The State Of Oklahoma is set to execute Anthony Sanchez for the kidnapping, sexual assault and murder of Jewell Jean “Juli” Busken
According to court documents Anthony Sanchez would kidnap Jewell Jean “Juli” Busken who was a student at the University Of Oklahoma. The young woman would be sexually assaulted and murdered.
The brutal crime which took place in 1996 would go unsolved until Anthony Sanchez went to prison in 2004 for a burglary. In 2006 a cold case team would match Anthony Sanchez DNA to that found at the Jewell Jean “Juli” Busken crime scene
Oklahoma is set to execute the third death row inmate of the year on Thursday morning.
Anthony Sanchez, 44, was convicted for the 1996 rape and shooting death of Juli Busken at Lake Stanley Draper, after she was abducted from a Norman apartment complex.
Sanchez’s conviction was based on DNA evidence collected when he went to prison in 2002 on a second-degree burglary charge. In 2004, the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation matched his DNA with evidence from the Busken case.
Sanchez has maintained his innocence and claims his late father Thomas Sanchez confessed to the crime before committing suicide in 2022.
The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals unanimously denied his appeal in April, saying those allegations were not enough to overcome the “compelling evidence” against him.
In June, Sanchez rejected the opportunity to have a clemency hearing before the state Pardon and Parole Board.
“The state always seems to come out on top,” Sanchez said at the time. “Even when it doesn’t, Governor [Kevin] Stitt is more than willing to make sure that death wins in the end. Why would someone like me participate in such a process?”
More recently, Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond rejected a request by state Rep. Justin Humphrey, R-Lane, to reprocess DNA evidence in the case. Drummond said the DNA had already been reprocessed, with “overwhelming” results showing Anthony Sanchez’s guilt.
Sanchez is scheduled to be killed by lethal injection at 10 a.m. Thursday at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester.
He will be the tenth person to be executed by Oklahoma since the state resumed the practice in 2021. One more man is slated to be put to death this year.
Well it is time for another Murder Database update. The site has now passed 2900 killers and as of a few minutes ago have finished with the US Executions section of the site. Right now I am trying to determine whether or not I am going to move on to Serial Killers or Spree Killers or work on the navigation of the site
Murder Database is slowly picking up traction and gaining more viewers each day. It still only gets a small percentage of what My Crime Library gets each day but it is will eventually get there.
Below is listed the pages on Murder Database that ties in with the executions that have taken place in the United States since 1977
According to court documents James Barnes would enter the home of Patricia Miller where he would strip naked. Patricia Miller would be tied up, sexually assaulted and murdered. Barnes would set her bed on fire before fleeing
James Barnes would later be arrested and sentenced to life in prison for the murder of his wife and would later confess to the murder of Patricia Miller
Florida is preparing to execute a man convicted of strangling his wife and brutally murdering another woman years earlier — a lethal injection that’s expected to proceed on schedule after he dropped all legal appeals and said he wants to accept his punishment.
James Phillip Barnes, 61, is scheduled to die by lethal injection at 6 p.m. Thursday at Florida State Prison in Starke. He would be the fifth person put to death in the state this year.
James Barnes was serving a life sentence for the 1997 strangulation of his wife, 44-year-old Linda Barnes, when he wrote letters in 2005 to a state prosecutor claiming responsibility for the killing years earlier of Patricia “Patsy” Miller, a nurse who lived in a condominium in Melbourne, along Florida’s east coast.
James Barnes represented himself in court hearings where he offered no defense, pleaded guilty to killing Miller and did not attempt to seek a life sentence rather than the death penalty. Miller, who was 41 when Barnes killed her, had had some unspecified negative interactions with him, according to a jailhouse interview he gave to film director Werner Herzog.
“There were several events that happened (with Miller). I felt terribly humiliated, that’s all I can say,” Barnes said in the interview.
Barnes killed Miller at her home on April 20, 1988. When he pleaded guilty, Barnes told the judge that after breaking into Miller’s unit, “I raped her twice. I tried to strangle her to death. I hit her head with a hammer and killed her and I set her bed on fire,” according to court records.
