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Texas Department of Criminal Justice via Reuters
Kimberly McCarthy is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection on Tuesday for the stabbing murder of her neighbor in 1997.
HUNTSVILLE, Texas — A Dallas judge has halted the scheduled Tuesday night execution of a Texas woman who would have been the first woman put to death in the U.S. in three years.
The order from state District Judge Larry Mitchell moves the execution of Kimberly McCarthy, 51, to April 3.
McCarthy faced lethal injection for the 1997 beating, stabbing and robbery of a 71-year-old neighbor in Lancaster, about 15 miles south of Dallas.
Lawyers for McCarthy, who is black, argued that the jury that convicted and sentenced her to death was selected improperly based on race. It was made up of 11 white people and one black person.
The Dallas County District Attorney's office said it wouldn't appeal the ruling. The DA's office had called the effort a "mere delay" tactic, saying the record didn't support a valid legal claim for discrimination.
A Dallas County jury had already found McCarthy, a former nursing home therapist, guilty of the killing when evidence at the punishment phase of her trial tied her to two similar murders a decade earlier.
"Once the jury heard about those other two, we were certainly in a deep hole," recalled McCarthy's lead trial attorney, Doug Parks. Jurors decided McCarthy should die.
Her execution would have been the first since a Virginia inmate, Teresa Lewis, became the 12th woman put to death since the U.S. Supreme Court in 1976 allowed capital punishment to resume. In that same time, 1,309 men have been executed.
McCarthy also would have been the first woman executed in Texas in more than eight years and the fourth overall in the state, which executes the most people in the nation — 492 prisoners since capital punishment resumed 30 years ago.
Federal Bureau of Justice Statistics compiled from 1980 through 2008 show women make up about 10 percent of homicide offenders nationwide. According to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, 3,146 people were on the nation's death rows as of last Oct. 1, and only 63 — 2 percent — were women.
Ring cut from living victim
Evidence showed McCarthy, who has exhausted her court appeals, phoned Booth to borrow a cup of sugar, then attacked Booth when she went to retrieve it. Booth was stabbed with a butcher knife, beaten with a large candle holder and robbed of a diamond wedding ring.
"(McCarthy) quite literally took the woman, put her left hand on a chopping block of the kitchen and then used a knife to sever her ring finger while she was still alive," said Greg Davis, the former Dallas County assistant district attorney who prosecuted McCarthy. "She took the ring from the finger that had been severed and continued the attack until she finally killed her."
Prosecutors showed McCarthy stole Booth's Mercedes and drove to Dallas, pawned the ring for $200 and then went to a crack house to buy some cocaine. Evidence also showed she used Booth's credit cards at a liquor store and was carrying Booth's driver's license.
Booth's DNA was found on a 10-inch butcher knife recovered from McCarthy's home. McCarthy was arrested after police found her name on a pawn shop receipt for the ring.
McCarthy was tried twice for Booth's slaying, most recently in 2002. Her first conviction in 1998 was thrown out three years later by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, which ruled police violated her rights by using a statement she made to them after asking for a lawyer.
Prosecutors presented DNA and fingerprint evidence that tied McCarthy to similar slayings of two other women in Dallas in December 1988. Maggie Harding, 81, was beaten with a meat tenderizer and stabbed.
Jettie Lucas, 85, was beaten with both sides of a claw hammer and stabbed. McCarthy was indicted but not tried for those slayings. She denied any involvement.
“When the jury saw the other two were equally gruesome, I think it sealed the deal for her," Davis said.
McCarthy is a former wife of Aaron Michaels, founder of the New Black Panther Party, and he testified on her behalf. They had separated before Booth's slaying.
McCarthy declined to speak with reporters as her execution date neared. She's one of 10 women on death row in Texas but the only one with an execution date.
In 1998, Karla Faye Tucker, 38, became the first woman executed in Texas since the Civil War for a robbery in Houston where two people were killed with a pickax.
At least eight male Texas prisoners have executions scheduled in the coming months.
Related:
Widow asks Pennsylvania governor not to execute husband's killer
Convicted Ohio killer: I'm too obese to be executed
Leave a Comment:
only male killers can get away with murder. so many SOBs in prisons who get away with killing and raping and just get long sentences.
Only one woman has committed murder in the last sixteen years and she is being executed.
Must be an Obama voter.
Can be fed sh*t, told it's caviar, and believes it..
You are a very astute person.
PMS....neither you or wilman are astute...just take the "stu" and add pid. Politics has nothing to do with the fact that this woman is guilty as charged...in not just the murder of one individual...but three. Exactly why and how do you justify making the ignorant comments you both make?
I know that both Republicans and Independents are more intelligent. So what exactly is your political affiliation?
Guess you really just don't get it....
FIFTEEN YEARS on death row???? What the F*ck??? Anybody else see a problem with this?? That's 15 years of food we could've given to someone that didn't slay anyone.
what about the ones serving life sentences? what about the food and other benefits they're receiving until their death? so stop complaining about only 15 years. but of course you're complaining because it's a woman and you turn the blind on the the ones servinging life sentences because they're mainly men.
yep if they were bad enough for a life sentence then just fry them
Pleased to see that the reporter was able to detail the events of the crime without bringing race or gender into the equation, e.g., race of the criminal, color of the jury, etc. Well done, Graczyk...I may be missing a consonant or two...you're on the way to becoming a fine, disinterested reporter. However, I would be curious to know what the race of the victim was, as well as the race of the other two murders committed by this individual - maybe we are missing out on a potential hate crime or two? Not that that matters...
