Transcript women_and_dp_presentation

A Woman in the Spotlight
“The argument for you gains a great
deal of attention because you’re a
woman. We could dare say if you
were a man we wouldn't be here
and you wouldn’t be getting a lot of
attention, unless a lot of prominent
people were speaking up for you.”
Larry King
A Woman in the Spotlight
Guinevere Garcia
January 16, 1996 (commuted)
Illinois
A Troubled Past
• Guin Garcia was born in 1959.
• Before the age of 2, she witnessed her mother commit suicide.
• Her father left her in the care of her grandmother when she was
4 years old.
• While in the care of her grandmother, she was regularly raped
by her uncle.
• She became an alcoholic by the age of 12.
• She was gang-raped at 15.
• At 16, her grandfather “sold” her in marriage to an Iranian
seeking U.S. citizenship for $1,500, after which she was
divorced.
• Soon thereafter, she became a prostitute.
Guinevere Garcia
A Life of Crime
• In 1976, at 17, Garcia was addicted and pregnant.
• She gave birth to a baby girl, Sara, whom she suffocated less
than a month before Sara's first birthday.
• In 1981, after being picked up by police on another charge,
Guinevere confessed to the crime.
• While incarcerated, she married George Garcia, a man nearly
thirty years her senior, whom she met while working as a
prostitute. This ill-fated marriage ended in divorce, before Guin
even left prison.
• After 10 years in jail, Garcia was considered for parole.
• Her ex-husband offered her shelter in his home, on the
condition she remarry him.
Guinevere Garcia
A Life of Crime
• She remarried Garcia, but they lived together only a few weeks.
During that brief interval, according to court documents, George
Garcia reportedly mutilated his wife's genitalia.
• In 1991, only 4 months after being released from prison she shot
and killed her husband in the parking lot of his Chicago
suburban condominium.
A History of Abuse
“He ripped her private parts
with a broken bottle.”
Bianca Jagger
Guinevere Garcia
And the Sentence Is Death
• Garcia was drunk at the time of her crime and her arrest.
• She was convicted of first degree murder, when the jury
concluded that she went to her husband's apartment, armed
with a .357 magnum and motivated by his $30,000 life insurance
policy.
• She was sentenced to death and scheduled to be the first woman
to be executed in the U.S. in 20 years.
• Over Garcia's objections, death penalty opponents Sister Miriam
and Amnesty International's Bianca Jagger campaigned for her
clemency.
• On January 16, 1996, just 14 hours before her scheduled
execution, Illinois Governor Jim Edgar commuted her sentence
to life in prison.
• Edgar rejected arguments that Garcia was a victim of battered
woman's syndrome and his aides said that neither media
attention nor Garcia's gender influenced his decision.
A Reprieve
“Horrible as was her crime, it is an
offense comparable to those that
judges and jurors have
determined over and over again
should not be punishable by
death.”
Illinois Governor Jim Edgar
Karla Faye Tucker
February 3, 1998
Texas
A Troubled Past
• Karla Faye Tucker grew up in Houston, Texas.
• At a young age, her family life disintegrated–her mother was a
heavy drug user who “lived a wild life,” and her father “had no
control.”
• She described her youth up to the age of 23 as a series of bad
choices, destructive relationships, and substance abuse.
A Lack of Guidance
“A lot of drugs, a lot of anger and
confusion, no real guidance. I was just
out of hand, and had no guidance at a
certain point in my life when I was most
impressionable and probably could have
been steered the right way. There
wasn’t anybody there to steer me.”
Karla Faye Tucker
Karla Faye Tucker
A Life of Crime
• In June, 1983, 23-year old Karla Faye was living with her 37-year
old boyfriend Daniel Garrett.
• During a 3-day party for her sister, Karla, Daniel, and her
friends, on a “considerable amount of coke and bathtub speed,”
started talking about the recent break-up of mutual friends
Shawn and Jerry Lynn Dean.
• Shawn attended the party, with a broken nose and busted lip;
she had left her biker husband a week earlier after he had
physically abused her.
• “I saw what he had done to (Shawn), and I was really mad
(because) I was really protective of her,” said Karla Faye.
• Daniel left the party mid-evening on June 13, 1983, to bartend.
Karla Faye Tucker
A Life of Crime
• At 2 a.m., Jimmy Leibrant and Karla Faye went to pick up Daniel
from work. The 3 friends planned that night to steal Jerry
Dean’s motorcycle.
• Knowing that Dean would probably be sleeping, they dressed in
black and went to Dean’s apartment to “case the joint out.”
• Armed with a .38mm shotgun (for protection), Karla and Danny
went into Dean’s apartment while Jimmy acted as the look-out.
• When they entered the apartment, they discovered that the
motorcycle was in pieces, and Dean was awake.
• Danny began striking Dean with a hammer from an open
toolbox. Karla, following Danny’s lead, took up a pickaxe that
had been leaning against the wall and struck Dean over 20 times.
• Discovering (surprise) Deborah Thornton under the bed sheets,
Karla struck her with the pickaxe until she was also dead.
• Neither Karla or Dean fled from town.
A Crazy, Violent Time
“I was–at that time in my life, I was
very excited about doing different
crazy, violent things, yes. It was a
part of me that was used to fit in
with the crowd that I was hanging
around to be accepted.”
Karla Faye Tucker
Karla Faye Tucker
And the Sentence Is Death
• About 1 month after the murders occurred, Karla and Danny
were arrested.
• Karla was indicted in Harris County, Texas, for the murder of
Jerry Lynn Dean, while in the course of committing and
attempting to commit robbery.