There was also DNA evidence linking Barnes to Miller’s killing. Barnes pleaded guilty to killing her and was sentenced to death on Dec. 13, 2007. He also pleaded guilty to sexual battery, arson, and burglary with an assault and battery.
James Barnes killed his wife in 1997 after she discovered that he was dealing drugs. Her body was found stuffed in a closet after she was strangled, court records show. Barnes has claimed to have killed at least two other people but has never been charged in those cases.
Barnes had been in and out of prison since his teenage years, including convictions for grand theft, forgery, burglary and trafficking in stolen property.
In the Miller case, state lawyers appointed to represent Barnes filed initial appeals, including one that led to mental competency evaluations. Two doctors found that Barnes had symptoms of personality disorder with “borderline antisocial and sociopathic features.” However, they pronounced him competent to understand his legal situation and plead guilty, and his convictions and death sentence were upheld.
After Gov. Ron DeSantis signed his death warrant in June, a Brevard County judge granted Barnes’ motion to drop all appeals involving mitigating evidence such as his mental condition and said “that he wanted to accept responsibility for his actions and to proceed to execution (his death) without any delay,” court records show.
Though unusual, condemned inmates sometimes don’t pursue every legal avenue to avoid execution. The Death Penalty Information Center reports that about 150 such inmates have been put to death since the U.S. Supreme Court reaffirmed the death penalty as constitutional in 1976.
The Florida Supreme Court accepted the Brevard County ruling, noting last week that no other motion seeking a stay of execution for Barnes had been filed in state or federal court.
n the Herzog interview, Barnes said he converted to Islam in prison and wanted to clear his conscience about the Miller case during the holy month of Ramadan.
“They say I’m remorseless. I’m not. There are no more questions on this case. And I’m going to be executed,” Barnes said.
In a recent letter, the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops asked DeSantis to grant a stay of execution and commute Barnes’ sentence to life in prison even though Barnes isn’t seeking such relief. The Catholic church opposes the death penalty.
“Mr. Barnes’ willing acceptance of death, the punishment put in place by the justice system, does not absolve the state from bringing it about. Simply put, no one should be executed in our modern penal system, even if they willingly accept it,” the letter said.
A Florida man who recently dropped all legal appeals was executed Thursday for the 1988 murder of a woman who was sexually assaulted, killed with a hammer and then set on fire in her own bed.
James Phillip Barnes, 61, was pronounced dead at 6:13 p.m. following a lethal injection at Florida State Prison in Starke.
Lying on a gurney, Barnes appeared to already have his eyes shut when the curtain was opened for witnesses. He didn’t respond when prison officials asked if he had a final statement, and he remained motionless except for breathing for about 10 minutes until that stopped. A doctor then pronounced him dead
The 61-year-old inmate was sentenced to death for the murder of nurse Patricia “Patsy” Miller. It was the fifth execution in Florida this year.
One of the victim’s siblings, Andrew Miller, witnessed the execution and said he came to remember his sister.
“I did not come here to watch someone die. I came here to honor our sister, Patricia Miller,” he told reporters afterward. “No one should live in fear within the safety of their own home. No woman, no child, no animal should have that fear. We did.”
Barnes was serving a life sentence for the 1997 strangulation of his wife, 44-year-old Linda Barnes, when he wrote letters in 2005 to a state prosecutor claiming responsibility for killing Miller years earlier at her condominium in Melbourne on Florida’s east coast.
Barnes represented himself in court hearings where he offered no defense, pleaded guilty to killing Miller and did not attempt to seek a life sentence rather than the death penalty
Miller, who was 41 when Barnes killed her on April 20, 1988, had some previous unspecified negative interactions with him, according to a jailhouse interview he gave German film director Werner Herzog.
“There were several events that happened (with Miller). I felt terribly humiliated, that’s all I can say,” Barnes said in the interview.
When he pleaded guilty, Barnes told the judge that after breaking into Miller’s unit, “I raped her twice. I tried to strangle her to death. I hit her head with a hammer and killed her and I set her bed on fire,” according to court records.
There was also DNA evidence linking Barnes to Miller’s killing. After pleading guilty, Barnes was sentenced to death on Dec. 13, 2007. He also pleaded guilty to sexual battery, arson, and burglary with an assault and battery.
