Robert Newland was executed by the State of Georgia for the murder of Carol Beatty
According to court documents Robert Newland would attempt to kiss Carol Beatty who lived across the street from him. When she refused and slapped him Newland would stab the woman to death
Robert Newland would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death
Robert Newland was executed by lethal injection on March 10 2009
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When Was Robert Newland Executed
Robert Newland was executed on March 10 2009
Robert Newland Case
he execution last week of a man who murdered a St. Simons Island mother brought a measure of relief to her family after nearly 22 years of uncertainty as his case moved through the court system.
Robert L. Newland went to Georgia’s Death Row on Aug. 31, 1987, for murdering his neighbor, Carol Sanders Beatty, a 27-year-old mother who refused his sexual advances. His appeals included a decade before a state judge who ultimately rejected Newland’s assertion that his conviction and death sentence violated the state constitution.
The case isn’t unusual. Known as state habeas corpus petitions, those death penalty appeals routinely go on for years in Georgia under a system deemed woefully inadequate by attorneys and victims’ families. “It’s dragged out. It takes longer and longer and there’s no relief in sight,” said Gene Dixon of Waycross, whose daughter was slain in a triple murder 16 years ago.
Charlye Dixon, 18, her fiance, 19-year-old Jason Hampton, and Teresa Gail Taylor, a 40-year-old nurse, were killed by Billy Daniel Raulerson Jr. during the 1993 Memorial Day weekend. On Death Row since 1996, Raulerson, now 39, is appealing his three murder convictions and death sentences. The Georgia Supreme Court unanimously affirmed the death sentences in 1997.
But Raulerson’s next round of appeals, to a state habeas judge, went on for eight years before being denied in 2005. His most recent appeal is before Senior U.S. District Judge Anthony Alaimo in Brunswick. “I hope I live long enough to see his death sentence carried out,” Dixon said. “At some point, the state should take it on themselves, say enough is enough, and carry out the jury’s verdict.”
Raulerson is among 65 inmates who have been on Death Row for 13 years or more. Most are in varying stages of the appellate process.
Legislation rejected
Efforts to shorten the state habeas process in death penalty cases failed last week in the General Assembly. The first, authored by state Rep. David Ralston, R-Blue Ridge, would have established time frames for each step of the process. It also would have required judges to rule within 180 days after receiving all the legal briefs and evidence in appeals.
A judge failing to meet the deadline would have been forced to send a report to the circuit’s chief judge explaining the delay, followed by an updated status report every 30 days. Ralston, a lawyer, also co-sponsored a bill by state Rep. Steve Davis, R-McDonough, that mandated habeas appeals be filed within a year after the imposition of a death sentence. Defendants now have up to four years.
Both of those bills died in committee. So did an unrelated Senate bill that would have made it easier for defendants, including Raulerson, to use the defense of “guilty but mentally retarded” in criminal cases. Sponsored by Sens. Preston Smith, R-Rome, and Seth Harp, R-Midland, the measure was intended to lower Georgia’s legal standard for mental retardation. It would have lowered the burden of proof to “a preponderance of the evidence” to show a person is “guilty but mentally retarded.”
The current standard of “mentally retarded beyond a reasonable doubt” has been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court and Georgia Supreme Court. If the Senate bill had passed into law, Raulerson and others who used the “guilty but mentally retarded” defense would have been entitled to new trials. It’s already been proven that Billy Raulerson is not retarded,” said Dixon, who characterized Raulerson’s ongoing claim of mental retardation as unfounded and a stall tactic.
No legislation this session addressed the shortage of habeas judges, which attorneys assert is a major problem bogging down the system. Because habeas appeals are a regular part of a judge’s normal duties, the state doesn’t allocate any extra funding for handling those cases, said Chris Schrimpf, a spokesman for Gov. Sonny Perdue. “It’s part of the job for them,” Schrimpf said.
Legal logjam
“Ideally, we need a certain number of judges trained specifically to handle habeas cases, and that would be the only cases they hear,” said District Attorney Rick Currie, president of the District Attorney’s Association of Georgia. Habeas appeals now are handled by judges from throughout Georgia who must travel to Death Row in Jackson for the cases. Those judges must fit the cases in between their normal case load, Currie said.
Currie, of the Waycross Judicial Circuit, prosecuted Raulerson. Another circuit death penalty case, that of James Allyson Lee, who murdered his stepmother in 1994, has been waiting almost five years for a judge to rule on his habeas appeal, Currie said. “Right now, judges are overwhelmed with cases in their own circuits. Then they have to take on a death penalty appeal case, which is very intensive and time-consuming,” he said.
Having a group of judges just for those appeals would alleviate the “bottleneck” of habeas cases clogging the system, said District Attorney Stephen Kelley of the Brunswick Judicial Circuit. “It would streamline and speed up the process as well as provide consistency in rulings,” Kelley said. “The defendants wouldn’t have to wait so long for their appeal to be heard.”
No death penalty state has a group of judges assigned solely to hear habeas appeals, according to the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington, D.C. The bottom line in Georgia is money, Currie and Kelley said. Georgia doesn’t set aside any funding for state habeas judges. Because of the bad economy and continuing state budget crisis, that situation isn’t going to change any time soon, Currie said.
“Realistically, there’s no hope of habeas cases speeding up while Georgia continues cutting back on state judiciary budgets,” Currie said. Until then, Dixon and other families like his wait. They have no other option.
Southeast Georgia Death Row Inmates
Georgia’s Death Row has 105 inmates, including one woman. Eight were convicted and condemned in the adjacent Brunswick and Waycross judicial circuits, which include 11 Southeast Georgia counties. For the Brunswick Judicial Circuit (Appling, Camden, Glynn, Jeff Davis and Wayne counties):
- Michael A. Cohen, now 51, of Brunswick: Since Dec. 23, 1986, for the 1985 fatal shooting of a Brunswick man during a burglary.
- Warren Deon King, now 32, of Surrency: Since Oct. 19, 1998, for the 1994 fatal shooting of an Appling County woman during a convenience store robbery.
- Jimmy Fletcher Meders, now 47, of Brunswick: Since May 5, 1989, for the 1987 fatal shooting of a Glynn County convenience store clerk during an armed robbery.
For the Waycross Judicial Circuit (Bacon, Brantley, Charlton, Coffee, Pierce and Ware counties):
- Ashley Lyndol Jones, now 35, of Waycross: Since June 19, 1995, for the 1993 sledgehammer beating death of a disabled Ware County man.
- James Allyson Lee, now 34, of Hilliard: Since June 23, 1997, for the 1994 fatal shooting of his stepmother in Charlton County.
- Billy Daniel Raulerson Jr., now 39, of Waycross: Since March 19, 1996, for the 1993 triple slaying of a young Ware County couple and a nurse.
- William Sallie, now 42, of Peoria, Ill.: Since May 2, 1991, for the 1990 fatal shooting of his former father-in-law in Bacon County. Sallie also wounded his former mother-in-law and kidnapped his ex-wife and her sister in the attack.
- Willie James Wilson Jr., now 52, of Quitman: Since Feb. 15, 1982, for the 1981 double slaying of a Pierce County convenience store owner and a clerk during a robbery.
http://www.jacksonville.com/news/georgia/2009-03-15/story/death_row_dwellers_drain_patience
