On the Beat in the Bluegrass

on November 21, 2008

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By Brandon Ortiz

Executions in Kentucky have been rare the last 40 years, but the death penalty has a long history in the Bluegrass state.

Chapman is expected to be the 165th person executed at the Kentucky State Penitentiary, and only the second to die by lethal injection. The others died by electric chair.

The racial breakdown is disproportionate: 80 whites and 84 blacks. Blacks currently make up less than 10 percent of Kentucky’s population, although that proportion was higher in the early 20th century.

Chapman would be the third inmate executed since the death penalty was reinstated in 1977, and only the fourth since 1956, when three people were executed. The death penalty was once common in Kentucky, with 161 men being executed in Eddyville from 1911 to 1955. (Kentucky did not begin to keep complete records of executions until 1911.) The most inmates to be executed in one night is seven, on July 13, 1928.

Nine others were legally hanged elsewhere in Kentucky between 1920 and 1938.

Only 50 of Kentucky’s 120 counties have sent someone to Death Row. The last time someone convicted in Fayette County was executed was in 1943. Jefferson County has set the most inmates to death with 44.

After Chapman’s execution, there will be 35 men and one woman on Death Row. Thirteen of them have been on Death Row longer than 20 years. Thirty inmates are white, six are black and one is Hispanic.

Source: Kentucky Department of Corrections

UPDATE: Notes from media briefings at Chapman execution

Published

on November 21, 2008

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By Brandon Ortiz

Here are the highlights of a 4:30 p.m. CST press briefing with Lisa Lamb, a Kentucky Department of Corrections spokeswoman.

-    With two-and-a-half hours left to live, Marco Allen Chapman is seemingly calm. “He has not outwardly expressed any fear or communicated that to us,” Lamb said.
-    Chapman has not changed his mind and has not filed any last-minute appeals. The execution, scheduled for 7 p.m. CST, remains on schedule.
-    The cost of Chapman’s final meal was $31.81.

Lisa Lamb, a spokeswoman for the Kentucky Department of Corrections, briefed the media at 3:30 p.m. CST. Here are the highlights of the press conference:

– Marco Allen Chapman was served his last meal, a 32-ounce steak with A1 steak sauce and 20 butterfly shrimp, at 3 p.m. He was eating it at the time the press conference began
– Chapman met with a public defender at his request at 2 p.m. The meeting, with lawyer Heather McGregor, lasted 30 minutes. The content of the discussion is confidential.
– Chapman’s last meal was bought at a local food market and prepared by prison staff.
– At this point only a court order can stop Chapman’s execution. A public defender is available if he chooses to exercise his remaining appeals.
– Chapman spent the early afternoon watching Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.

Ky. court denies appeal in death case

Published

on November 20, 2008

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The Associated Press

FRANKFORT, Ky. — The Kentucky Supreme Court has denied a motion that would have halted Friday’s scheduled execution of confessed child killer Marco Chapman.

Chief Justice John Minton signed an order Thursday denying a request by a Louisville attorney to stop the execution. The attorney, Philip Longmeyer, had questioned whether the Kentucky Department of Corrections should have held public hearings before adopting regulations that specify how lethal injections are administered.

Supreme Court justices unanimously reached the decision Thursday afternoon.

If the execution is carried out, Chapman would become the first Kentucky inmate put to death since 1999.

Child killer’s final wish on course

Published

on November 20, 2008

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By BRETT BARROUQUERE - Associated Press Writer

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — For four years, Marco Allen Chapman hasn’t wavered about his last wish - to die by lethal injection for killing two children in a violent attack on their family.

That wish will be granted Friday night, barring a last-minute change of heart by Chapman or the Kentucky Supreme Court.

Chapman is scheduled to be executed at Kentucky State Penitentiary, which would make him the first Kentucky inmate to die at the hands of the state since 1999.

“The only thing I could says is I’m sorry. Even though they shouldn’t accept it, my heartfelt apologies for their loss and what I’ve done,” Chapman told The Associated Press in May. “I’m ready. I’m ready and I’m sorry. There’s nothing else I can say.”

Chapman’s aunt, Donna Rumburg of Mount Airy, Md., said his family is a little less certain about his decision. Rumburg, who raised Chapman for a short time, said she hasn’t forgiven Chapman for what he did because it’s not her place.

“But I don’t say I don’t love him,” Rumburg said.

