Eric Robert was executed by the State of South Dakota for the murder of a prison guard. According to court documents Eric Roberts and Rodney Berget during an escape attempt would murder a prison guard, Ronald “RJ” Johnson with a metal pipe. Eric Robert and Rodney Berget would be both sentenced to death. Rodney Berget was executed in 2018. Eric Robert would be executed by lethal injection on October 16, 2012
Eric Robert More News
A South Dakota man who beat a prison guard with a pipe and covered his head in plastic wrap to kill him during a failed escape attempt was put to death Monday, in the state’s first execution since 2007.
Eric Robert, 50, received lethal injection and was pronounced dead at the state penitentiary in Sioux Falls. He is the first South Dakota inmate to die under the state’s new single-drug lethal injection method, and only the 17th person to be executed in the state or Dakota Territory since 1877.
Robert was put to death in the same prison where he killed guard Ronald “RJ” Johnson during an escape attempt on April 12, 2011. Robert was serving an 80-year sentence on a kidnapping conviction when he tried to break out with fellow inmate Rodney Berget, 50.
Johnson was working alone the morning of his death — also his 63rd birthday — in a part of the prison known as Pheasantland Industries, where inmates work on upholstery, signs, custom furniture and other projects. Authorities said the inmates beat Johnson with a pipe, covered his head in plastic wrap and left his body on the floor.
Robert then put on Johnson’s pants, hat and jacket and approached the prison’s west gate. With his head down, he pushed a cart loaded with two boxes. Berget was hidden in one of the boxes, according to a report filed by a prison worker after the slaying
Other guards became suspicious as the men got closer to the gate. When confronted, Robert beat one guard; other guards quickly arrived and detained both inmates.
Months later, Robert told a judge his only regret was that he hadn’t killed more guards. He pleaded guilty to Johnson’s slaying and asked to be sentenced to death, telling a judge last October that he would otherwise kill again. He never appealed his sentence and even tried to bypass a mandatory state review in hopes of expediting his death.
Berget also has pleaded guilty in the killing, but has appealed his death sentence. A third inmate, Michael Nordman, 47, was given a life sentence for providing materials used in the slaying.
Robert’s execution could be the first of two in as many weeks. Donald Moeller is scheduled to be put to death the week of Oct. 28 for the 1990 kidnapping, rape and murder of a 9-year-old girl. Robert had been on death row only for about a year, Moeller has been there for more than two decades. Only three other inmates currently are on the state’s death row.
South Dakota’s last execution before Monday took place in 2007, and that was the first in the state for 60 years.
“You have few people on death row, few executions, and then you have this coincidence of cases coming all at once,” said Richard Dieter, executive director of the nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center. “When people waive appeals, their cases start to move more quickly.”
Cuhuatemoc Peraita was sentenced to death by the State of Alabama for a prison murder. According to court documents Cuhuatemoc Peraita was serving a life without parole sentence for the murders of three people during a robbery at a Popeye’s restaurant. Cuhuatemoc Peraita along with two other accomplices would stab to death a fellow inmate inside of an Alabama prison. Cuhuatemoc Peraita would be convicted and sentenced to death
Cuhuatemoc Peraita 2021 Information
Inmate:
PERAITA, CUHUATEMOC HINRICY
AIS:
0000Z680
Institution:
HOLMAN PRISON
Cuhuatemoc Peraita More News
he State presented evidence that the Cuhuatemoc Peraita, Michael Castillo, and Quincy Lewis were incarcerated at Holman Prison on December 10 and 11, 1999. Around midnight, an incident occurred in which Lewis was stabbed several times. Shortly thereafter, he died as a result of his injuries.