• After Karla entered a plea of not guilty in the 180th District
Court, the jury found her guilty of capital murder on April 19,
1984.
• On April 25, after a separate hearing on the issue of punishment,
the jury answered affirmatively the special issues submitted
pursuant to the former provisions of Article 37.071 of the Texas
Code of Criminal Procedure (repealed effective September 1,
1991). In accordance with state law, the trial court sentenced
Tucker to death by lethal injection.
Karla Faye Tucker
And the Sentence Is Death
• Karla also admitted a history of drug use and prostitution, as
well as to having ingested several substances the night of the
murders.
• Leibrant turned state’s witness. Danny was tried and convicted
in a separate trial.
• While in prison, Karla became a born-again Christian and
repented of her crimes. She was married by proxy to the prison
chaplain Dana Lane Brown, whom she was allowed to see during
the ceremony through an acrylic glass barrier.
• In 1993, Daniel Garrett died in prison from liver disease.
• Before Tucker was executed, there were pleas for clemency from
various world figures and from conservative American political
figures such as Newt Gingrich and Pat Robertson. She was
interviewed by Larry King in January, 1998.
• Then Texas governor George W. Bush did not grant the (30-day)
reprieve, and Karla Faye Tucker’s execution went forward.
The Execution Went Forward
“I believe that's up to the almighty God to make
that decision. And so when confronted with
the facts—the two questions that a governor—
at least I ask—is guilt or innocence and was…
Karla Faye—either had full access to the
courts of law in the state of Texas and
Washington, D.C., in the federal courts when I answered those affirmatively, I signed
the—the execution went forward.”
George W. Bush
Last Words
“Yes sir, I would like to say to all of you,
the Thornton family and Jerry Dean's
family that I am so sorry. I hope God
will give you peace with this.”
Karla Faye Tucker
Aileen Wuornos
October 9, 2002
Florida
A Troubled Past
• Aileen Wuornos was born in Rochester, Michigan, to Diane
Wuornos and Leo Dale Pittman. Her father, whom she never
knew, was a psychopathic child molester who served time in
Kansas and Michigan mental hospitals. He hanged himself in
1969 while in prison.
• Wuornos' mother, Diane abandoned her two children in 1960,
leaving them in the care of their Finnish-born grandparents
Lauri and Britta Wuornos, who raised them in Troy, Michigan.
• Wuornos claimed that her grandfather physically and sexually
abused her as a child and her grandmother was an abusive
alcoholic.
• Wuornos became pregnant at the age of fourteen.
Aileen Wuornos
October 9, 2002
Florida
A Troubled Past
• Upon giving birth to her child in 1971, she was banished from her
family home and disowned by the community. The child was put
up for adoption soon after birth.
• Wuornos was forced to take shelter in an abandoned car in the
woods. Soon after she was sent to a home for unwed mothers.
• After their grandmother's death, Wuornos and her brother
became wards of the court.
• Still at school, she began to work as a prostitute.
• From 1974 to 1988, Wuornos committed a multitude of crimes,
including drunk driving, disorderly conduct, armed robbery,
passing forged checks, grand theft auto, and resisting arrest.
Aileen Wuornos
A Life of Crime
• In 1986, Aileen met 24-year old Tyria Moore at a gay bar. The
two became lovers and had a year of romance followed by
friendship.
• Aileen supported herself and Moore with earnings from truckstop prostitution and theft.
• From November 1989 to November 1990, Aileen killed 7 of her
“johns.” Her victims were Richard Mallory, David Spears,
Charles Carskaddon, Peter Siems (body never found), Troy
Burress, Dick Humphreys, and Walter Antonio.
• Wuornos was eventually identified when she and Moore were
involved in an accident while driving a victim's car.
Aileen Wuornos
And the Sentence Is Death
• At trial, Wuornos cited self-defense for Mallory's murder,
maintaining that he had attempted to rape her. She was
convicted of his murder in January, 1992 with help from Moore’s
testimony.
• Wuornos pleaded no contest to the murders of Dick Humphreys,
Troy Burress, and David Spears. She pleaded guilty to the
murder of Charles Carskaddon and of Walter Gino Antonio.
• Although at her trial she told a graphic story of rape, sodomy
and torture at the hands of her victims, forcing her to act in self
defense, in her last few months she recanted her testimony,
insisting she was never the victim of any violence. She swore
instead that she simply robbed her johns for their money, then
murdered them to cover up her crime.
Scumbags of America
“I’m innocent. I was raped! I hope you get
raped! Scumbags of America!”
Aileen Wuornos
Aileen Wuornos
And the Sentence Is Death
• At trial, Wuornos cited self-defense for Mallory's murder,
maintaining that he had attempted to rape her. She was
convicted of his murder in January, 1992 with help from Moore’s
testimony.
• Wuornos pleaded no contest to the murders of Dick Humphreys,
Troy Burress, and David Spears, saying she wanted to “get right
with God.” She pleaded guilty to the murder of Charles
Carskaddon and of Walter Gino Antonio.
• Although at her trial she told a graphic story of rape, sodomy
and torture at the hands of her victims, forcing her to act in self
defense, in her last few months she recanted her testimony,
insisting she was never the victim of any violence. She swore
instead that she simply robbed her johns for their money, then
murdered them to cover up her crime.
• She was executed on October 9, 2002.
Last Words
“I’d just like to say I’m sailing with the
rock, and I'll be back like Independence
Day, with Jesus June 6. Like the movie,
big mother ship and all, I’ll be back.”
Aileen Wuornos