This week’s email edition is here. From the intro:

The South Carolina Supreme Court’s decision in Donney S. Council v. State, affirming the grant of penalty phase relief, leads off this edition. The justices ruled, 4-1,  that trial counsel should have done more than simply have Council’s mother testify during the sentencing phase of his trial. Council  suffered head trauma as a child, his father was a violent alcoholic, and his family had a pronounced history of mental illness “Given there is evidence to support the PCR judge’s holding that Respondent’s trial counsel was ineffective in failing to investigate and present mitigating evidence at the penalty phase of Respondent’s trial, we affirm the PCR judge’s decision vacating Respondent’s sentence and ordering a new sentencing hearing.”

In other news, on September 15, Fulton County Superior Court Judge Melvin Westmoreland granted a stay of execution for Jack Alderman in Georgia until he could receive a meaningful clemency hearing;  the Parole Board met and then denied clemency on Sept. 16 and Jack Alderman was executed shortly thereafter. SCOTUS Blog’s Lyle Denniston reports on the latest filings in Kennedy v. Louisiana in “Court urged to hold fast against death for child rape.”  In Delaware mediation has been ordered in that state’s lethal  injection suit.  Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights (MVFHR) and the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) are working together to launch a national project concerned with the intersection of the the death penalty people with severe mental illness.

In innocence news, a new DNA test shows that hair found clenched in the hand of a fatally beaten woman in 1985 does not match either the State’s theory of the case or Paul House. The Death Penalty Information Center has added Michael Blair to its list of men and women exonerated from death row becoming the 130th person sentenced to death to be exonerated since 1973. The Virginia Department of Forensic Science has been awarded $4.5 million for a DNA study aimed at finding people who may have been wrongly convicted , according to a recent  DoJ press release. Johnnie Earl Lindsey has become the 19th person exonerated in Dallas County Texas, after serving more than a quarter of a century for a rape he did not commit. Finally, the “Dallas County DA wants to re-examine nearly all of pending death row cases,” in light of his predecessors’ less than spectacular record for getting the right man.

Looking ahead to the next edition, the Eleventh Circuit in Herbert Williams, Jr, v. Allen grants penalty phase relief as “trial counsel’s investigation of mitigating evidence in Williams’ background fell short of prevailing professional norms” and he has otherwise satisfied both “components of an ineffective assistance of counsel claim;” remand ordered on a Batson claim as well.  The Fifth Circuit in Jeffrey Demond Williams v. Quarterman remands certain  “post-judgment motions” for a determination in the first instance of the appropriateness of “a COA on those issues.”

As always thanks for reading, for forgiving the typos in advance, and understanding that the downturn in the economy has seen a corresponding rise in the demands of an indigent defense practice and related obligations. – k