Kevin James Bishop was employed as a correctional officer at Holman Prison and worked from 10 p.m. on December 10, 1999, until 6 a.m. on December 11, 1999. At approximately 11:43 p.m., as officers were doing a body count to make sure all of the inmates who were assigned to Dorm 4 were accounted for, he saw the appellant in the dorm. Cuhuatemoc Peraita said, “ ‘What’s up Bishop,’ ” and did not indicate that he was scared for himself or Castillo. (R. 966.) Bishop testified that, if the appellant had asked to be removed from the dorm, he would have been placed in segregation in a cell by himself for his protection until the situation could be investigated. After the body count was completed, the lights were turned down for the night so that only about one-half of the lights were on.
Charles Smith was incarcerated at Holman Prison on the night of the offense and knew the appellant, Castillo, and Lewis. Five or six days before the offense occurred, he had seen the knife that was used to stab Lewis in a paper bag at the foot of Lewis’ bed. He testified that he had heard Lewis tell the appellant to get the knife out of the bag and that the appellant had taken the knife and hidden it under his clothes.
Shortly before midnight and after the body count on the night the offense occurred, Smith saw Castillo and Lewis together. Lewis was walking toward the television room, but he stopped and sat on a bed across from Castillo’s bed, where Castillo was sitting. When he did, Cuhuatemoc Peraita, who was sitting on a box that was between the beds, got up to walk away. As the appellant walked between Castillo and Lewis, Lewis slapped him. The appellant continued to walk to his own bed. Smith testified that, after Lewis slapped the appellant, the other inmates were expecting something else to happen. He explained that some sort of response is common in a prison when one inmate slaps another inmate.
Smith testified that Cuhuatemoc Peraita stayed at his bunk for two or three minutes and then returned to the box on which he had previously been sitting. After about three to five minutes, the appellant stood up and started out like he was going to leave again. However, he spun around, grabbed Lewis around the neck, and “snatched his neck back.” (R. 1044.) Castillo then started stabbing Lewis in the neck and in several other places. In the process, he also stabbed the appellant in the arm. Eventually, Lewis put a towel to his neck and staggered out of the dorm. As he was doing so, Castillo gave the knife to the appellant. The appellant then “hit [Lewis] in the side” and said, “ ‘Die, nigger.’ ” (R. 1045-46.)
Smith testified that Cuhuatemoc Peraita and Castillo had paid Lewis two cartons of cigarettes to leave them alone and that he had asked Lewis several times to leave them alone. He also testified that Lewis could not stand the idea of the appellant being with Castillo. Finally, he stated that the appellant had been sleeping in the bed above Lewis’ bed, but that he had changed to a different bed.
Alvin Hamner was also incarcerated at Holman Prison on the night of the incident and knew the appellant, Castillo, and Lewis. During the night, he heard some movement and turned to look at what was happening. At that time, he saw Cuhuatemoc Peraita “holding Quincy Lewis around the neck and Castillo standing over him.” (R. 1029.) He first thought Castillo was punching Lewis in the neck, chest, and stomach. However, after more lights were turned on, he saw blood and realized that Castillo had been stabbing Lewis. He testified that Castillo had the knife, but handed it to the appellant when the lights came on and officers entered the dorm. He further testified that, as Lewis was falling to the floor, he saw the appellant stab Lewis in the side. Lewis subsequently walked out of the dorm and into the hallway, where he again fell to the floor. As the appellant walked by Lewis, Hamner heard him say, “ ‘M_ f_, die.’ ” (R. 1031.)
Alphonso Burroughs was also employed as a correctional officer at Holman Prison and worked from 10 p.m. on December 10, 1999, until 6 a.m. on December 11, 1999. When he walked into Dorm 4, he saw Lewis, who was covered with blood, walking from the area around Castillo’s bed. Cuhuatemoc Peraita, Lewis, and the appellant had a knife in his hand.
Lewis walked out of the dorm and collapsed during the time Burroughs was escorting Cuhuatemoc Peraita and Castillo out of the dorm. Burroughs went to help Lewis, and he told the appellant and Castillo to “go on up the hall.” (R. 952.) The appellant and Castillo complied, and Burroughs, another officer, and two inmates picked up Lewis to carry him to the infirmary to get medical attention. Part of the way there, the appellant, who was still holding the knife, and Castillo turned around. The appellant waved the knife and said, “ ‘Drop the bastard and let the bastard die.’ ” (R. 953.) The appellant, who appeared to be mad, continued to swing the knife and said, “ ‘Y’all get back too or we’ll cut you too.’ ” (R. 954.)
