Death Penalty

Daughter spared when Richard Strong killed her mother, half-sister, asks Missouri governor to block his execution

June 8, 2015 By Mike Lear

The daughters of a man Missouri plans to execute Tuesday for killing his girlfriend and her 2-year-old daughter want his life spared, even though one of them was there the night of the murders.

Alyshia ,Richard, and Lauren Strong during a visit at the state prison in Potosi.

Richard Strong brutally stabbed and slashed 23-year-old Eva Washington and her 2-year-old daughter, Zandrea Thomas, to death after an argument in October of 2000. When police arrived they found the couple’s 3-month-old daughter sitting on a bed next to a pool of blood and a knife.

That daughter, Alyshia Strong, is now 14, and she is asking Governor Jay Nixon (D) to stop her father from being executed Tuesday evening. She knows some people might find that hard to understand.

“My dad is the only parent I have,” Strong told Missourinet. “I live with my grandma and she’s an amazing … she’s been amazing raising me … but my dad is my dad.”

Alyshia’s half-sister Lauren Strong, 18 and also Richard Strong’s daughter, says in spite of his having been in prison most of their lives, he has been active as their father.

“In any way he could possibly have been a part of my life, he was,” Lauren said.

The two young ladies have presented Nixon with a request for clemency for Strong. Neither daughter denies his crime or attempts to excuse it, but both say he would be punished enough if he spent the rest of his life in prison and say it would only punish them to execute him.

Lauren Strong was four at the time of the murders. She says she likes to think she knows who he is now, “or on some level, the reasons why he did what he did, and I’m not going to make any excuses. It was horrible. But it’s not for anybody else to, without sounding cliché, play God.

“There is nothing good that would come out of his execution. Absolutely not one thing I can think of that’s good. But there are a hundred bad things I can think of,” Lauren added.

In the clemency request Alyshia writes that she never asked him about the night of the murders until his execution date was set by the Missouri Supreme Court in April. She told Missourinet she put it off because she wanted to protect his feelings.

“But, if my father was going to die, I needed to know everything. I needed closure. I needed to know what happened because I didn’t want him to leave and me not be able to find out,” she said.

According to her statement in the request, he told her Washington had been abused as a child, had Multiple Personality Disorder, and said his relationship with Washington was volatile.

Eva Washington was 23 when she was murdered by Richard Strong in October, 2000. Court documents say she was stabbed 21 times, with five slash wounds, and the tip of the knife used to stab her was embedded in her skull.

“He didn’t mean to hurt anybody and he’s very sorry,” she told Missourinet. “I’m at peace now but I would rather him live than to die for something that [he] didn’t mean to happen.”

She said in her statement she still isn’t ready to ask why he spared her on the night of the murders, and hopes he won’t be executed so some day, she can.

Strong’s mother, Joyce Knox, is Alyshia’s legal guardian. She says Richard Strong calls Alyshia two or three times a week.

“I know they talk about important things – the same kinds of things a father would talk to his daughter about if he were living at home with her,” she writes in her statement in the clemency request. “Even though he is in prison, Richard is a very good father – he always has been.”

“At one time Richard was going to church with me, and by me being a minister he thought that he could go to Heaven off of mama’s coattails, but I know now that Richard has truly found God in his life,” Knox told Missourinet. “And he’s helped a lot of other people that are in prison with him to find God and he’s changed so much.”

She added tearfully, “I don’t want to see him die.”

Two-year-old Zandrea Thomas was stabbed nine times and had 12 slash wounds inflicted by Richard Strong.

Nixon has heard from the families, attorneys, and friends of some of the other men that have been executed in Missouri since late 2013 that those men had found religion and were positive influences on those with them in prison, as well as claims regarding some of those men’s competency to be executed – one of the claims raised now by Strong’s attorneys in seeking to keep him from being executed. Nixon has also been told that some of those men were abused as children, as has been said of Strong. None of those arguments has dissuaded Nixon from allowing any given to proceed.

Strong’s attorneys are seeking to block his execution on several other fronts, as well, including arguing that the jury was not properly instructed in how it had to consider the factors that prosecutors raised as arguments that he should receive the death penalty.

