[CUADPUpdate] 100 - a horrific milestone and a CHALLENGE

[Abraham J. Bonowitz]

UPDATE -- As of today - Tuesday evening - 14 
CUADP donors have reported to me that they have 
responded to my request for special assistance to 
Texas so far, 9 of them at the $100 level!  And 
earlier today it was posted to the Blog at 
http://deathpenaltyusa.blogspot.com/ 
CUADPUpdate readers - please continue to help lead this movement!

********

Sent initially *only* to the recipients of CUADPUpdate
Now sending to ALL ABOLITIONISTS
Please excuse Cross-Posts
Please Forward


Minutes ago, Lonnie Johnson was exterminated by 
the people of Texas in revenge for the murders of 
Gunar Nelson Funk and Leroy McCaffrey Jr.  This 
was the 100th prisoner sent to his death out of 
Harris County, Texas.  Amnesty International last 
week issued a report about Harris County - read 
it 
here: 
http://www.amnestyusa.org/Our_Issues/Death_Penalty/page.do?id=1011005&n1=3&n2=28

On Saturday, I wrote the following to CUADPUpdate:

Greetings All,

I had a crazy idea this afternoon while driving 
home from a meeting.  I was thinking about a 
nasty milestone that is coming up - probably this 
week, when Lonnie Johnson is set to become the 
100th prisoner to be put to death out of Harris 
County, Texas on July 24, 2007.  Read all about 
Harris County in the report issued on Friday by Amnesty International.

In thinking about this milestone, I decided to do 
something symbolic and at the same time 
meaningful.  I decided to mobilize MY base 
-  that is, YOU - people who receive and read 
CUADPUpdate.  With less activity, list membership 
has dwindled from around 5,000 to its
current level of 3,303.  There is still enough of 
us to pull this off, and then some, and since 
CUADP is technically on a sabbatical, why not 
mobilize you to help some other groups' specific efforts?

HERE'S THE CHALLENGE:  Please join CUADP in going 
to http://www.tcadp.org/donate.php to use your credit card to send $100
to the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death 
Penalty.  If you prefer to give by check, send it 
to TCADP at 2709 South Lamar Blvd.,  Austin, TX 78704.

I'd like to see 100 gifts of $100 to TCADP (or 
another Texas Abolitionist Group) by July 31st, 
if not sooner, just from people (and 
organizations) on this list.  Can't swing 
$100?  How about 100 quarters ($25)?  Or 100 dimes ($10)?

I should note that it's Saturday night as I send 
this.  I have not spoken to anyone in Texas or 
anywhere else about this idea.  I'm just doing 
it.  I can't imagine they will complain.... 
Obviously, because I don't see TCADP's 
information and in fact because I have no formal
relationship with TCADP other than being a 
supporter/donor, the only way I can track how 
this campaign is going is if you send me an 
e-mail confirming your participation.  I'm not 
listing names, but I will follow up this message 
several times between now and July 31 to update 
our progress.  Just send me a note saying you 
made a gift to TCADP (or another Texas 
Abolitionist group) and tell me the amount you have sent.

I gave CUADP's $100 to TCADP and noted it should be considered "general funds."

A few alternative groups to give to - let me know if I am missing any!:

Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement - checks 
only, to TDPAM, c/o s.h.a.p.e. center, 3903 almeda road, houston, tx  77004

Texas Moratorium Network - 
http://www.texasmoratorium.org/ - and click on DONATE

Texas Defender Service - http://www.texasdefender.org/contribute.asp

Gulf Region Advocacy Center - http://www.gracelaw.org/support.html

Texas Students Against the Death Penalty - 
http://www.texasabolition.org/ - and click on DONATE

The upcoming Texas Journey of Hope ...From 
Violence to Healing - 
http://www.journeyofhope.org/pages/support.htm - be sure to indicate
that your gift is for the Texas Journey!

*****************

UPDATE -- As of today - Tuesday evening - 14 
donors have reported to me that they have 
responded to my request for special assistance to 
Texas so far, 9 of them at the $100 level!  And 
earlier today it was posted to the Blog at http://deathpenaltyusa.blogspot.com/

100 gifts of $100 on the occasion of the 100th 
Harris County killing.  It's both symbolic and 
meaningful.  We can do this.  Please
join me.  Thank you.