Chapman, 37, pleaded guilty in December 2004 to killing 7-year-old Chelbi Sharon and 6-year-old Cody Sharon in their northern Kentucky home. He also admitted stabbing 10-year-old Courtney Sharon, who survived, then raping and trying to kill their mother, Carolyn Marksberry, during the 2002 assault.

Prosecutors said at the time of Chapman’s plea in 2004 that Chapman attacked the family because he was upset with Marksberry for telling Chapman’s girlfriend to end a relationship with him. But Chapman has never explained the attack and may not before the lethal three-drug cocktail is administered.

“To this day, I still don’t know why. I don’t know exactly what happened that night,” Chapman said. “I did something that was immoral and wrong. I want to pay the price for it.”

Gov. Steve Beshear said on Thursday he has no plans to stop Chapman’s execution.

“I quite honestly don’t see any extenuating circumstances that will cause me to exercise my authority to grant clemency,” Beshear said. “It is a heinous crime that was committed.”

The state’s high court on Thursday rejected a motion that would have halted the execution.

Chief Justice John Minton signed an order denying a request by a Louisville attorney to stop it. The attorney, Philip Longmeyer, had questioned on behalf of a group of private citizens whether the Kentucky Department of Corrections should have held public hearings before adopting regulations that specify how lethal injections are administered.

Chapman’s first attorney in the case, public defender John Delaney, visited Chapman in prison last week. He said he thinks his former client is telling the truth about not knowing why he committed the crimes.

“Marc is a nice man,” Delaney said. “He’s a nice guy, a smart guy who doesn’t really have a good handle on why he did what he did.”

Linda Talley Smith, who prosecuted Chapman, described his case as unusual because Chapman has been so forthcoming about what he did and wanting to take the punishment for it. But that doesn’t make it easier for everyone involved to handle, Smith said.

“I don’t think that there is any such thing as a healing effect in this type of case,” Smith said. “Come Saturday morning, Codi and Chelbi will still be missing from their family’s lives.”

Despite Chapman’s willingness to die, anti-death penalty activists plan to hold a vigil Friday at the prison.

“The issue isn’t Chapman,” said the Rev. Pat Delahanty, head of the Kentucky Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. “The issue is when do you kill. We happen to think it’s never appropriate to kill someone.”

Ky. high court rejects requests to halt execution

Published

on November 19, 2008

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By Brett Barrouquere
The Associated Press

LOUISVILLE — The Kentucky Supreme Court has rejected two requests to halt the scheduled execution of Marco Allen Chapman, saying the death row inmate is competent to make his own decisions about whether to die.

The high court on Wednesday ruled that Chapman, who has asked to be executed, is competent to make his own decisions. Because of that finding, Chief Justice John Minton said, the court must dismiss the remaining appeals that were filed by the Department of Public Advocacy against Chapman’s will.

Justice Mary Noble issued a one-page concurring opinion saying the court properly applied the law, but that she would be open to legislative action on the death penalty.

“If state executions are not the will of the people, then they must demand a different approach,” Noble wrote. “I would welcome such legislation.”

Barring a last-minute change of heart by Chapman, the ruling could clear the way for Chapman to die by lethal injection at the Kentucky State Penitentiary on Friday.

Chapman, 36, pleaded guilty in 2004 to killing a 7-year-old girl and her 6-year-old brother, as well as attacking their 10-year-old sister and mother in the northern Kentucky town of Warsaw. He asked to be sentenced to death.

The public advocates asked the high court to stop the execution, questioning Chapman’s competency in one motion and citing a pending challenge to Kentucky’s execution protocol in another.

Two other death row inmates, convicted cop killer Ralph Baze and Thomas Clyde Bowling, convicted of killing a couple in Lexington, sued the state saying it improperly adopted the current execution protocol. That challenge is pending before the Kentucky Supreme Court. Chapman did not take part in that suit.

The high court’s ruling comes about a week after a circuit judge in Frankfort found Chapman competent to fire his attorneys and waive his appeals.

Chapman wrote directly to the justices with a plea to allow his execution.

“So I ask this court one last time to dismiss all motions and allow my execution go forward as planned without any further delays or proceedings,” Chapman wrote.

Kentucky has executed two people since states resumed the practice in 1977 after a four-year, court-imposed hiatus. Harold McQueen was put to death in the electric chair in 1997 for the shooting death of Rebecca O’Hearn in Richmond in 1980.