If those efforts ultimately fail, Strong will die by lethal injection at the state prison at Bonne Terre between Tuesday at 6 p.m. and Wednesday at 5:59 p.m. His would be the fourth execution carried out in Missouri this year and the 16th since Missouri resumed conducting executions on a regular basis, and began scheduling one per month in November, 2013.

Attempts to reach the family of Eva Washington and Zandrea Thomas for this story have been unsuccessful.

State Supreme Court sets execution date for convicted murderer Leon Taylor

July 24, 2014 By Mike Lear

The State Supreme Court has set a date for the execution of convicted murderer Leon Taylor. He is scheduled to die by lethal injection just after midnight, September 10, at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center at Bonne Terre.

Leon Taylor (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

Taylor was convicted of the 1994 murder of Robert Newton, who was attending a gas station in Jackson County where Taylor and two of his half-siblings had purchased gas.

Taylor pulled a gun and demanded money from Newton, who gave the trio $400 in a bank money bag. Taylor then led Newton to a back room and shot him in the head, killing him.

Taylor then turned the gun on Newton’s eight-year-old step daughter Sarah Yates and pulled the trigger, but the gun jammed and the little girl was spared. Taylor wanted to return to the gas station and get the girl but his step-siblings wanted to leave, so they did.

The state’s next scheduled execution is that of Michael Shane Worthington, for the murder 19 years ago of Mindy Griffin in St. Louis. He is scheduled to be executed early the morning of August 6.

Ruling against California death penalty could be raised in Missouri execution cases

July 18, 2014 By Mike Lear

A federal judge in California has ruled that state’s death penalty takes so long to be carried out it breaks the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment. The ruling could have an impact on cases in Missouri.

Washington University Professor Peter Joy

The judge ruled that delays of 25 years or more for appeals and the rarely carrying out of executions by California mean that state’s death penalty has become arbitrary and pointless.

Washington University Law Professor Peter Joy says the ruling could come up in Missouri cases.

“Any lawyer representing somebody on death row who’s been on death row for a lengthy period of time should raise this argument now because there is this decision out there,” says Joy.

About 40 percent of California’s death row inmates have been there more than 19 years. Three Missouri inmates have been awaiting execution for 25 years, and about 22 percent of condemned Missouri inmates have been waiting 19 years or more.

Not all the delays cited by the judge stem from appeals.

Joy says also noted were, “delays [related to] the system itself, and have nothing to do with the person filing a lot of appeals.”

“Out in California,” says Joy, “There’s a much lengthier time before the court finds someone to appoint as a lawyer to represent people that have been convicted in their appeals and post-conviction relief. There isn’t that lengthy a time here in Missouri but there are still issues with the way the process works that take a long time.”

The issue could be raised by attorneys for Michael Shane Worthington, who Missouri is scheduled to execute August 6 and who has been awaiting execution for 15 years.

UPDATE: New stay of John Middleton execution is granted

July 15, 2014 By Mike Lear

For the second time Tuesday, District Judge Catherine Perry has granted a stay in the lethal injection execution of John Middleton, just over an hour from when it is scheduled to take place at the prison in Bonne Terre. Judge Perry writes that Middleton should have a hearing on his claim that he is incompetent to be executed.

The Attorney General’s Office has appealed the stay. The appeal would be heard by the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals, which has a history of lifting stays, including a separate one issued early Tuesday by Judge Perry, also related to an incompetency claim by Middleton.

Middleton was sentenced to death for the 1995 murders of three people in northwest Missouri. Middleton, a user and dealer of methamphetamine, was found guilty of murdering three people he suspected had or would “snitch” on him.

Missourinet News Director Bob Priddy is at the prison in Bonne Terre where he will witness the execution if and when it is allowed to proceed.

Court lifts stay of Middleton execution, set for tonight

July 15, 2014 By Mike Lear

A 3-judge panel of the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has vacated the stay of the execution of John Middleton, scheduled to happen tonight at the prison in Bonne Terre.

John Middleton (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

A District Judge had granted the stay based on Middleton’s claim that he is not competent to be executed, and arguing that the state did not give him the opportunity to raise that claim.

His attorneys could appeal the ruling. The execution is still scheduled to happen just after midnight tonight, and if delayed, could potentially take place any time before midnight Wednesday night.