Bishop also saw Cuhuatemoc Peraita and Castillo standing side by side in the dorm. Both were covered with blood, and the appellant had a knife in his hand. Shortly thereafter, Lewis walked out of the dorm and collapsed. As others helped Lewis, Bishop stayed between Cuhuatemoc Peraita and Castillo and Lewis. He testified that he told the appellant several times to put the knife down. However, the appellant said he would not do so until he and Castillo were in segregation. The appellant and Castillo walked part of the way down the hall, but then they turned around, the appellant swung his knife toward Bishop, and said, “ ‘Put the bastard down and let the son-of-a-bitch die.’ ” (R. 972.)
Kevin Dale Boughner was also employed as a correctional officer at Holman Prison on December 10 and 11, 1999. He saw Cuhuatemoc Peraita, who had a knife in his hand, walking toward the segregation area. The appellant and Castillo were “[c]overed with blood, arm [in] arm, walking down the hall at a very brisk pace” toward him. (R. 980.) The appellant looked at him and said, “ ‘If you get us to a safe place I’ll give you the knife.’ ” (R. 980.) Boughner put them in a holding cell and locked the door, and the appellant threw the knife out. Boughner described the appellant as “really pumped up, hyper, adrenaline flowing, just really pumped up, hyped up.” (R. 981.) He also stated that, on two occasions, the appellant asked, “ ‘Is he dead?’ ” (R. 982.)
Bishop remained with the appellant and Castillo while Burroughs, the other officer, and the two inmates carried Lewis to the infirmary. Burroughs testified that, while he was going toward the infirmary, Bishop and Boughner tried to lock the appellant and Castillo in separate holding cells. However, he heard the appellant say that he and Castillo would not give up the knife unless they were locked up together. Burroughs testified that, after he and Castillo were locked in a holding cell together, the appellant threw the knife to the floor.
Sergeant William James, the shift commander for the segregation area, saw the appellant and Castillo, who he described as “covered from head to toe with blood,” as they were approaching the holding cell. (R. 991.) After he was secured in the holding cell, the appellant asked, “ ‘Is he dead?’ ” (R. 991.)
Dr. William John McIntyre treated Lewis in the emergency room at Atmore Community Hospital approximately one hour after the offense occurred. He testified that Lewis had six wounds, including a very large wound to his neck, and that he was close to death because he had lost so much blood. He further testified that medical personnel tried to revive Lewis, that they were not able to because the blood loss was irreversible, and that he pronounced Lewis dead.
Dr. Leroy Riddick, a medical examiner employed by the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences, performed an autopsy on Lewis’ body. He testified that Lewis had a total of eighteen separate injuries, including six stab wounds. One stab wound to his neck cut his carotid artery. Another stab wound to the chest went through the chest cavity and caused a lung to collapse. He also had several superficial incised wounds. Dr. Riddick concluded that the cause of death was sharp force injuries from stab wounds and cuts.
The defense called several inmates to testify on the Cuhuatemoc Peraita behalf. Michael Best testified that he knew the appellant, Castillo, and Lewis and had seen them interact; that the three seemed to get along well at first, but that the situation deteriorated over time; that Lewis had admitted to him that he had made threats against the appellant and Castillo; and that he had discussed those threats with the appellant and Castillo. Finally, he testified that Lewis had a reputation for being sexually violent in Holman Prison.
