking Supreme Court intervention, Lockyer's office argued that the last-minute stay was "an unwarranted intrusion on California's ability to carry out a lawful and final judgment'' and violated a federal law that restricted state prisoners' ability to appeal repeatedly to federal courts.
"Law-abiding citizens, and most particularly Cooper's victims and their community, are left to wonder whether there is an inability or unwillingness on the part of the federal judiciary to permit California to enforce the death penalty,'' wrote Deputy Attorney General Holly Wilkens.
Cooper, a prolific writer from his prison cell, has attracted support for his claim of innocence from anti-death penalty and prisoners'-rights activists, labor leaders and other national figures, including Rubin "Hurricane'' Carter, the former boxing contender who was wrongly imprisoned for murder for nearly 20 years.
Another backer was former Illinois Gov. George Ryan, who commuted all 167 of his state's death sentences last year after revelations of police abuse and wrongful convictions. The Rev. Jesse Jackson made statewide appearances with newly discovered witnesses, who allegedly could help clear Cooper, and with trial jurors who now favor a reprieve.
Jackson tried unsuccessfully to meet Monday with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, to urge him to consider new evidence in the case and stop what Jackson called a "legal lynching.'' A spokeswoman for Schwarzenegger said the governor was busy in meetings and briefings and had already made his decision when he denied clemency to Cooper last week.
Some of the strongest evidence against Cooper came from DNA tests that he sought for many years, and that were finally conducted after the state passed a law allowing such tests for convicted felons. The results, announced in 2002, linked Cooper to a blood spot on the wall of the Ryens' home, two cigarette butts in their stolen station wagon, and a T-shirt found at a roadside that also contained the victims' blood.
Cooper's lawyers contended a sheriff's criminalist who had custody of the blood spot evidence, one of the cigarette butts and Cooper's blood for one day in 1999 could have planted the DNA evidence. They argued that the T-shirt, which was in court custody after Cooper's 1985 trial, could have been contaminated earlier.
Defense lawyers also claimed to have found new evidence in the past week that would undermine the prosecution's case. On Sunday, a new witness came forward to say she saw two men come into a nearby bar wearing bloody clothing the night of the murders.
The jury at Cooper's trial heard defense testimony about suspicions men in the same bar, and other allegations of multiple killers, but concluded that Cooper had acted alone.
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Appeals court bars Cooper execution
U.S. Supreme Court can still lift Ninth Circuit's stay
Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer
Tuesday, February 10, 2004
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A federal appeals court intervened dramatically Monday afternoon to block the execution of Kevin Cooper, less than eight hours before he was to die by lethal injection for the murders of two adults and two children in 1983.
The 9-2 ruling by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals left Cooper's fate up to the U.S. Supreme Court, which had the power to lift the appeals court's stay of execution. Even before the appeals court acted, California Attorney General Bill Lockyer's office asked the high court to undo a temporary stay of execution that the appellate court had imposed Monday morning.
The appeals court ordered the case returned to a federal judge in San Diego for Cooper's lawyers for testing of evidence that, Cooper claimed, would demonstrate his innocence.
"No person should be executed if there is a doubt about his or her guilt and an easily available test will determine guilt or innocence,'' the court majority wrote, adding that the tests should be conducted promptly.
One piece of evidence was a T-shirt, found near the crime scene that contained blood from the victims as well as Cooper's DNA. Cooper contends the DNA was planted. Another piece of evidence consists of blond or light brown hairs, found in the hand of one of the murder victims, which could not have come from the African-American defendant. The defense wants the hairs tested for DNA to see if they implicate others as the killers.
Cooper, who has spent 19 of his 46 years on death row, has maintained his innocence and argued he was framed. Until Monday, no state or federal court had ruled in his favor.
He was convicted of hacking and stabbing to death Doug and Peggy Ryen, their 10-year-old daughter, Jessica, and 11-year-old Chris Hughes, who was spending the night at the Ryens' home in Chino Hills (San Bernardino County). The Ryens' 8-year-old son, Joshua, had his throat slashed but survived.
Cooper had escaped two days earlier from a nearby state prison, where he was serving a burglary sentence, and had hidden in a house near the Ryens'. He said he fled to Mexico the night of the killings and never approached the Ryens' house.
Chris Hughes' mother, Mary Ann Hughes of Chino Hills, was with her family in the Bay Area when they received word of the stay and expressed disappointment that the justices lent credence to "a new crazy theory from the defense" that she said is based upon testimony and evidence that was discredited at Cooper's trial.
But she expressed confidence that Cooper's execution will go through.
"It's still a waiting game," she said. "If it doesn't happen this time, it will happen next time or the time after that, and we'll come back up here when it does."
And with the hours until Cooper's execution counting down, Hughes and other relatives of those killed 20 years ago held out hope that the U.S. Supreme Court would send Cooper to his death.
"We hope the saner minds at the Supreme Court will prevail," she said.
The Supreme Court has lifted several other stays of execution imposed by the Ninth Circuit in recent years. Such an action requires votes from five of the nine justices.
In seeking Supreme Court intervention, Lockyer's office argued that the last-minute stay was "an unwarranted intrusion on California's ability to carry out a lawful and final judgment'' and violated a federal law that restricted state prisoners' ability to appeal repeatedly to federal courts.
"Law-abiding citizens, and most particularly Cooper's victims and their community, are left to wonder whether there is an inability or unwillingness on the part of the federal judiciary to permit California to enforce the death penalty,'' wrote Deputy Attorney General Holly Wilkens.
Cooper, a prolific writer from his prison cell, has attracted support for his claim of innocence from anti-death penalty and prisoners'-rights activists, labor leaders and other national figures, including Rubin "Hurricane'' Carter, the former boxing contender who was wrongly imprisoned for murder for nearly 20 years.
Another backer was former Illinois Gov. George Ryan, who commuted all 167 of his state's death sentences last year after revelations of police abuse and wrongful convictions. The Rev. Jesse Jackson made statewide appearances with newly discovered witnesses, who allegedly could help clear Cooper, and with trial jurors who now favor a reprieve.
Jackson tried unsuccessfully to meet Monday with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, to urge him to consider new evidence in the case and stop what Jackson called a "legal lynching.'' A spokeswoman for Schwarzenegger said the governor was busy in meetings and briefings and had already made his decision when he denied clemency to Cooper last week.
Some of the strongest evidence against Cooper came from DNA tests that he sought for many years, and that were finally conducted after the state passed a law allowing such tests for convicted felons. The results, announced in 2002, linked Cooper to a blood spot on the wall of the Ryens' home, two cigarette butts in their stolen station wagon, and a T-shirt found at a roadside that also contained the victims' blood.
Cooper's lawyers contended a sheriff's criminalist who had custody of the blood spot evidence, one of the cigarette butts and Cooper's blood for one day in 1999 could have planted the DNA evidence. They argued that the T-shirt, which was in court custody after Cooper's 1985 trial, could have been contaminated earlier.
Defense lawyers also claimed to have found new evidence in the past week that would undermine the prosecution's case. On Sunday, a new witness came forward to say she saw two men come into a nearby bar wearing bloody clothing the night of the murders.
The jury at Cooper's trial heard defense testimony about suspicions men in the same bar, and other allegations of multiple killers, but concluded that Cooper had acted alone.