Barnes killed his wife in 1997 after she discovered that he was dealing drugs. Her body was found stuffed in a closet after she was strangled, court records show. Barnes has claimed to have killed at least two other people but has never been charged in those cases.
Barnes had been in and out of prison since his teenage years, including time served for convictions for grand theft, forgery, burglary and trafficking in stolen property.
In the Miller case, state lawyers appointed to represent Barnes filed initial appeals, including one that led to mental competency evaluations. Two doctors found that Barnes had symptoms of personality disorder with “borderline antisocial and sociopathic features.” However, they pronounced him competent to understand his legal situation and plead guilty, and his convictions and death sentence were upheld.
After DeSantis signed the inmate’s death warrant in June, a Brevard County judge granted Barnes’ motion to drop all appeals involving mitigating evidence such as his mental condition and said “that he wanted to accept responsibility for his actions and to proceed to execution (his death) without any delay,” court records show.
Though unusual, condemned inmates sometimes don’t pursue every legal avenue to avoid execution. The Death Penalty Information Center reports that about 150 such inmates have been put to death since the U.S. Supreme Court reaffirmed the death penalty as constitutional in 1976.
The Florida Supreme Court accepted the Brevard County ruling, noting that no other motion seeking a stay of execution for Barnes had been filed in state or federal court
n the Herzog interview, Barnes said he had converted to Islam in prison and wanted to clear his conscience about the Miller case during the holy month of Ramadan.
“They say I’m remorseless. I’m not. There are no more questions on this case. And I’m going to be executed,” Barnes said
Johnny Johnson was executed by the State of Missouri for the murder of six year old Casey Williamson
According to court documents Johnny Johnson would lure six year old Casey Williamson from her home and brought her to an abandoned building. When Johnson attempted to sexually assault the child she would scream and Johnson would beat her to death with a brick
Johnny Johnson would be arrested, convicted, sentenced to death and executed by lethal injection on August 1 2003
Johnny Johnson lawyers attempted to get his execution stopped due to him being diagnosed with schizophrenia
Johnny Johnson Case
A man who abducted a 6-year-old Missouri girl and beat her to death at an abandoned factory two decades ago was put to death Tuesday evening, shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a request to block the execution over arguments he was mentally incompetent.
Johnny Johnson, 45, received a lethal injection dose of pentobarbital at a state prison in Bonne Terre and was pronounced dead at 6:33 p.m. CDT, authorities said. He was convicted of the July 2002 killing of Casey Williamson in the St. Louis area suburb of Valley Park.
Johnny Johnson, who had schizophrenia, expressed remorse in a brief handwritten statement released by the Department of Corrections hours before being executed
“God Bless. Sorry to the people and family I hurt,” Johnson’s statement said.
As he lay on his back with a sheet up to his neck, Johnny Johnson turned his head to the left, appearing to listen to his spiritual adviser shortly before the injection began. He then faced forward with his eyes closed, with no further physical reaction.
Among those witnessing Johnny Johnson’s execution were several members of the girl’s family and the former prosecutor and police investigator who handled his case.
The U.S. Supreme Court, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor and two other justices dissenting, rejected a late request to stay the execution
In recent appeals, Johnson’s attorneys have said the inmate has had delusions about the devil using his death to bring about the end of the world.
“The Court today paves the way to execute a man with documented mental illness before any court meaningfully investigates his competency to be executed,” Sotomayor and the other dissenting justices wrote in a statement when the stay was rejected. “There is no moral victory in executing someone who believes Satan is killing him to bring about the end of the world.”
Former St. Louis County Prosecutor Bob McCulloch called the delusions “nonsense” and said Johnson inflicted “unspeakable horrors” upon Casey.
“He’s got some issues — significant issues,” McCulloch said moments before witnessing the execution. But “he knew exactly what he was doing.”
The girl’s disappearance from her hometown of Valley Park on July 26, 2002, had set off a frantic search before her body was found.