--abe

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And now here are two news items about Harris County #100
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>July 24, 2007, 6:58PM
>Condemned killer executed for slaying of two teens
>
>By MICHAEL GRACZYK Associated Press Writer
>© 2007 The Associated Press
>
>
>HUNTSVILLE, Texas ­ Convicted murderer Lonnie 
>Earl Johnson was executed Tuesday evening for 
>the fatal shootings of two Harris County teenagers 17 years ago.
>
>Johnson expressed love to a friend. "It's been a 
>joy and a blessing. Give everybody my regards 
>and my love," he said in a brief final 
>statement. "Take me home. I'm gone, baby. I'm ready to go."
>
>Johnson never looked at six relatives of the 
>victims, including the mothers of Sean Fulk 
>Schulz, 16, and his friend Leroy McCaffrey Jr., 17.
>
>He was pronounced dead at 6:44 p.m. CDT.
>
>Johnson, 44, didn't deny killing Schulz and 
>McCaffrey and taking their pickup truck, but had 
>insisted the slayings were in self-defense after 
>the pair pulled a gun and made racial threats 
>against him. Johnson is black, his two victims white.
>
>The execution was the 19th this year in Texas, 
>the nation's most active death penalty state.


********

Tomball killer is set to be executed Tuesday----Case again focuses
attention on race relations in community


Midnight came, midnight went and downtown Tomball seemed dead as dead
could be. From her post at the Stop N Go's cash register, Tammy Wynette
Durham scanned the bleak scene, enlivened only by the lights of an
occasional passing car. Then, about 1:30 a.m., she noticed something that
frightened her: a lone black man loitering at the store's front with his
hand concealed beneath a newspaper.

Durham, alone in the store, telephoned her friend Gunar "Bubba" Fulk, 16,
and asked him to keep her company. Minutes later, Fulk, a strapping
6-foot-plus Magnolia High football player, and his friend Leroy "Punkin'"
McCaffrey, 17, pulled into the parking lot.

The teens talked to the man  later identified as Lonnie Earl Johnson  then
told Durham they were giving the seemingly stranded motorist a ride.

Four hours later, about 6:30 a.m. on Aug. 15, 1990, a motorist spotted
Fulk's body beside FM 2920, about four miles from the store. He had been
shot 3 times in the head and once in the chest. McCaffrey's corpse was
found 350 feet away.

Detectives traced Johnson to Austin, where he was arrested at a topless
bar Aug. 30. Although the Tomball landscape worker said he killed the
teens in self-defense, a Harris County jury found him guilty of capital
murder and sentenced him to die.

Barring favorable action on last-minute appeals accusing prosecutors of
illegally withholding crucial information from defense attorneys, Johnson,
44, will be executed Tuesday. In a recent death row interview, Johnson
likened himself to James Byrd Jr., the 49-year-old Jasper man whose
racially motivated dragging death in 1998 gained international notoriety.

"The only difference between me and James Byrd," Johnson said, "is that I
lived."

The case, which has attracted interest from as far away as Canada, again
focuses attention on race relations in the tiny northwest Harris County
community, which 2 years ago hosted a Ku Klux Klan function in a
city-owned building.

Racially charged period

The Tomball murders occurred during a racially charged summer as a
campaign in neighboring Montgomery County to free Clarence Brandley from
death row moved toward success. Brandley, a black high school janitor
condemned for the 1980 rape-strangulation of a 16-year-old white student,
was released from prison after almost 10 years.

Austin attorney Jodi Callaway Cole last week launched an appeals strategy
at state and federal levels arguing that prosecutors withheld
investigators' reports and other documents that could have buttressed
Johnson's claim of self-defense.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals on Friday rejected Cole's application
for a writ of habeas corpus, and Cole said she would file petitions with
the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court.

"The chain of deception utilized by the state is at best gross
incompetence and at worst flagrant misconduct," Cole said in the state
petition, which also alluded to the region's history of racial prejudice.
In perusing prosecutors' files, she said, she found police reports of
racial conflict in the Harris County town immediately before and after the
killings.