The last person executed in Kentucky was Eddie Lee Harper, who died by lethal injection in 1999. Harper was sentenced to death for killing his adoptive parents in 1982. Harper waived all appeals and asked to be executed after 16 years on death row.

Injunction that could have halted execution denied

Published

on November 18, 2008

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FRANKFORT — A judge has denied a request for an injunction that could have halted Friday’s scheduled execution of a confessed child killer.

Franklin County Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd entered an order Tuesday morning in a lawsuit that questioned whether the Kentucky Department of Corrections followed proper procedure in developing regulations regarding lethal injections.

Attorney Philip Longmeyer had argued that the state agency should have held public hearings before adopting regulations that spell out how lethal injections are administered. David Smith, an attorney for the state attorney general’s office, said public hearings weren’t necessary because state law spells out the procedure.

If Shepherd had granted the injunction, it would have stopped the planned execution of Marco Allen Chapman.

Judge says he’ll find Death Row inmate competent

Published

on November 7, 2008

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Associated Press

A Kentucky death row inmate who is pushing to be swiftly executed will likely be found competent to fire the public defenders who have been fighting his death sentence, a judge and attorneys said at a hearing Friday.

The finding could clear the way to executing 36-year-old Marco Allen Chapman, who is currently scheduled for lethal injection on Nov. 21.

Even though Chapman dismissed his lawyers in 2004 before pleading guilty to murder and asking for a death sentence, public defenders have continued to file motions on his behalf, questioning his competency.

Special Judge Roger Crittenden has scheduled another hearing next week to hear testimony from a doctor who examined Chapman. The judge said he would likely declare Chapman competent.

Chapman admitted to killing two children and attacking their sister and sexually assaulting their mother in 2004 in the northern Kentucky town of Warsaw.

Public defender Heather McGregor said if an order declaring Chapman competent is issued, defense attorneys will hold up their end of a deal made with the inmate and withdraw two pending motions in the Kentucky Supreme Court trying to stop the execution.

“If he’s found competent, we will voluntarily withdraw from the case,” McGregor said.

Chapman told the court on Friday that once those motions are withdrawn, he wants the execution to go forward.

“I’m competent,” Chapman told the court by telephone from prison. “I’ve already made my decisions.”

Chapman sued the Department of Public Advocacy seeking a judge’s order allowing him to fire the public defenders. The hearing on Friday was on a request to allow the state Attorney General’s office to intervene in the lawsuit, which the judge granted.

Carolyn Marksberry, the mother of the victims and a survivor of the attack, attended the hearing Friday, but declined to speak to a reporter.

It is a policy of The Associated Press not to name victims of sexual assault in most cases; however, Marksberry has discussed her ordeal in national television broadcasts.

EARLIER: Marco Chapman coverage.

Attorney seek stay of execution for child killer

Published

on October 27, 2008

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FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — Attorneys are seeking a stay of execution for a confessed child killer who has volunteered to be put to death.
The Kentucky Supreme Court cleared the way last week for Marco Allen Chapman to become the first death row inmate executed in the state in nearly 10 years. The execution date is set for Nov. 21.
Chapman dismissed his public defenders in 2004, entered a guilty plea and asked to be put to death.
The public defenders questioned Chapman’s competency in one motion for a stay. In another, they argued that Chapman shouldn’t be executed until appeals are exhausted in a separate case that questions the validity of Kentucky’s execution protocol. That case is pending before the state Supreme Court.

Inmate calls for no more delays in execution

Published

on August 22, 2008

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The Associated Press

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A Kentucky death row inmate who asked to be executed for killing two children has called for an end to delays in his case and for the state to put him to death.

Marco Allen Chapman told The Associated Press in a phone interview on Friday that he doesn’t understand why his case is dragging out.

The Kentucky Supreme Court on Thursday declined to rehear his case, but Chapman’s court-appointed attorneys have 10 days to ask the justices to reconsider. Then the attorney general has 10 more days to respond. Chapman said the delays merely “drag out the misery” for himself and the family of his victims.

Chapman pleaded guilty in 2004 to killing 7-year-old Chelbi Sharon and 6-year-old Cody Sharon, and attacking their mother, Carolyn Marksberry, and their older sister, Courtney Sharon, in the small town of Warsaw in northern Kentucky.

Ky. Supreme Court denies rehearing for death row inmate

Published

on August 21, 2008