Schwarzenegger: Lethal executions will resume

Supreme Court's decision 'opens door' for California; Tokay murder victim's mother still seeks justice

Wednesday's U.S. Supreme Court decision to allow lethal injections for death row inmates will allow California executions to resume, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said.

Terri Winchell

But the family of Tokay High School student Terri Lynn Winchell, who was raped and murdered in 1981, won't be seeing her killer's execution in the immediate future.

A federal court battle over the lethal injection process won't be heard until June, and a separate state lawsuit is also pending. More than 27 years after Winchell's death, her killer, Michael Angelo Morales, is one of 654 inmates on death row at San Quentin State Prison.

"Twenty-seven years is too long. That's a third of a person's lifetime," Winchell's mother, Barbara Christian, said Wednesday.

"As long as he's alive over there, it keeps this nightmare in front of us. I still think about her every day. I hear her calling for help."

Michael Morales

Morales was scheduled to die by lethal injection in February 2006, but the process was halted half an hour before the set time. His attorneys had challenged the three-drug sequence California used for its lethal-injection procedure.

All California executions have since been on hold.

"I will continue to defend the death penalty and the will of the people, and I am confident that California's lethal injection protocol will be upheld," the governor said in a statement.

The Supreme Court voted 7-2 Wednesday to reject a Kentucky inmate's challenge to the execution procedure. Kentucky and California, as well as roughly three dozen other states, use three drugs to sedate, paralyze and kill inmates.

Morales' attorneys wrote in court papers two years ago that if the drugs were not administered properly, Morales could be "paralyzed but conscious and suffering death from ... burning veins and heart failure."

In response, U.S. District Court Judge Jeremy Fogel recommended that the state monitor the execution with two anesthesiologists. One would be in the execution chamber and another nearby to make sure Morales was unconscious before the two remaining drugs were injected.

Morales' execution was delayed for a day and ultimately canceled after the anesthesiologists refused to participate because of ethical concerns.

"There has been a de facto moratorium," said Seth Unger, a spokesman with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. "The U.S. Supreme Court's ruling opens the door for us to proceed with the Morales case in California."

The next step is a hearing in Fogel's courtroom in San Jose, scheduled for June 12. At that time, the judge could set a schedule for reviewing the state's proposed execution procedure.

In December 2006, he ruled that California's procedure was so badly designed and carried out that it was likely to cause pain and suffering.

Since then, the state has taken a number of steps to address the concerns, including building a better-lighted death chamber at San Quentin State Prison.

Corrections officials submitted a new execution plan, but it was invalidated last fall by a Marin County Superior Court judge.

Attorney Brad Phillips sued the state in Marin County, home to San Quentin, on behalf of two condemned inmates. Judge Lynn O'Malley Taylor agreed with Phillips that state prison officials had failed to gather public comment and take other required steps in forming their new execution plan.

The state is appealing the Marin County ruling.

Christian, Winchell's mother, said the public has had 27 years to make public comments.

Winchell was a 17-year-old Tokay High senior when she unknowingly angered Morales' cousin because she was dating a man the cousin was in love with. Lured with the lie of going to buy a present for a friend, Winchell got in a car with Morales and his cousin, who drove to a vineyard north of Lodi on that January 1981 night.

After strangling her with a belt, beating her in the head with a hammer, raping her and stabbing her in the heart with a knife, Morales left Winchell for dead. Her body was found two days later. A memorial service at the high school was attended by more than 1,000 people.

A jury convicted Morales and recommended the death penalty, and he was sentenced to death in 1983. Appeals have been underway since then.

David Senior, one of Morales' attorneys, said he expects the federal judge to delay a decision until California state courts resolve the pending administrative challenge.

"California may ultimately choose a procedure which is completely different from the state of Kentucky's," he said.

No judge in California has scheduled an execution since the one was halted for Morales.

"There are four people who have basically exhausted all their appeals ... and for whom we could set dates once the Morales litigation is resolved," said Gareth Lacy, spokesman for the state Attorney General's Office.

State attorneys reviewing the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in the Kentucky case preliminarily believe it also will end challenges to California's procedure, Lacy said.