Oklahoma
State executes man for 1997 hammer killing
McALESTER, Okla. (AP) — Oklahoma executed a man Thursday for a 1997 killing, despite a recommendation from the state’s Pardon and Parole Board that his life be spared.
James Coddington, 50, received a lethal injection at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester and was pronounced dead at 10:16 a.m. Gov. Kevin Stitt declined to commute Coddington’s sentence to life in prison without parole and rejected his petition for clemency. Coddington was the fifth Oklahoma inmate to be put to death since the state resumed executions last year.
Coddington was convicted and sentenced to die for beating 73-year-old Albert Hale to death with a hammer. Prosecutors say Coddington, then 24, became enraged when Hale refused to give him money to buy cocaine.
During a clemency hearing this month before the state’s five-member Pardon and Parole Board, an emotional Coddington, now 50, apologized to Hale’s family and said he was a different man today.
“I’m clean, I know God, I’m not ... I’m not a vicious murderer,” Coddington told the board. “If this ends today with my death sentence, OK.”
But Mitch Hale, Albert Hale’s son, urged the parole board not to recommend clemency, and said this week he was relieved Stitt decided to let the execution go forward.
“Our family can put this behind us after 25 years,” Hale, 64, said. “No one is ever happy that someone’s dying, but (Coddington) chose this path ... he knew what the consequences are, he rolled the dice and lost.”
Coddington’s attorney, Emma Rolls, told the panel that Coddington was impaired by years of alcohol and drug abuse that began as an infant when his father put beer and whiskey into his baby bottles.
The panel voted 3-2 to recommend clemency, although Hale’s family had urged against it. Stitt, a Republican, denied the parole board’s recommendation.
Coddington was twice sentenced to death for Hale’s killing, the second time in 2008 after his initial sentence was overturned on appeal.
After killing Hale, Coddington committed at least six armed robberies at gas stations and convenience stores across Oklahoma City.
“When the full circumstances of the murder, related robberies, and extensive history of violence on Mr. Coddington’s part are considered, one thing is clear: death is the only just punishment for him,” prosecutors in the state attorney general’s office wrote to the Pardon and Parole Board.
The state had halted executions in September 2015 when prison officials realized they had received the wrong lethal drug. It later came to light that the same wrong drug had been used to execute an inmate, and executions in the state were put on hold.
California
$480K to inmate who miscarried after coffee stop
SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) — Southern California’s Orange County has agreed to pay $480,000 to an inmate who was pregnant but suffered a miscarriage after sheriff’s deputies stopped at a Starbucks while driving her to a hospital.
Sandra Quinones, who is no longer in custody, alleged in a federal lawsuit that sheriff’s staff delayed treatment after her water broke in the jail.
County supervisors on Tuesday unanimously approved the payment, but Quinones must formally accept the settlement before it becomes final, the Orange County Register reported.
“That’s a very good result for someone badly treated in the jail,” her lawyer, Dick Herman, told the Register. “This poor woman, she’s in jail having a miscarriage and, instead of calling an ambulance, they take her to the hospital in a patrol car and the cops stop at Starbucks while she’s bleeding.”
Herman said Quinones is homeless and mentally ill.
The lawsuit said no jail staff responded for two hours after Quinones pushed a call button in her cell when her water broke on March 28, 2016.
Then instead of being put in an ambulance, Quinones was given a ride to a hospital in a patrol car, but not until deputies stopped for coffee, the lawsuit alleged.
Quinones was hospitalized, but the fetus did not survive, according to court filings.
Sheriff’s officials declined to comment on the settlement.
The lawsuit accused deputies of acting with “deliberate indifference” toward Quinones’ civil rights and her medical condition, the Register said.
North Carolina
DA: Officer won’t face charges in fatal shooting
CONCORD, N.C. (AP) — A North Carolina police officer who authorities said fatally shot a man during a suspected car theft earlier this year won’t be prosecuted, a local district attorney announced Wednesday, saying the officer was legally justified in firing.
Cabarrus County District Attorney Roxann Vaneekhoven announced that Timothy Larson, who no longer works for the Concord Police Department, will not face criminal charges in the death of Brandon Combs in an auto dealership on Feb. 13, The Charlotte Observer reported.
Combs, 29, of Gastonia, was struck by gunfire while he sat behind the wheel of Larson’s police SUV, according to attorneys. Combs had jumped into the vehicle after Larson had discovered him trying to steal a nearby pickup truck, the newspaper reported.
Vaneekhoven said in a statement that the evidence shows Larson “did not utilize excessive force when he fired his weapon at a fully revved police SUV that was pointed at him a few feet way, that Brandon Combs was attempting to steal.”
Larson was fired from the department in May. Police Chief Gary Gacek cited Larson for insubordination in his termination letter for refusing to answer questions after the shooting and for giving misleading or untrue answers in other instances.
Combs’ mother, Virginia Tayara, filed a federal lawsuit earlier this month accusing the officer of breaking the law when he shot her son. Attorneys for Combs’ family have seen video generated from Larson’s body-worn camera.
The mother’s attorneys said Wednesday that they were disappointed but not surprised by the district attorney’s decision, saying “Vaneekhoven thinks that kind of brutality, disregard for human life and contempt for the rule of law is just fine if you wear a badge.”
In explaining her decision, Vaneekhoven cited several factors, including that Combs ignored multiple commands from Larson to get out of the truck and failed to show his hands. A police rifle in the SUV was within the reach of Combs, she said, and Combs had revved the vehicle just before Larson opened fire.
The mother’s lawsuit says that Larson fired five shots through the windshield of the vehicle. He called in the shooting to the department dispatchers, then fired again, the suit alleges.
Vaneekhoven received the findings of a State Bureau of Investigation review of the shooting in June.
