July 20, 2009 - NEW HELL HOLE NEWS #13

NEW HELL HOLE NEWS

JULY 20, 2009

NEW HELL HOLE NEWS #13 July 20, 2009 Well here I am again! I’m sure most of you have by now seen the artfully written Associated Press story about the U. S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit’s opinion in my case, denying relief. I expected no less out of those three (3) “judges”. Ha! But I’ll get to that in a minute.

First, I owe you all out there an apology for using the derogatory term “camel jockey” it was merely meant to show a certain individual what I think of her retaliation and the far worse names she uses to refer to myself and others here. This woman has a serious problem or, set of them; but as I said previously, it’s about to be remedied for her. In any event, I’m self-correcting on use of that term – it’s derogatory toward an entire class of people (middle easterners) who’ve done nothing to deserve it and I sincerely apologize to all for that gaffe. I had no business doing that at all. I’m sorry.

Back again to the situation here. We just came off a two week long lockdown. I died laughing when these media hypers like Mike Ward wrote “Governor Perry ordered a rare system-wide lockdown”! Prison sweep to search for contraband” and intimated it was the first time they’d done it in ten years (?!!) Ha! They do it every six months! They haven’t been “lax” (Whitmire’s accusation) on it; ask any officer who works here. It’s mandatory. They take all our property out of the cell and take it to the day rooms where long tables are set up with 2 or 3 officers per table and they open everything up and go through it all, page-by-page, piece-by-piece. Simultaneously they have 2 officers in the cell with rods, shims and hooks prodding all cracks, holes, nooks and crannys around the edges of the doors, light fixtures, windows, vents, toilets etc. etc. Anywhere different surfaces meet, essentially. They do the same to the dayrooms themselves and, any and all other places prisoners have access to. i. e. outside rec yards, legal visit booths, showers etc.

TDCJ seems intent on fomenting a growing public hatred for death row prisoners by constantly denigrating them in the media and purposely over-focusing on their crimes and or embellishing and aggrandizing any purported “bad acts” by the prisoner.

In recent media coverage of my own situation Mike Graczyk of the Associated Press narrowly reports only the worst selected snippets out of the recent 5th Circuit decision in my case. For example, they run two photos of me; one taken 6 years before the murders and which had no connection whatever to the case ------that was a book-in photo taken in 1987-88 after I’d been arrested and beat up by Pampa Police Department “officer” Danny Lance. My expression is fearful, wild, defiant, tight lipped. My eyes are kinda bugged out.

This photo, thinks Cheryl Berzanskis of the Amarillo Globe-News makes wonderful cannon fodder for portraying me as some kind of rabid psycho who’d kill a house full of people on a whim. I’m no such thing. I’ve never killed anyone. I have “ample” proof of that, Mr. Jerry E. Smith and cohorts, Wiener and Owen. But I’ll get to dealing with these three “judges” (ha/ha) in a minute.

The other photo ran of “me” in the Pampa News looked horrid indeed. I’m not sure where this purported photo of “me” came from but I think it’s been heavily distorted, photoshopped or something of that nature. One, I don’t wear my hair that way and it’s not that receded or gray on top altho’ I do have quite a bit of gray on the right side. My face is not fat or wide like that, I have no sags or wattles under my chin, my neck is not wrinkled or flabby. I just looked at it in the mirror – it’s far thinner than this photo depicts and smooth as can be. I have a more recent photo and I’ll send it shortly to my Myspace page and website for illustration. It just always seems the media is intent on portraying me in the worst light possible via unreal distorted means. Character assassination by manufactured, negatively oriented imagery . How quaint.

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Now, on to the story itself. As I said, it quotes only the most negative statements from the opinion.

It wholly fails to relate the reality of the situation, which is this: First of all those two IAC (ineffective assistance of counsel, a 6th amendment claim) claims were the very least of more than 8 related, interwoven and interlocking claims of IAC, the cumulative effect of which resulted in my wrongful conviction. But the court arbitrarily denied a COA (certificate of appealability) on all other claims, leaving only these two rather minor ones that they could more easily cast aside and inappropriately deny. Denying COA on the other claims allowed them to ignore current evidence like DNA test results which are exculpatory and Andrea Reed’s full recantation on her trial testimony, which was lies.