James Jones testified that he knew Cuhuatemoc Peraita, Castillo, and Lewis; that he had seen them interact; that they initially did not have problems; and that eventually problems developed. He explained that the appellant and Lewis “were partners” before Castillo arrived at Holman Prison; that Castillo came between the appellant and Lewis; that the appellant and Castillo “paid” Lewis two cartons of cigarettes to leave them alone; that Lewis left them alone for seven or eight days; and that problems started again. (R. 1134.) Finally, he stated that Lewis made a threat against the appellant in his presence and that he told the appellant about the threat.
Darwin Knight testified that he knew the appellant, Castillo, and Lewis; that the appellant and Lewis had been “partners”; and that there was “a major change” in the relationship between the appellant and Lewis after Castillo arrived at Holman Prison.
Robert Gleason was the last person to be executed by the State of Virginia after he was sentenced to death after two prison murders. According to court documents Robert Gleason was initially sentenced to life in prison for a murder. However once behind bars he would not stop killing. Robert Gleason would murder his first cellmate in 2009. Robert Gleason would be transferred to a super max prison known as Red Onion where he would again murder another prisoner. Robert Gleason would be sentenced to death for the two murders. Gleason demanded that he would be executed and he wanted to be executed by the electric chair. On January 16, 2013 Robert Gleason would get his wish and would be executed in the electric chair.
Robert Gleason More News
Robert C. Gleason Jr. died with fists partially clenched and smoke rising from his body.
He was faceless Wednesday night, the throes of death hidden behind a thick, black mask that allowed enough space only for his nose to poke through.
Death came on his own terms: He sought execution for a pair of murders in two Southwest Virginia prisons and asked for the electric chair.
There was the customary, last-minute flurry of appeals rejected by the governor and the U.S. Supreme Court. But those weren’t his appeals. Instead, they were filed by a team of capital defense attorneys arguing Gleason’s mental incompetence and hoping for the chance to represent him.
And Gleason, like the governor and federal judges, rejected their help to the very end.
His last words in the execution chamber at the Greensville Correctional Center in Jarratt, Va., were cryptic.
“Well, I hope Percy ain’t going to wet the sponge. Put me on the highway to Jackson and call my Irish buddies. Pog mo thoin. God bless,” he said.
The translation of the Irish Gaelic wording is “kiss my a–.”
Death took roughly eight minutes from the time the condemned man entered the chamber.
The execution, taking place on the other side of a two-way window, was like a play that began with Gleason taking a few steps into a cinderblock room and ended with someone mumbling a “time of death.”
It culminated with someone drawing a blue curtain across the witness room window and a prison official telling the witnesses it was time to leave.
Robert Gleason died violently as more than 1,000 volts of electricity jolted his body in a pair of 90-second cycles.
He smiled to the room full of witnesses as soon as he stepped into the execution chamber and winked at his spiritual advisor, who was sitting in the crowd. He gave a thumbs up as he sat in the chair.
Robert Gleason wore flip-flops, a blue shirt and dark blue pants with the right pant leg cut off at the knee. A skullcap was placed on his head and a brine-soaked sea sponge was strapped to his right tattoo-covered calf.
A pair of cables snaked up along the electric chair to the top of the skullcap and along the ground onto the floor to his calves.
A guard stood with a red phone in his hand that was a direct line to the governor’s office. But there would be no intervention.
At 9 p.m., a man with the phone nodded for the executioner to begin. One man turned a key in a wall to activate the system and another man in an adjacent room started the electrocution.
Gleason’s body spasmed with each series of jolts, smoke rising from the mask.
The jolts were administered at 9:03, and after five long minutes of silence a doctor in a white coat entered from a side room, put a stethoscope to his tattooed chest and then nodded that he was dead.
He then pronounced the time of death as 9:08 p.m.
Sitting in another room to view the execution was Kim Strickland, the mother of the last victim, Aaron Alexander Cooper.
“May God have mercy on his soul,” she said Monday of her son’s killer. “I have been and will be praying for his family throughout this ordeal.”
In a letter sent to her, Robert Gleason described Cooper’s death and noted that he was holding on to the mother’s address.
“Everyone will be O.K. if I get the death penalty,” he wrote.