One day before the double murders, two white youths and a black teenager
clashed at a service station across the street from the Stop N Go. Days
after the killings, a white teen was injured in a fight with a black teen.
Hours later, a black gunman fired shots at a car occupied by Durham,
McCaffrey's brother and other white youths. No one was injured.

Had they been aware of the Tomball incidents, Johnson's lawyers said,
jurors might have given more credence to his self-defense claim.

'It was disclosed'

Roe Wilson, chief of the district attorney's post-conviction writs
division, responded that offense reports and related documents were
available to defense attorneys.

"There is really nothing there at all," Wilson said of Cole's allegations.
"It was disclosed. In 99 percent of capital cases, the state's file is
open to defense counsel  offense report, supplements, everything."

Robert Morrow, 1 of 2 lawyers representing Johnson at his 1990 trial, said
that he can't remember if he found the offense reports in the district
attorney's file.

"I can't swear that I didn't see them," he said.

But Austin lawyers Karyl Krug and David Schulman are certain the
exculpatory documents were not present when they sifted through boxes of
files at the district attorney's office while preparing a state habeas
corpus petition.

"It is impossible we overlooked them," Schulman said. "They were not
there."

Johnson's story

In the death row interview, Johnson said he had gone to the Stop N Go
early on the morning of the killings while jogging. A former high school
and college athlete, he said he hoped to get into shape to try out for a
position with the Houston Oilers.

He said he was talking on the telephone with a girlfriend when Fulk and
McCaffrey offered him a ride.

"The district attorney's theory is that I robbed these guys," Johnson
said. "The lady at the store said I had a newspaper rolled up. If I was
walking around with a rolled up newspaper, as late as it was, why didn't
she call the police? Does that make sense?"

Johnson dismissed prosecution allegations that he was motivated by a
desire to rob his victims as "a theory with no merit."

"When homicide came to the scene, they found these guys and all of their
belongings. Their pockets weren't turned inside out," Johnson said.

"If I robbed them for their vehicle, why not take the truck and sell it?"

Authorities found Fulk's truck abandoned in San Marcos.

In a statement to authorities, Johnson said the teens drove several miles
before stopping the truck in the roadway. One of the youths told him his
ride had ended and pressed a pistol to his side, Johnson said.

Johnson told his lawyer the teens forced him to the ground and urinated on
him. When the youths allowed him to stand, Johnson grabbed the pistol. The
gun discharged, striking Fulk. Johnson then fired 3 more times before
taking aim at McCaffrey, who died as he attempted to cross a fence.
Authorities found a knife in McCaffrey's hand.

Johnson then drove to Austin, where he told a girlfriend, an exotic
dancer, that he had killed two youths. The girlfriend later told
authorities the teens had owed Johnson money for a drug transaction.

"I recognize that I screwed up when I fled. I knew I should never take
rides with strangers, but these were kids," Johnson said. "It's an
unfortunate situation. I lost 17 years."

"My son was just 17," said Chris Schultz, Fulk's mother. "Johnson's been
on death row as long as my son was alive ... I want to watch him die. I
want to see he will never hurt anyone again."

Schultz said her son had taken a night job at an area supermarket in part
to pay for his 1st vehicle, a used white 1980 Chevrolet pickup. He had
owned the truck only a few weeks before his murder.

"He was a big boy, like over 6 feet and 220 pounds, but he was the
sweetest thing," she said. "He would do anything to help anyone."

Fulk and McCaffrey enjoyed hunting and fishing and hoped to join the
military.

McCaffrey's mother, Laura McCaffrey, said her son had spent the summer
working with her husband as a printer.

She dismissed Johnson's claims of self-defense and his assertion that he
was the victim of a racially motivated attack.

"He has changed his story so many times," she said. "It's only natural
that he's going to try this. There wasn't a prejudiced bone in either one
of their bodies."

McCaffrey said she plans to witness Johnson's execution.

"Yes. Yes, sir, I will go. But I will say that it's not something I'm
really looking forward to," she said.

"I'm sorry that his family has to go through what basically we went
through, but he made a mistake. He did wrong and he needs to pay."

********

SENT BY:


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Abraham J. Bonowitz
Director
Citizens United for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (CUADP)

        PMB 335,  2603 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Hwy
                       Gainesville, FL  32609
800-973-6548    <http://www.cuadp.org>    <abe at cuadp.org>
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