The other claims were: 1.) Failing to impeach the state’s star witness, Andrea Reed with her prior inconsistent statement – this alone in any other case is adequate grounds for reversal on appeal; 2.) Ineffective closing argument: 3.) Failure to prove my allergy to codeine; 4.) Failure to inform Dr. Lowry, our toxicologist, of the allergy; 5.) Failure to rebut the D. A.’s closing argument which contradicted the state’s own evidence; 6.) Failure to obtain and introduce evidence of my innocence; 7.) Failure to obtain DNA testing which would’ve provided exculpatory results; 8.)

Failure to have other scientific tests performed; 9.) Denial of effective counsel at the motion for new trial stage.

All of this while counsel, the ex. D. A. who’d also previously prosecuted me twice and was laboring under an actual conflict of interest, had been thrown out of office for stealing (that known as embezzlement, Michael Graczyk, not “borrowing” you lying sack of garbage) $10,000.00 from the drug fortfeiture fund and, who’d made an under-the-table-agreement with the trial judge to sell me out and let then D. A. John Man convict me on false pretenses using perjured testimony because counsel, Harold Comer, owed the I. R. S. $96,000 in arrears for filing false tax returns and had defaulted on his repayment agreement because his cocaine and downer habits were out of control and eating his lunch and his wallet. The trial judge, M. Kent Sims, ultimately approved interim payments to Comer totaling $86,000.00 + - less the $10.000.00 he stole. Ha/ha.

Michael Graczyk’s propagandish story conveniently fails to mention any of these things, huh.

Michael Graczyk is a ghoul and a wannabe cop, not any reporter for an impartial media. The same and worse is true of the Pampa News David Bowser, who wrote the fake smear campaign stories for Mann in 2000 when he was lying about the DNA testing results, falsely alleging it was my hair and my blood “clutched” in my girlfriend, Twila Busby’s hands. Subsequent re-evaluation of the underlying electronic date reveals the DNA profile from the blood is Twila’s own and the hairs “clutched” in her hand, wrapped around her ring finger, caught under her ring came from an “unknown male individual”, not me!

There is untested evidence in this case that would unequivocally prove who committed the crime. I fear it would’ve been. My own lawyers, including trial counsel, have said they fear testing it will only incriminate me further. But hell, I just insisted on it. What have I got to lose? I’m dead anyway, right? I agree it’s time to bring this circus to an end but, by God, do it right. I was passed out that night, in an alcoholic blackout and I don’t know what happened. Looks to me I ought to at least be able to go to my grave on the truth and not his current pack of bullshit and lies, eh? Texas (in)justice! Whee! Whew! (Lyn: ‘possy”. “I can’t hear you “ ha/ha!) This stuff makes me ill, nauseous en extremis.

Here goes Mike Graczyk now with his phone-up-the-wazoo-crap. Well here’s an interesting aside.

Ol’ Whitmire et al wants to jam cell phone signals. Ha! So?! Keep them cell phones out of prisons 2

and out of (allegedly) the prisoner’s bootys! Just the other day I was reading a dream come true story. A company called (of all things!) AZZtech out of Russia has developed a miraculous satellite phone that is favored by the Russian Mafia operating here in the U. S! This phone is badass! It’s a tiny little phone with w/3G internet access. It’s a flip phone (i. e. folds in half). Closed it’s only 1⅝ “wide and 3¼” long. The charger is 1¼” x 2” and the cord retracts inside it. The wall lug prongs fold in or flip out for use. This phone operates on a secured digital signal which is encoded and encrypted ----- it cannot be tapped or listened in on. It has no GPS locator and it has a ‘bounce back’ signal feature where is cannot be tracked by signal; as if you’re in, like, Africa the signal may appear to originate in Tibet or somewhere! Cool, huh! Also, for a small extra fee the phone can be set up to dial directly into the AT&T trunk line (mainline land line) so you can call long distance anywhere in the world anonymously and, for free! Because of the minute size it’s perfect for any of you who truly want to hide it in the special, warm, dark place! Just remember to water proof it, first. The only drawback to this phone is that it only emits a tiny beep when it rings, it cannot be set to vibrate – so for any of you who want prostate stimulation, you’re literally outta luck. The upshot is, cell phone microwave radio jamming technology has no effect on digital transmission! So, “jam” that, Whitmire! The Russian Mafia has graciously decided to offer a two for one combo package and free shipping in the U. S. or Europe. Needless to say, we’ve all decided to join the Russian Mafia! Ha/ha! Remember, if you’re questioned by OIG( we call it oink! oink!) the official single word is “nyet” and only “nyet”! Ha/ha.