Casey’s mother had been best friends in childhood with Johnson’s older sister and even helped babysit him. After Johnny Johnson attended a barbecue the night before the killing, Casey’s family let him sleep on a couch in the home where they also were sleeping.
In the morning, Johnson lured the girl — still in her nightgown — to the abandoned glass factory, even carrying her on his shoulders on the walk to the dilapidated site, according to court documents. When he tried to sexually assault her, Casey screamed and tried to break free. He killed her with a brick and a large rock, then washed off in the nearby Meramec River. Johnson confessed that same day to the crimes, according to authorities.
“It was more violent and brutal than any case I’ve ever seen,” said former St. Louis County homicide investigator Paul Neske, who questioned Johnson at length the day of Casey’s murder and witnessed his execution.
After a search by first responders and volunteers, Casey’s body was found in a pit, buried under rocks and debris, less than a mile (kilometer) from her home.
At Johnson’s trial, defense lawyers presented testimony showing their client — an ex-convict who had been released from a state psychiatric facility six months before the crime — had stopped taking his schizophrenia medication and was acting strangely in the days before the slaying.
In June, the Missouri Supreme Court denied an appeal seeking to block the execution on arguments that Johnson’s schizophrenia prevented him from understanding the link between his crime and the punishment. A three-judge federal appeals court panel last week temporary halted execution plans, but the full 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated it. Johnson’s attorneys then filed appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court centered around his competency to be executed.
Gov. Mike Parson on Monday denied a request to reduce Johnson’s sentence to life in prison. The clemency petition by Johnson’s attorneys said Casey’s father, Ernie Williamson, opposed the death penalty.
But Casey’s great aunt, Della Steele, wrote an emotional plea to the governor urging the execution be carried out to “send the message that it is not okay to terrorize and murder a child.” Steele said grief from Casey’s death led to destructive effects among other family members.
“He did something horrible. He took a life away from a completely innocent child, and there have to be consequences for that,” Steele said recently, speaking with The Associated Press.
The family has organized community safety fairs in Casey’s memory, including a July 22 event that drew a couple hundred people. The family gave away dozens of child identification kits along with safety tips involving fire, water and bicycles, among other items.
The execution was the 16th in the U.S. this year, including three previously in Missouri, five in Texas, four in Florida, two in Oklahoma and one in Alabama.
“It’s been a difficult day, and a difficult 21 years,” Steele said in a statement after witnessing the execution. “We will continue to honor our sweet Casey’s memory by doing our best to make a difference in the lives of other children.”
James Barber was sentenced to death by the State of Alabama for the robbery and murder of Dorothy Epps. Now he is scheduled to be executed tonight, July 20 2023
According to court documents James Barber knew Dorothy Epps for the majority of his life and decided to rob her. Barber would head to the farm owned by Dorothy Epps when he knew her husband would be out of town and would murder the seventy five year old woman
James Barber was executed by lethal injection on July 20 2023
James Barber News
Amid fears of another botched execution, Alabama plans to put James Barber to death on Thursday or early Friday after a federal appeals court upheld a decision not to halt his execution despite his claim that lethal injection could result in cruel and unusual punishment.
Barber, sentenced to death for the 2001 murder of 75-year-old Dorothy Epps, is scheduled to be executed at any time during a 30-hour period that began at midnight Thursday morning and will last until 6 a.m. Friday, court documents show.
The inmate sought to have a US District Court prevent the state from executing him by any method other than nitrogen hypoxia, an alternative to lethal injection that is allowed under Alabama law but has yet to be used.
Barber argued an execution by lethal injection would violate his rights under the Eighth Amendment, according to his initial complaint, which pointed to three allegedly botched executions in Alabama last year, in which Barber’s attorneys said Department of Corrections officials struggled to set intravenous lines in the condemned inmates’ veins to deliver the fatal drugs.
One of those executions ultimately resulted in the death of the inmate while the two others were called off, with the state citing time constraints due to late-night court battles that prevented the executions from being carried out before the inmates’ execution warrants expired. Taken together, they prompted heightened scrutiny of Alabama’s lethal injection process and led Gov. Kay Ivey last November to ask Attorney General Steve Marshall to halt executions for a “top-to-bottom review” of its protocol.