Strickland, fearing his reach beyond prison walls, has moved several times since her son died and remains on the run.
“A very reliable source told me I was not safe and I have moved four or five times,” she testified during a 2011 sentencing hearing. “I have no sense of home anymore.”
Now penniless, she lives out of her car and shelters.
Amy Taylor, the mother of one of Gleason’s children, said she will miss him.
“He will always be remembered by those who truly knew him as a very fun, loving, compassionate person who cared more for those he loved than he ever did for himself,” she said.
Robert Gleason spent his last two hours with his spiritual advisor, Tim “Bam Bam” Spradling, a former biker buddy who now preaches at a Richmond church.
“We talked about how my life went one way and his went in the opposite direction,” Spradling said.
In those last hours, Robert Gleason cried for his victims and asked God for forgiveness, he added.
No one seems to know the real reason Gleason demanded execution. In court, he said it was to teach younger relatives that murder comes with severe consequences.
Yet, a case worker’s report from 2011 suggests that Gleason had a mental history filled with feelings of paranoia, anxiety and depression, ultimately leading to exhaustion and a need to escape. Life in prison, according to the report, would simply be too intolerable.
Initially, Gleason earned life in prison without parole for shooting to death truck driver Michael Kent Jamerson on May 8, 2007, to cover up the tracks of a methamphetamine ring already eyed by federal investigators.
Robert Gleason, during his 2011 sentencing hearing, said they had stopped by a wooded area in Amherst County and he pulled a pistol from Jamerson’s own belt, told him to get right with God, and began shooting.
A turkey hunter found Jamerson’s body the next day. A Liberty University student fishing along the bank of the James River, about three miles from the body, found the gun several days later.
Two years later, Gleason ended up in a cell with 63-year-old Harvey Gray Watson Jr. at Wallens Ridge State Prison in Big Stone Gap. Watson was serving a 100-year sentence for killing a man and wounding two others when he fired a shotgun into his neighbor’s Lynchburg home in 1983.
The older inmate was mentally impaired and known for such antics as singing nonsensical tunes throughout the night and drinking his own urine. Gleason tired of him after about a week and tied him up, beat and strangled him on May 8, 2009 – the two-year anniversary of Jamerson’s murder.
Guards didn’t notice the body in the cell for 15 hours.
Soon after that, Gleason threatened to kill again unless given the death penalty.
Then, on July 28, 2010, he strangled convicted carjacker Aaron Alexander Cooper, 26, in the recreation yard of the supermax security Red Onion State Prison near Pound.
It was done with ripped apart strips of braided bed sheet threaded through the chain link fence separating the two inmates.
Travis Runnels was executed by the State of Texas for a prison murder that took place in 2003. According to court documents Travis Runnels would murder prison supervisor Stanley Wiley on Jan. 29, 2003. Travis Runnels who was serving a 70 year sentence for armed robbery was upset that Wiley prevented his transfer to the prison barbershop. Travis Runnels would be executed by lethal injection on December 12, 2019
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A Texas inmate was executed by lethal injection Wednesday evening for killing a supervisor at a state prison shoe factory in Amarillo nearly 17 years ago.
Travis Runnels, 46, was convicted of slashing the throat of 38-year-old Stanley Wiley on Jan. 29, 2003. Runnels was executed at the state penitentiary in Huntsville.
Prosecutors say Runnels killed Wiley at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice Clements Unit in Amarillo because he didn’t like working as a janitor at the shoe factory. They said Runnels had wanted to transfer to a job at the prison barber shop and was angry at Wiley because that hadn’t happened.
Runnels, belted to the death chamber gurney, responded “no” when the warden asked whether he had a final statement. As the lethal dose of the powerful sedative pentobarbital began, he smiled and mouthed words and a kiss toward three female friends and two of his attorneys who watched through a window a few feet from him. Then he blurted out, “Woof, woof!” just before taking four quick breaths and snoring four times before all movement stopped
Runnels was pronounced dead at 7:26 p.m. Central time, 22 minutes after the drug began flowing into his arms, making him the 22nd inmate put to death this year in the U.S. and the ninth in Texas.