Back to the 5th Circuit decision --- A number of things are seriously out of whack here, starting with the statement again that Scooter (Elwin) and Randy were “retarded”. They were not! Perhaps a bit socially retarded because no one much interacted with them at home until I came along but, they were not mentally retarded. Both graduated high school. This “retardation” was a myth created by John Mann, then district attorney, to try to explain how someone in my condition could’ve overpowered and killed two strapping young men 22 years old 6’ 6” 245 lbs and 6’1” 180 lbs. At the time I was 5” 9’ 145-154 lbs depending on which police report you want to credit with belief.

So Mann began calling them “poor little retarded boys” and Twila’s mother lent credibility to the lie by perpetuating in a court.

Andrea Reed is described as an “ex-girlfriend”. This was coined to try to explain away her 1997 full recantation of her trial testimony. She now admits everything she said was a lie suggested to her by D. A. Mann and Tracey Warner – then assistant district attorney under threat if she failed to comply. This will become important in a minute – read on. Andrea and I did once live together, back in 1984. For the next 17 + years we were distant acquaintances. The magistrate suggested she recanted to “help her friend Skinner” implying romance was a motivator. Ha! Well, if that were the case she never would’ve testified against me or lied on me to start with, would she.

Graczyk is his “story” conveniently failed to mention this passage from the opinion: “Skinner presented evidence that he was too intoxicated from alcohol and codeine to have committed the murders. An expert testified that, based on the blood/alcohol levels, Skinner should barely have been able to walk, let alone commit three [or any!] murders. Skinner also argued that Robert Donnell, Twila’s uncle, was the murderer”. That too was based on solid evidence, not just my idea or speculation.

The expert who testified was a retired FBI agent of 27 years who holds two masters degrees and a list of accomplishments in his C. V. (Curriculum Vitae) that goes on for 7 or 8 pages and , most importantly, his evidence was unrefuted and agreed to / conceded on every point by the state’s own experts! But altho’ all that is in the record, Judge Jerry E. Smith conveniently overlooked it, eh.

Imagine that.

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Next, in footnote 4 he takes issue with the fact that my attorney, Rob Owen, corrected the judges in their COA opinion when they incorrectly stated that the Pampa Police Department Morse Burroughs’ blood spatter report “does not establish, beyond mere speculation, that the blood on Elwin (Scooter) was Twila’s”-----establishing, we allege, proof that Scooter was attacked and stabbed in the living room at the same time his mother was assaulted and not in the back bedroom as D. A. Mann alleged at trial. The distinction is important because it indicates either one person used multiple weapons, expertly switching from one to the other or, there were multiple assailants attacking them simultaneously.

Rob showed that of the four persons known to have been bleeding in the house that night only Twila was attacked in such a way as to cause the type of cast-off *(sic) spatter observed by Burroughs report. (* not cast off but medium velocity impact spatter).

Judge Smith responds that Rob “does not, however, provide a citation to the record or any other source that supports that contention”. That has got to be the most obtuse statement I’ve ever read in a 5th Circuit opinion and that’s saying something, as I’ve read hundreds of them if not over a thousand.

Anyone who handles criminal cases should be familiar with B P A Science (blood stain pattern analysis aka blood spatter interpretation) since it’s gained such widespread renown and use in recent years. In one recent and notable case in Texas the godfather of BPA, Herbert Leon McConnell used it to exonerate capital defendant Susie Mowbray, who’d been falsely convicted of killing her husband for the insurance money by shooting him in the head while they were both in bed. Turns out he committed suicide while she was asleep and his blood blew all over her from backspatter.