Death penalty opponent, analyst consider reasons for limit to MO executions

July 8, 2014 By Mike Lear

The Corrections Department asked the State Supreme Court not to ask it to carry out more than one execution per month. The Supreme Court has honored that request and changed its own rules to reflect it.

Missouri executed two inmates at the same time on four occasions in its gas chamber between 1938 and 1953. (photo courtesy; Adam Roberts)

A Corrections spokesman hasn’t acknowledged the request was made, but some who watch how the death penalty is carried out in Missouri have ideas why it was made.

Rita Linhardt chairs the board of Missourians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. She thinks one group the change would benefit would be the Corrections Department’s employees.

“The people down at Bonne Terre who are actually carrying out the executions,” Linhardt refers to specifically. “I would imagine that an execution is very disruptive to the normal prison routine, and so I would think the DOC needs time to prepare for this not just only logistically but also emotionally … so I would think this ruling of having no more than one a month would help in some way those type of burdens on DOC workers.”

A spokesman at the Missouri Correctional Officers Association says it has no comment on the rule change.

Linhardt thinks the one-per-month limit could also benefit attorneys who represent clients who are under a death sentence, who often represent multiple clients.

“They don’t even one want one (execution) a month, but the possibility that you could be facing two of your clients in the same month … I just think would be terribly emotionally draining,” says Linhardt.

Attorney John Mills is an attorney participating in a Saint Louis University law school study of the death penalty in Missouri. He says the Department could be sensing that Missourians’ limits would be tested by more frequent executions.

“The public may have a limit in what they will tolerate in terms of executions, and (the Department) may be feeling some pressure or may sense that the public may not be willing to tolerate more than one execution per month,” Mills tells Missourinet.

Mills concedes that it could be a matter of budgeting or staffing for the Department that makes multiple executions in a month too taxing on resources, though a Department spokesman declined to comment on whether that is a factor.

The rule change was ordered by Chief Justice Mary R. Russell. No commentary was provided explaining the rationale behind it.

Missouri currently has 41 men under a death sentence, meaning it would take at least three-and-a-half years for Missouri to execute all the men currently sentenced to death in the state.

Even before the rule took effect Missouri has been scheduling one execution every month since November 2013, with only one having been blocked by the courts. Executions have been scheduled to take place July 16 and August 6.

Missouri has not historically placed such limits on executions, though the last time two inmates were executed in the same month was in October, 2001, when Michael Roberts was executed on the October 3 and Stephen Johns was executed 21 days later.

On four occasions between 1938 and 1953 Missouri executed two people at the same time using lethal gas. Prior to 1938 when the state’s death penalty was carried out by hanging, sometimes two or more condemned individuals would be hung alongside each other.

Mother of condemned man’s victim reacts to setting of his execution date

July 1, 2014 By Mike Lear

Carol Angelbeck has been waiting 15 years since her daughter’s killer was sentenced to death. Now she has learned her wait could end in a little more than a month.

Melinda Griffin

24-year-old Mindy Griffin was found dead in her apartment on September 30, 1995, the victim of rape and murder. Her stolen car was found later that day being driven by her neighbor, Michael Shane Worthington. His confession and DNA later tied him to the murder and he was sentenced to death in 1999.

Angelbeck, now 76, was told Monday morning that the Supreme Court has set August 6 as the date for his execution.

“I just couldn’t believe that it was finally going to come to an end. That I was finally going to not have to deal with this portion of the murder of my daughter,” Angelbeck tells Missourinet. “I didn’t have to deal with the justice system or anything else anymore. All I have to think about is my Mindy and what she would be doing by now.”

Angelbeck now lives in Florida with her husband where they raise horses. She has already started making arrangements for others to care for their property and animals, and to fly to Missouri to be here for Worthington’s execution.

She says it’s not a matter of closure or revenge for her.

“I guess I’ve always felt that if you believe … and I could be wrong … but for me, I feel like if you believe in the death penalty as a punishment for the most heinous of murders, then you should be willing to go through with the whole thing,” says Angelbeck.

She says she doesn’t know how she will feel when the execution is over.

“I’m sure that every emotion runs through your mind,” Angelbeck says. “It’s another human being dying, but yet if you think about your child that’s been murdered … I don’t know … I really don’t know what I’m going to feel until it’s over.”

Angelbeck says she hasn’t known how to feel for more than 18 years.