In February, Ivey said executions could resume after the Department of Corrections completed its review and said it would take several steps to address issues with the lethal injection protocol, including expanding the pool of personnel available for the execution team and conducting rehearsals to ensure staff were well-trained, among other steps.
But Barber – who would be the first inmate executed since the review – argued Alabama had “not made any meaningful improvements to their lethal injection protocol,” according to his motion for a preliminary injunction, other than by expanding the window in which officials could carry out an execution
In his appeal, Barber’s attorneys argued he faces a “substantial risk of severe harm” due to his elevated body mass index, which they said makes it more difficult to access his veins. This complication makes him vulnerable to suffering a failed lethal injection, they said.
Instead, Barber had asked to be put to death by nitrogen gas. The state legislature has approved this alternative execution method, but the state has said it hasn’t finalized its protocols.
The US District Court for the Middle District of Alabama denied Barber’s motion, prompting his attorneys to appeal earlier this week to the 11th Circuit. That court, however, similarly rejected Barber’s argument by upholding the district court’s decision in an opinion Wednesday. The judges wrote, in part, that the inmate’s claim he would suffer the same problems as the inmates before him was “purely speculative” in light of the Department of Corrections’ newly-implemented changes
Alabama executed a man on Friday for the 2001 beating death of a woman as the state resumed lethal injections after two failed executions prompted the governor to order an internal review of procedures.
James Barber, 64, was pronounced dead at 1:56 a.m. after receiving a lethal injection at a south Alabama prison.
Barber was convicted and sentenced to death for the 2001 beating death of 75-year-old Dorothy Epps. Prosecutors said Barber, a handyman, confessed to killing Epps with a claw hammer and fleeing with her purse. Jurors voted 11-1 to recommend a death sentence, which a judge imposed.
Before he was put to death, Barber told his family he loved them and apologized to Epps’ family.
“I want to tell the Epps’ family I love them. I’m sorry for what happened,” Barber said. “No words would fit how I feel.”
Barber said he wanted to tell the governor “and the people in this room that I forgive you for what you are about to do.”
It was the first execution carried out in Alabama this year after the state halted executions last fall. Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey announced a pause on executions in November to conduct an internal review of procedures.
The move came after the state halted two lethal injections because of difficulties inserting IVs into the condemned men’s veins.
Attorneys for inmate Alan Miller said prison staff poked him with needles for more than an hour as they unsuccessfully tried to connect an IV line during Miller’s aborted execution in September, at one point leaving him hanging vertically on a gurney. Advocacy groups claimed a third execution, carried out after a delay because of IV problems, also was botched, a claim the state has disputed.
Barber’s attorneys unsuccessfully asked the courts to block the execution, saying the state has a pattern of failing “to carry out a lethal injection execution in a constitutional manner.”
The Supreme Court denied Barber’s request for a stay without comment. Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a dissent from the decision that was joined by Justice Elena Kagan and Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. She said the court was allowing “Alabama to experiment again with a human life.”
“The Eighth Amendment demands more than the State’s word that this time will be different. The Court should not allow Alabama to test the efficacy of its internal review by using Barber as its ‘guinea pig,’” Sotomayor wrote.
After his last words, Barber spoke with a spiritual adviser who accompanied him into the death chamber. As the drugs were administered, Barber’s eyes closed and his abdomen pulsed several times. His breathing slowed until it was no longer visible.
Barber’s execution came hours after Oklahoma executed Jemaine Cannon for stabbing a Tulsa woman to death with a butcher knife in 1995 after his escape from a prison work center.
The last-minute legal battle centered on Alabama’s ability to obtain intravenous access in past executions. Alabama Corrections Commissioner John Hamm said the two intravenous lines were connected to Barber with “three sticks in six minutes.”
The state wrote in legal filings that it was using different IV team members. The state also changed the deadline to carry out the execution from midnight to 6 a.m. to give more time for preparations and to carry out last-minute appeals.
“Justice has been served. This morning, James Barber was put to death for the terrible crime he committed over two decades ago: the especially heinous, atrocious, and cruel murder of Dorothy Epps,” Attorney General Steve Marshall said in a statement.
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