In a murder scene like the one at my house there are three kinds of blood patterns: 1.) Dripped blood – leaking from a wound; 2.) cast off spatter-slung off a limb, wound or weapon by movement and the effects of centrifugal force overcoming the static bond of liquid blood to whatever surface it’s on; 3.) Medium velocity impact spatter (M. V. I. S.) which occurs only in blunt force injuries of the type Twila sustained—she was beat in the head with an axe handle. In M. V. I. S. the first blow creates a defect in the flesh which fills with blood. The second or subsequent blows spatter that blood outward creating M. V. I S. on whatever the spatter hits –in this case Elwin “Scooter” Caler and his undershorts. A 4th kind of blood spatter is direct contact transfer – touching a blood surface. Then the blood gets on you or your clothes.

Twila was the only victim bludgeoned to death. Scooter and Randy were both stabbed, which created no M. V. I S. unless Judge Smith is suggesting an assailant was also bludgeoned and got away (which exonerates me) or, there was some nameless fifth (5) victim bludgeoned whom the Pampa Police department never found or identified, the blood on Elwin “Scooter” Caler absolutely had to come from his mother and that fact is abundantly reflected in the record. I. E. only Twila’s blood and hair was on the end of that axe handle. Judge Smith and his cohorts are simply inept, if they can’t even grasp the most basic facts of the case. The real deal is, they do understand; they’re just acting like asses because they’re so high toned and don’t like being corrected over something so simple that they failed to see. Their antagonistic response to it tells volumes about their lack of judicial and personal integrity and fortitude.

Smith goes on to rehash the state’s old worn out mantra “duh, he walked 4 blocks to Andrea Reed’s trailer so duh-uh, it means he killed three people in a minute and a half” as if I just strolled right down there in a perfect gait.

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There is a vast difference in staggering, falling and crawling down the street in fear for your life and maliciously and expertly assassinating 3 people in a minute and a half using 3 different hand held weapons (axe handle and 2 knives) with wound grouping patterns so tight a green beret could not do better.

Think about his ok. Using an axe handle 3½ feet long to consistently strike an object on the floor as small as someone’s head at least 14 (fourteen) times, switching weapons to a knife and stabbing in the left side 3 (three) times a moving, fighting, 6’ 6’ 245lb. Elwin, then stabling 3 (three) times Randy in his bunk in a group roughly 3’ - 3½ in diameter. First off, whoever did that had to be big because of three things: 1.) the backswing of the club broke the ceiling fan lights so the killer had to be pretty big; 2.) He/they had to be big enough to overpower Scooter, who was 6’ 6” 245 lbs and ; 3.) Whoever stabbed Randy had to be tall enough to do it. He was in the top bunk of a bunk bed and it was pretty high. I’m only 5’9”. I had to get up on a foot stool to change sheets on that bed. All at -24 B. A. C. and .8 mg/ml codeine blood level.

As an odd aside, an officer here with life-long military service, I think in a special forces unit of the marines, told me that, due to the way they were literally assassinated, he believed whoever killed them had military training because the blunt force trauma on Twila was directed solely to her head, because of the way she was strangled unconscious first and because, especially, of the way Scooter and Randy were stabbed in vital areas 3 times each – he said only military people are trained to kill that way in hand-to- hand combat.

Judge Smith says there was ample evidence I was the murderer and cites blood on my clothes of Scooter and Twila; plus my “confession” to Andrea Reed and, there was no physical evidence of anyone else’s having entered the house the night of the murders, he says. All untrue / incorrect!

This I.A.C. claim has to be viewed through the prism of the known evidence at the time of the trial, so ostensibly that’s what Judge Smith is alluding to here, but he’s artfully mis-written it to appear as if those things are still true today and they certainly are not. Nor were they true in the context used at the time of trial and, if anyone is “overstating the implications of evidence”, Judge Smith is the one doing so, here. Very falsely and deceptively at that!

I never “confessed” anything to Andrea Reed. She just intentionally misunderstood what I said.