He never looked at the sister and brother-in-law of his victim, who watched through a window in an adjacent witness room.
Outside the Huntsville Unit prison, several hundred Texas corrections officers stood in formation, and Wiley’s sister, Margaret Robertson, hugged or shook the hands of many of them as she and her husband left the prison.
Runnels had been serving a 70-year sentence for an aggravated robbery conviction in Dallas when he killed Wiley with a knife used to trim shoes. The factory makes shoes for inmates in the state prison system.
The execution was delayed about an hour until the U.S. Supreme Court turned down an appeal by Runnels’ attorneys, who said that a prosecution witness at his 2005 trial provided false testimony and that no defense was presented because his lawyers advised him to plead guilty and called no witnesses.
Janet Gilger-VanderZanden, one of his more recent attorneys, said Runnels changed during his 14 years on death row.
“There is true and authentic remorse for the death of Mr. Wiley. There are no excuses, rather there is a commitment to finding some kind of light in what was once a world of only darkness,” Gilger-VanderZanden said.
Lower courts and the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles had also turned down Runnels’ attorneys’ requests to stop his execution.
Four inmates who were convicted in the deaths of state correctional officers or other prison employees have been put to death since 1974, while three others remain on death row, according to Texas Department of Criminal Justice.
At the factory, Runnels approached Wiley from behind, pulled his head back and used enough force for the knife to go through his trachea and cut Wiley’s spinal cord.
“It was cowardly,” prosecutor Randall Sims told jurors at Runnels’ trial.
Wiley, who grew up in the Texas Panhandle city of Amarillo, began working as a state corrections officer in 1994. He was later promoted to a supervisory position.
Inmate Bud Williams Jr., who also worked at the shoe factory, testified that Wiley “was a good guy.”
At his trial, Runnels’ lawyers didn’t present any witnesses or evidence, including information about Runnels’ troubled childhood and family history of drug and alcohol abuse, Gilger-VanderZanden said.
In their petition to the Supreme Court, Runnels’ attorneys argued that his death sentence was mainly a consequence of the testimony of prison expert A.P. Merillat, who told jurors that inmates like Runnels could not be held in a secure environment if sentenced to life in prison without parole.
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals overturned the death sentences of two inmates, in 2010 and 2012, after ruling that Merillat gave jurors incorrect information.
The Texas attorney general’s office pointed to assaults by Runnels on other guards after Wiley’s death, including throwing feces and a light bulb at them, as evidence that he was a future danger and merited a death sentence.
In his clemency petition to the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, Runnels included letters from more than 25 individuals from around the world who said Runnels had worked to make amends for what he did.
“He has become a light that shines bright even in the darkest of spaces. The tragedy that he is responsible for will only be compounded if his valuable light were to be extinguished,” Kristin Procanick, from Syracuse, N.Y., wrote in one of the letters.
Michael Braxton was sentenced to death by the State of North Carolina for a prison murder. According to court documents Michael Braxton was serving a life sentence for robbery and murder when he murdered Dwayne Maurice Caldwell at the Caledonia Correctional Center in Halifax. Michael Braxton was convicted and sentenced to death
The State’s evidence at trial tended to show that in August of 1996 Michael Braxton and the victim were both inmates in block A of unit 4 at Caledonia Correctional Center (“Caledonia”) in Tillery, Halifax County, North Carolina. Defendant owned the illegal canteen operation in block A. Defendant also owned and operated card games and a loan business in violation of prison regulations. In August of 1996 the victim owed defendant $17.00 for items charged at defendant’s canteen. Michael Thomason, another inmate, testified that, three days prior to the killing, defendant harassed the victim for the money owed. Thomason and other inmates pooled their money to pay the victim’s debt. Thomason gave the money to defendant, but defendant gave it back. According to Thomas McCombs, another inmate, defendant would not accept the money because “it was a principle thing.” McCombs also testified defendant told him that he was going to “hurt [the victim].”