“We were thrown into the justice system when Mindy was murdered. I can remember the day after day after day living with this. The anger when I found out who did this to Mindy, when they showed me his picture. The anger was so bad in me for probably the first 5 or 10 years. I just couldn’t understand how he could do this to my daughter,” says Angelbeck. “It went from anger to not knowing what to do next, to trying to see that justice was done.”

One thing she does not expect is for Worthington’s death to put an end to any part of her life now. Over the years since Mindy’s death, Angelbeck has worked with and encouraged families of other murder victims as a chapter leader for Parents of Murdered Children.

She says she can’t stop that because there are still people that need help.

“One man in particular … his sister was violently murdered by a man in (the prison in) Potosi and he’s up for execution too, and I talk to him all the time,” says Angelbeck. “There’s about four or five other people, and so we all really kind of support each other.”

One of Angelbeck’s frustrations with the system concerns the length of time it takes to carry out death sentences. She notes the recent decision by the state Supreme Court in Florida that upheld that state’s “Timely Justice Act,” designed to keep condemned inmates from languishing on death row for decades before their sentences are carried out.

Still, she says if she could go back now and choose for Worthington to be sentenced to life in prison, to save herself some of the grief and struggles of the past two decades, she would not change anything. She says it is the work she has done that has meant Mindy’s death was not in vain.

“For me, I think it was helping others as Parents of Murdered Children’s chapter leader and for fighting to see that justice is done for these victims, that, to me, is what got me through the last 18 years.”

Appeals court maintains stay in Winfield execution

June 17, 2014 By Mike Lear

A three-judge panel of the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals has refused to overturn a stay of execution for condemned inmate John Winfield, who is scheduled to be executed just after midnight tonight.

A federal judge issued the stay Friday based on arguments that Corrections Department Officials pressured a worker at the prison where Winfield was held not to write a letter in support of clemency for Winfield. The Attorney General’s Office argues that point is moot because Governor Jay Nixon (D), who decides whether clemency is granted, has received a copy of a letter of support from that worker.

The Attorney General has appealed for a hearing before the full 8th Circuit Court.

An application for a stay made by Winfield’s attorneys to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito is still pending.

Winfield was sentenced to death for the 1996 murders of Arthea Sanders and Shawnee Murphy.

Earlier stories on John Winfield

UPDATE: Attorney General asks federal judge to change order halting next week’s execution

June 12, 2014 By Mike Lear

The Attorney General’s Office has filed its response to the stay of execution issued for convicted inmate John Winfield, who is scheduled to be executed Wednesday.

A federal judge on Thursday issued the stay citing concerns that Department of Corrections officials interfered with the clemency process. Winfield’s attorneys say a Corrections employee was pressured not to write a letter in support of their request for clemency for Winfield.

Attorney General Chris Koster argues that the claim is moot because a copy of the employee’s letter in support of Winfield is available in public record and media reports. He says Winfield’s attorneys failed to prove that the Governor’s Office had no knowledge of the employee’s statement.

Winfield was sentenced to death for the 1996 murders of Arthea Sanders and Shawnee Murphy. They were friends of his ex-girlfriend, whom he also shot and rendered blind.

See earlier story

Stay issued in execution scheduled for next week cites concern of interference in clemency process

June 12, 2014 By Mike Lear

A federal judge has issued a stay in the execution of condemned inmate John Winfield, which is scheduled to take place next week. U.S. District Judge Catherine D. Perry cites concerns that Department of Corrections officials interfered with the clemency process.

John Winfield (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

Lawyers for Winfield say Corrections officials pressured an employee of the prison at Potosi not to write a letter in support of a request for clemency for Winfield. The employee informed his superiors that he had been approached by an attorney for Winfield regarding the clemency proceeding and learned the next day that he was under investigation by the Corrections Department’s Investigator General’s Office for “over-familiarity” with Winfield.

Judge Perry’s order staying next week’s execution also instructs Corrections officials and staff including Director George Lombardi and the wardens of the prisons at Bonne Terre and Potosi not to interfere with corrections employees’ providing of statements in support of clemency for Winfield.

Winfield was sentenced to death for the 1996 murders of Arthea Sanders and Shawnee Murphy, friends of his ex-girlfriend.