And, it is only through the court’s gutting of our out her I.A.C. claims that Judge Smith is able to so aptly misstate and mischaracterize this “evidence” as such.

What actually happened is this: First, Andrea said she wanted to call the house. I said, “No, you can’t” They’ll come over here and kill us!” But I was also suffering the after-effects of that codeine allergic reaction and I couldn’t articulate it clearly; I was talking out of my head, semi-delirious.

Still, I said, “No, they’ll kill us!” I’m sure.

Later on when I was a few degrees better but still half out of it, Andrea said, “I’m going to call Twila to come get you?. I said, “You can’t call her, she’s dead”. She said, “How do you know that?” I said, “because I kicked her”. What I meant was, I’d remembered tripping and falling over her as Scooter tried to get me out of there and I remembered lying prone on the floor and seeing her. I knew she was dead – she didn’t move when I’d hit her with my foot. I saw what was done to her and instinctively knew no one could survive that. At the time I could not articulate all that, but I know Andrea knew what I meant because I followed it with “she didn’t move” - “I kicked her, she didn’t move”, = I knew she was dead.

These things were included in other claims the court gutted from hearing – Andrea has fully recanted her trial testimony because it was all false. Lies she concocted at the instance of D. A. 5

Mann. It all started on the night of the murders when the P.P.D’s Katie Gearhardt and D.A.’s investigator Bill McMinn started threatening Andrea telling her she could go to prison and lose her kids if she knowingly harbored a fugitive (me) and assisted me in any way. This is a standard corrupt pig tactic in Texas; divide and conquer. Get her feeling like I got her in trouble so she’ll say bad things about me, to help them. Flim flammery.

So, my statement to Andrea, “No, you can’t call! They’ll kill us!,” became “You can’t call anyone or I’ll kill you”. “I know she’s dead because I kicked her; she didn’t move” became “She’s dead because I kicked her to death!” -- and even that doesn’t qualify for any “confession” because I had no shoes on at all; Twila was not “kicked to death” nor kicked anywhere. So you see Judge Smith is nothing but a common prevaricator and, joined in it by Wiener and Owen. I never credibly confessed to Andrea nor anyone else because I’m not guilty.

As to the blood evidence, that state’s own experts at trial flatly stated that the tested bloodstains on my clothes were only contact transfers and in no way alluded to nor proved guilt of any crime; they proved only that I “somehow came into contact with the victims (Scooter and Twila) at a time after they became bloody”. So far from “ample proof” that I am guilty, there is no credible proof that I was even in the house at the time of the murders! Much less that I was the assailant. I wasn’t even wearing Randy’s shirt and my pants, they were hanging on a chair back and hanging off the seat of it right by where Twila was killed. The truth is, for all Judge Smith knows, on this record, I could’ve been in my gym shorts at the neighbors, staggered in drunk after the murders and fell all over the place; Scooter got me dressed and out of there, he went to one neighbors and I, another.

Now tell me – he had wounds just as I did, he had blood all over him – his mother’s and his brothers and his own. What’s the difference between he and I? Why has he never been accused of killing his brother, then his mother, then attempting to kill me but I got away? For all we know his mother stabbed him because she came home and discovered he’d killed his brother, they got in a fight, she stabbed him, he throttled her unconscious and beat her head off. I’m not saying for a fact that this happened; I don’t know that it did. But the so called “overwhelming evidence” of my alleged guilt lends itself just as equally to that scenario as to any other. More so, Scooter is the only one in that house who could’ve stood flat footed and stabbed his brother in that top bunk. My point here is that quite obviously Smith, Wiener and Owen are just 3 more biased, prejudicial, rush-tojudgment types as have been the last 13 judges to review the case (M. Kent Sims, Steven Emmert, Federal Magistrate Clinton Averitte, Federal District Judge Mary Lou Robinson and the nine (9) judges on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals). That’s a sad state of affairs, isn’t it? You bet.

Now you see why I call it Texas (in)justice!

Lastly, Judge Smith cites “no physical evidence of anyone else’s having entered the house the night of the murders”. Ha/ha. This is more subterfuge.

One of the claims these three excuses for a judiciary denied was trial counsel’s (Comer’s) failure to test the evidence. Now pay careful attention here, o.k.

