As recently as January, 34 of the 35 states that allow lethal injections for executions used sodium thiopental, usually administered as the first of three drugs that are intended to prevent pain, inhibit muscle movement and then stop the heart.
Michelle Lyons, a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said Monday that Mr. Foster’s execution was one of seven scheduled in Texas through August.
Ms. Lyons said that the state had plenty of sodium thiopental on hand, but that it reached its expiration date at the end of March.
Ms. Levin said Monday that Texas had failed to adhere to its own administrative rules when it decided to switch to pentobarbital and that it had not properly notified the public of the change.
Mr. Foster’s lawyers also say the state used an invalid federal permit to buy pentobarbital.
“Given the frequency of which we carry out this ultimate act, it should be done in compliance with the law, with transparency and deliberateness and care,” said Ms. Levin, who also teaches at the University of Texas. “It is experimental, a drug that is brand new to lethal injections.”
“We are very pleased that Judge David Laser has ordered a three-week continuous evidentiary hearing to review evidence of the innocence of Damien, Jason and Jessie. He clearly wants this case to move as expeditiously as possible. I am hopeful that upon a full review of the evidence there will finally be justice by years end. Every day in solitary confinement for Damien, and maximum-security imprisonment for Jason and Jessie, is a day in hell.”
The defense plans to point the finger at Terry Hobbs, Stevie Branch's step father and Pam Hobbs, ex-husband. They claim there are three eyewitnesses who saw Terry Hobbs with the three children shortly before their murder.
In the brief, the defense says it plans to call Pam Hobbs to testify about Terry's "extremely suspicious" actions the following days. But Pam Hobbs, despite her previous position, she doesn't think her ex-husband had anything to do with the murders.
"I don't think anyone needs to do what was done in the beginning and point fingers and say this one done it, voice our thoughts and theories, that's all they are," said Hobbs.
It's still so hard to believe - even when you look at someone in the eye - even when he says that there was so much pressure to confess - it's still hard to understand why a normal guy who's in his mid-20s could be coerced into admitting something that horrific.
"48 Hours" collected sections of defendant Michael Scott’s confessions and showed them to Saul Kassin, distinguished professor of psychology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
Kassin was familiar with the case because he was once contacted by the defense.
Scott: I remember looking at this girl. I hear the gun go off. I only pulled the trigger once… I hear somebody get slapped.
"A good valid confession will look something just like this. But there are many false confessions that are known, proven false confessions, that also look just like this," Kassin explained.
According to Kassin, the problem is what you see on tape is just a fraction of the actual interview.
"You can't tell just by looking," he said.
I asked him, "But why would somebody confess to something they didn't do? What goes on in a person’s mind to say, 'Yeah, I was there. I was thinking this?'"
"One is, the person feels absolutely trapped," Kassin explained.
Detective: At some point, Maurice hands you that revolver. What does he say to you?
"The goal of interrogation, very explicitly, is to increase the anxiety associated with denial," Kassin said.
Detective: Let’s do it now. You went inside with those boys, didn’t you Michael?
"We know you did it. And we don't want to hear any lies," said Kassin.
"What we found is that our participants clearly made admission decisions on the basis of the proximal consequence," Madon [one of the researchers] said. "They would admit to having done some criminal or unethical behavior in order to avoid answering repetitive questions. And they did that even though they knew that it increased the likelihood that they would have to meet with the police officer in several weeks to discuss their answers in more detail."
“Elasticity” is possible because the tests are largely subjective. Just how much human judgment is required depends on the discipline: DNA testing is mostly—though not entirely—done by machine, for instance, whereas microscopic hair comparison is based solely on the analyst’s opinion. Even fingerprints, which many of us regard as foolproof tools for identifying culprits—think Dexter feeding a print into his computer and a bad guy’s photo and driver’s license appearing on the screen—in fact rely largely on human interpretation, and therefore are subject to human error.
My friends have endured 17 years of people trying to raise money and get new trial for the convicted murderers and now we have a guy who is using Pizza Hut to raise money for this.
Please stop this, as this is assisting the defense to get 3 convicted child murderers out of prison.