The penal system needs to be changed.
Prisoners that may be released at some later date should not be incarcerated with prisoners sentenced to life.
Prisoners sentenced to life should not be incarcerated with prisoners sentenced to life without parole.
Prisoners sentenced to life without a chance of being paroled is risky, at best under all circumstances. At the point of no chance of parole, redemption, the death penalty may very well be justified for all involved. As dangerous as a person may be – they are more dangerous, destructive, violent, when they have nothing to lose.
The Death Penalty does stop an individual from committing any further crimes that may involve more innocent lives.
Do we make mistakes? Yes, we are only human.
But we do continue to try to insure the innocent are not unjustly found guilty or punished; unfortunately again we are only human.
But we must way out the victims of repeat offenders verse the innocent found guilty.
I believe in the death penalty for limited crimes: child molestation, kidnapping, rape and murder. Some day people may realize some lines are carved in stone on the edge of a cliff.
Good riddance and I have no problem with executing people like this. They murder innocent people and in this case also an elderly person, and they should die for it. Prison is just to nice for some people.
So we've (taxpayer) have spent over $80,000 a year (US prison average per inmate) keeping her alive for 15 years. Throw some legal fee's in there and we've flushed 2-3 Mil. Every inmate on death row... 6 month, max...Execute them,,, We'd save billions a year to pay for additional judges to make this happen, Probably stop some trends in the USA as well.
You are right on target.
Definitely. I don't really care if the death penalty is a deterrent or not. When someone is committing a crime in order to get drugs, no deterrent is strong enough to stop them. Six months-maybe a year-seems a long enough time frame to make sure of their guilt (DNA testing, etc). After that, not one more penny spent to keep them alive.
A little off subject but on the site We The People there is a petition for a Gun Free Zone around the prez and VP....If our kids are considered safe they should have no problems...sign up
Shoulda let Iran Put Her in SPACE!
I think they should blame it on the sugar!Ban sugar I say!!! If it had been Nutra sweet this may not have happened!
I find this simply amazing, This woman committed a horrible crime. The state of Texas is going to give her an injection to put her to sleep, the same way anyone goes into surgery. Then they give her the other drugs to stop her heart. Just look at Saudi Arabia, (Beheading), Iran (Hanging from a crane). My only objection is why have we spend this kind of money on her. Trial, Sentence, execution ASAP after review.
sorry but lethal injection is just too humane. Need to go back to the old sparky way. I am against housing convicted killers for the length of their natural life.
Taxpayers are paying the bill and thats inhumane. Far too much money is wasted in the criminal justice system housing murders and such.
I believe an "eye for an eye." Fry them all and all alike.
She robbed a innocent person of their right to live so why should she be allowed to live the rest of her life? She has lived in prison from 1997 to 2013......she has lived alot longer than her victim got the chance to do, hasn't she? Yes she's female and again with race card but why should any of that matter....she murdered a innocent person.
Yikes, you people are disgusting!
Not nearly as disgusting as she is.
The death penalty isn't about deterring crime, egghead. It's about justice for the victim, Robert. What if that were your wife that was beaten to death and had her ring cut from her finger? You honestly think scum that would do such a thing deserves life? She's lived far too long as far as I'm concerned. What agony those families of the victims must be going through every time they have to look at her ugly face.
Euthanize that black beich.
Good....@!$%#ing animal mental case....what took so long???
Jackhammer John.... she chopped her finger off to steal a ring. I take it you find that acceptable? I find that disgusting.
I guess Jackhammer doesn't value his life....what an idiot!
"McCarthy, who is black, was condemned for the July 1997 killing of neighbor Dorothy Booth in Lancaster, about 15 miles south of Dallas. All but one of McCarthy's jurors were white."
What about this case is a race issue when all the evidence - and two other murders (!) - shows she did it?
It's my understanding that you can not show previous incidents during the trial phase. However, when in the sentencing phase you can bring out previous crimes to show the jury that the prisoner is a menace to society.
I could be mistaken about that but I don't think so.
Execute a WOMAN? OH! How HORRIBLE. I thought only "Militant Islamists" were supposed to do that. LOL!
Good for Texas I wish more states follow in the same suit. Yes Jesus preach about forgiveness but the good book also says Thou Shall not Kill and a Eye for a Eye. The victims of this woman had just as much right to live as she did but did she show them any compassion. She put her victim hand on a chopping block and cut her fingers off while she was still alive as while as stabbing her and beating her to death. One of her other victim she beat to death with a hammer. I for one believe in a eye for a eye and a tooth for a tooth this woman should be put to death in the same manner as she killed her victims. They should cut her hands off and let her die a painful death just like she did to her victims lethal injection is to good for her.
And notice how the liberal media tries to sneak in the race card against the jury for being mostly white. Notice how this writer conveniently neglects to mention whether or not the victims were white (which they likely were). The fact that this scum has connections to the Black Panther Party isn't any grounds for suggesting that the victims just might have been targeted due to their skin color. No, no...Blacks can't "hate." Only evil white "racists" "hate." "Racism" can only be attributed to white jurors and white killers. Never black animals like this one. Of course, any time a white person murders a black person (which is significantly more rare), the liberal media is up in arms with "hate crime" this and "hate crime" that. Trayvon Trayvon Trayvon...No one will ever be asked to remember the names of the victims this animal killed.
Where is Al and Jessie?
What, are white people not able to hear evidence and come up with a verdict? Come on, you murdered someone, now you pay the ultimate price, just like poor Dorothy had to. Roast darling, roast.
How could she kill three people without an assault rife ?