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FOCUS ON BERNARDO ABAN TERCERO, NICARAGUAN NATIONAL ON DEATH ROW IN THE US - JUVENILE AT THE TIME OF THE CRIME?

12/19/2014

 
See original article in Spanish here

Houston - Bernardo Aban Tercero was born in Nicaragua, where he grew up and lived most of his childhood and youth. For more than ten years the economic and political problems of his country and the few job opportunities forced him to emigrate. For that reason and motivated for the convenience of having a secure employment he decided, like many, to enter the United States, the land where according to his plans, he would have a better future and a life full of hope and well-being. A future that never arrived or crystallized --  he faces death instead, the price that the authorities believe he must pay for his decisions and actions, which according to him, he should never have taken.


Tercero is currently incarcerated in the maximum-security prison in Livingston (Texas), a place where inmates sentenced to death are waiting for their execution. There, in the visiting room, wearing his white uniform, with his hands and feet shackled and accompanied by guards and wardens of the prison, Tercero went to the appointment with Semana News, to recount the circumstances that directed him towards the corridor of death, and to send a message that he expects to be heard by the authorities, lawyers and diplomats of his country. From the narrow cubicle covered in glass and reinforced by steel bars, where barely fits one chair, and using a phone, he told us his story. "Bad influences affected his behaviour, and at that age you don't think about the consequences," said the Nicaraguan. He refers to the misguided decision that had to be involved in a crime on March 31, 1997. "I came alone. Passed through Mexico, and by those countries of Central America I was very young," he said quickly, and then went on to describe the drama that he faced for having committed a crime. On that fateful day in March of 1997, Tercero attempted to rob a dry cleaner, a crime that he committed carrying a firearm. At establishment was a customer named Robert Keith Berger, 38 years old. Berger attempted to prevent the robbery and in the struggle with the Tercero, the  weapon was fired claiming the life of the customer. In 2000, Tercero was sentenced to death, and since then waits his turn to be executed in the prison of Livingston. "I had no intention to kill anyone. I have extensive documentation to prove it" he said with obvious despair.

Tercero does not deny his crime, but said he does not deserve the death penalty for several reasons, including the fact that he was a minor at the time of the robbery and the fatal outcome. In accordance with Texas law there should not exist the possibility of the death penalty for a minor under 18 years old who committed a violent crime.

For Tercero already has spent more than ten years and several hearings and appeals to demonstrate his true age when he committed the crime and has not yet been able to achieve his objective of changing his death sentence, for life imprisonment in a maximum security prison. But things are not that easy, because of another wrong decision that Tercero took in the past, and that was to use the identity of his dead brother, who had the same name and was born 20 August 1976, three years before him. He explains that when he reached this country, he faced several barriers, including the impossibility of renting housing, and work. "I had difficulty to rent apartments, work and change checks because he was under age and that is why I had to get an ID (identification papers) with the name of my older brother," he said. The opportunity was provided at the time because both he and his brother were given the same name and were born August 20, but now, this is becoming the main obstacle to change the direction of his legal case and avoid death by execution by the laws of Texas. "If no one helps me my death will be inevitable," he said, distraught.

The dilemma of this immigrant allows you to reflect on the consequences having identity theft, a crime that affects millions of people in the United States, according to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), entity in charge of preventing fraud and scams consumers annually.

Identity theft causes damage legal, economic and moral for those who are affected, since your personal information (name, social security number, credit history) is used by third parties to commit crimes, access to services or obtain credit. And although the case of Tercero is presented from the perspective of the person who commits the crime, he does not cease to be dramatic, according to the experts. "Here there are several elements, because it is not only the crime of homicide, but the masquerade as another person," said attorney Carolina Ortuzar, immigration specialist, who also pointed out that the penalties or fines may vary depending on each case. "The sanctions depend on the documents that are falsified and the use to which they have been put," said the lawyer. In general terms, he added, use of a name that does not belongs to you is a fraud and there may or may not forgiveness. Ortuzar said that, to avoid the need to steal an identity, the people can perform contract work or to find other means to work, within their capabilities, in a legal way.

For Bernardo Tercero he can only hope that the legal authorities of Nicaragua should coordinate with the authorities of this country on his unproved statement of being under-age, and that made him pass for his deceased older brother in order to be able to work in this country. Tercero says he is driven to despair by the absence of consular assistance of his country, something that consul Samuel Trejos refutes, since someone has been visiting him in a frequent way and attending to him legally. “We have assisted him but it was not possible to have presented to the Court the papers (documents) of evidence of his claim. We could not obtain from his family the definitive proofs of the matter that he was under-age”, said Trejos, also saying that Tercero is the only Nicaraguan who today faces the death penalty in the United States.


Read more about Bernardo Aban Tercero's case here

Credit: La Semana News (In Spanish, English translation of article below)

Death penalty case reversed in Alabama

6/17/2014

 
The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals recently reversed the capital murder conviction and death sentence for a 23-year-old man charged in a 2008 Dothan murder.

“It just means that he is going to get an opportunity to have a fair trial, and we think it’s the right decision,” Dothan's atorney Randy Susskind said.

Susskind said the court’s opinion said they found the trial judge improperly instructed the jury in regard to capital murder.