On the afternoon of 18 August 1996, the unit 4 inmates were released to the prison yard for exercise. While the others were in the prison yard, Officer Roy W. Brown, Jr. escorted the victim, who had been confined to his cell on administrative lockup, to the shower. Officer Brown searched the victim and the shower area and found no contraband or weapons. Officer Brown left the victim alone while he showered.
At the same time, defendant and other inmates were outside in the prison yard playing a card game. As they were playing, inmate Ronald Moore took defendant aside and told him “that guy” was in the shower. Shortly thereafter, defendant left the card game and headed toward block A. Inmate McCombs testified that before defendant went into block A, he saw defendant reach down and pull up his sock, where he had a “blade.” McCombs saw defendant step into the shower and stab the victim “like a mad man” approximately eighteen to twenty times, using a second knife he had hidden in the waistband of his pants. Inmate Thomason testified that he saw defendant stab the victim two more times with both hands on the knife after the victim was down.
After leaving the victim in the shower for approximately twelve to fifteen minutes, Officer Brown heard screams from the shower area. Officer Brown entered the shower and sprayed pepper mace on both defendant and the victim. Officer Brown testified that he saw defendant, who was wearing work gloves, stabbing the victim with a homemade knife known as a “shank.” After the victim fell out of the shower, defendant then kicked him repeatedly in the head and chest area and stabbed him in the chest and abdomen. Even though defendant’s vision was impaired by the pepper spray, he felt around for the victim’s body with his left hand and continued to stab the victim. Defendant eventually stopped his assault on the victim, threw the shank down, and ran out of the shower area. At the infirmary, the victim showed no signs of life. A medical examination of defendant revealed no apparent injuries on his body. Corrections Officer Horace Aycock testified that he and other officers, including Officer Brown, conducted a search for weapons in unit 4. They found a shank in the shower area, a pair of work gloves on the floor near the control room to block A, and a second shank wrapped in a wet towel in the light fixture of the open bathroom cell.
Dr. Louis A. Levy, a pathologist and medical examiner, performed the autopsy on the victim’s body. He testified that the victim had thirteen separate stabs and cuts on both sides of his chest, both arms, the index finger of his right hand, his right wrist, and his mouth. All of the victim’s flexor tendons had been severed in the right wrist; and the victim’s lungs, heart, and liver had been punctured. Dr. Levy opined that the cause of death was stab wounds to the heart and lungs and subsequent exsanguination. Dr. Levy further opined that the wounds were caused by two different weapons: The slicing of the right wrist was consistent with a knife that was sharpened on both sides, while the wound in the right shoulder was consistent with a weapon that was sharpened at the point but dull on both sides.
Defendant testified at trial as follows: Although defendant and the victim had argued about the money owed, defendant eventually told the victim on several occasions that he forgave the debt. However, the victim, while confined to his cell in administrative lockup, tried to provoke defendant into an argument and flashed a knife at him. Defendant testified that, on the afternoon of 18 August 1996, he was playing cards in the prison yard; and he had a knife “just in case an argument [broke] out at the game.” Defendant stated that most inmates carry a knife in prison and that he always carried his knife in his glove, especially to card games, as a safety measure. While playing cards, another inmate told defendant that the victim had been given a knife. Defendant then entered block A and heard someone in the shower make an obscene comment to him. Defendant recognized the person in the shower as the victim. Defendant testified that he told the victim, “I’m about burned out on your mouth”; and the victim told defendant to “come on up here and get some then. I got something for you anyway .” After defendant stepped into the shower and saw the victim with a towel in his hand, defendant pulled his knife out of one of his gloves, which were in his back pocket. Defendant “[felt] like that [the victim] must have had a knife in his hand” since he had been told earlier that someone had given the victim a knife. However, defendant admitted that he never actually saw the victim with a knife.
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