“The judge basically told the jury that they must presume that he had the intent to kill,” Susskind said. “The judge should have told the jury that they had to make the determination about whether or not that he had the specific intent to kill.”

The Prosecution contends a clerical error.

Read more on Dothaneagle.com

Delaware high court overturns 1992 murder conviction and death sentence

5/21/2014

 
Herbert Mondros, one of Jermaine Wright's attorneys, wrote in a statement: "As the Court found, not a shred of forensic or eyewitness evidence ties Mr. Wright to the crime, and, in violation of Mr. Wright's constitutional rights, evidence was illegally suppressed in the case... [T]he only evidence against Mr. Wright was a false confession, a confession that was 'inaccurate,' and squarely contradicted by the facts of the case."A date for retrial has not yet been set. CNN's request for comment from the Delaware Attorney General's office was not immediately returned.

Read full CNN article

FLORIDA DEATH ROW INMATE SEEKS CLEMENCY - He maintains his innocence. Urgent action needed

5/21/2014

 
The case of Charles Finney, a 60-year-old man on death row in Florida, is now before the clemency authorities. He maintains that he did not commit the murder for which he was sentenced to death. In Florida, an execution date is set if and when clemency is denied.

On the afternoon of 16 January 1991, the body of Sandra Sutherland was found in her home in Tampa, Florida. She was bound and gagged and had been stabbed in the back 13 times. Charles Finney, who lived in the same apartment complex, was arrested on 30 January 1991 after he was found to have pawned the victim's video recorder on 16 January. He was charged with capital murder and brought to trial in September 1992. Charles Finney testified that he did not killSandra Sutherland, but that he knew her as a neighbor and had been in her home several times when he did maintenance work at the complex (2 fingerprints of his were found in her apartment). He testified that he found the video recorder in a bag near the rubbish bins and decided to pawn it. The pawn shop owner confirmed that Charles Finney had also pawned a television (neither stolen nor belonging to Sandra Sutherland) on 15 January 1991, and that on both occasions he had provided his correct local address even though the driving license he used for identification still had a Georgia address on it.

A witness testified that the day before the murder, he saw "a white male, a big guy" and Sandra Sutherland "cussing and screaming at each other" outside her apartment. Charles Finney is African American. The witness testified that he told the police about this incident soon after the murder but that they had never followed up with him in trying to establish the man's identify. The police never located the white male in question.

2 further witnesses testified that on the morning of the murder they saw another person, known as "Bill", a white male acquaintance working at the apartment complex, standing in Sandra Sutherland's doorway with the door open. Onetestified that "as soon as [Bill] saw me, he acted like he was going to go back in, and then he came out real quick, locked the door and walked around the corner". The other witness corroborated this. Bill denied being in the apartment that day, however the defense presented a detective who indicated that he gave the police inconsistent accounts of his whereabouts. In closing arguments, the trial prosecutor said that "this is a circumstantial evidence case, no doubt about it" as there was no confession or eyewitness testimony. There is also evidence that the prosecution failed to disclose certain evidence to the defense. Charles Finney was found guilty, and on 18 September 1992, after some 8 hours ofdeliberation, the jurors voted 9 to 3 for the death penalty.

Please write immediately in English or your own language:

* Calling for Charles Finney to be granted clemency;
* Noting that the case against Charles Finney is circumstantial and the jury was divided on the sentence;
* Expressing concern that the prosecution failed to disclose certain information to the defense;
* Expressing your understanding of the seriousness of the crime and its consequences.

URGENT ACTION

FLORIDA DEATH ROW INMATE SEEKS CLEMENCY

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

In 2000, a landmark study conducted at Columbia Law School in New York concluded that US death sentences are "persistently and systematically fraught with error". The study revealed that appeal courts had found serious errors - those requiring a judicial remedy - in 68 % of cases. It pointed to prosecutorial and police misconduct and inadequate defense representation as the principal causes of error. The study expressed "grave doubt" as to whether the courts catch all such errors. (Read more...)

Name: Charles Finney (m)
Issues: Death penalty, Imminent execution
UA: 124/14
Issue Date: 13 May 2014
Country: USA


HOW YOU CAN HELP

PLEASE SEND APPEALS BEFORE 24 JUNE 2014 TO:
Governor Rick Scott
Office of the Governor, The Capitol
400 S. Monroe St.
Tallahassee, FL 32399-0001
USA

Email: Rick.scott@eog.myflorida.com


Salutation: Dear Governor
Office of Executive Clemency
Florida Parole Commission,
4070 Esplanade Way
Tallahassee, FL 32399-2450
USA
Email: ClemencyWeb@fpc.state.fl.us
Fax: 1 850 414-6031 or 1 850 488-0695


Salutation: Dear Members of the Clemency Board

Also send copies to your local representative in Congress.
Please check with the AIUSA Urgent Action office if sending appeals after the above date.
Please share this urgent action with your networks using this link:
http://www.amnestyusa.org/sites/default/files/uaa12414.pdf
UA Network Office AIUSA 600 Pennsylvania Ave SE, Washington DC 20003
T. 202.509.8193 -- F. 202.509.8193 --E. uan@aiusa.org --amnestyusa.org/urgent

(source: Amnesty International USA)

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