In 2000, after an extensive investigation by Professor David Protess (of Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism) and his students, then D. A. John Mann selectively tested certain pieces of evidence in order to “put a few more nails in [my] coffin”. Mann proclaimed that the hair and blood “clutched” in Twila’s dead hand was mine. He lied. The testing was carried out by the notorious William “Bill” Watson of Gene Screen in Dallas after Mann called a corrupt D.A. in Houston he was friends with, Kelly Siegler, and she recommended Watson as a DNA analyst who’d give Mann the results he wanted. Mann then got stories run in the local paper stating, “D.A. will test evidence. Expects tests will show blood and hair belonged to Skinner, he says”. (paraphrased).

“Expects”?!! Freudian slip, you think?

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Watson is infamous as the DNA analyst who provided false inculpatory results in the Austin “yogurt shop murders” case where several teenage girls were brutally assaulted, raped, murdered and then burned.

Robert (“Hillbilly) Springsteen IV and Michael Scott were arrested, indicted and convicted in that case after being coerced to give full confessions. Two other defendants were dismissed. After years of languishing on death row, credible DNA tests were finally carried out and it turns out that the semen and blood evidence exonerates them both. They’ve both since been released from custody.

Watson provided the same kind of false and misleading DNA results in Springsteen’s case as he did in mine. In 2004-2005 we obtained the underlying electronic data from Watson’s testing and had it analyzed by an excellent expert. It turns out that the blood in Twila’s hand and on the hairs “clutched” in her hand is her own, not mine. The hair belongs to an unknown male individual.

Bear with me now and understand: everything I’m citing here is almost exclusively the state’s evidence, not the defense’s.

D.A. John Mann told the media that the hairs “clutched” in the victim’s hand were obviously “torn from the head of her assailant, by her, during the struggle for her life, which she ultimately lost” (again, that’s paraphrased but elementally accurate).

When the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (CCA) thought the blood and hair were mine they said it absolutely proved my guilt by showing that I was in close contact with Twila at the time of her death. Yet, when we discovered that the blood was Twila’s and the hairs belonged to an unknown male individual the rooty poot Federal Magistrate said, “Oh, it’s just hairs from the home and carries no evidentiary value at all”. You gotta be bull shittin’ me!

Now explain me this, will you: as the lead Pampa Police Department detective Terry Young told the Houston Chronicle’s James Kimberly and Mike Tolson in a July 28th, 2000 story titled “Another Death Penalty Case Becomes the Focus of Scrutiny”: “Young acknowledged that Skinner never confessed to the crime” so, what the hell is Judge Jerry E. Smith talking about?

O.k., just right quick some other evidence: at the time of the murders, besides having a .24 B.A.C. (blood-alcohol concentration) and .8 mg/ml near lethal codeine blood concentration – to which I’m allergic/intolerant, by the way – and besides the synergistic effect of the two when combined, which multiplies their potency, there’s a bloody footwear (boot – American polytechnic) impression in the pooled blood by my gal’s head and bloody prints leading out of the house; her clothes were half pulled off and there were signs she’d been raped; her hands had defensive wounds and skin/blood caught under her fingernails, there was semen in her panties; there was a bloody, fully articulated handprint – fingers and palm – on the front storm door glass; there were bloody fingerprints on a black plastic trash bag found close to where Twila’s body lay which contained one of the purported murder weapons and which prints have been shown to not match mine. The knives, purported murder weapons, two of them, were bloody on at least one of them.

Beside Twila’s body was a man’s X-LG 44-46 jacket. Mann put Twila’s mother up to testifying at trial that Twila wore all her clothes baggy and that the jacket was hers, but of course that was a total lie. That jacket didn’t belong to any of us that I remember, although it might’ve fit Scooter.

Our expert criminologist Fred Courtney, S.W.I.F.S and one of the best, said the jacket had blood spatter all over the cuffs and was likely worn by the assailant. It has hairs in the collar and sweat stains in the armpits.

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Now NONE of this evidence, including the rape kit taken from Twila nor the fingernail scrapings have ever been tested. None of it. The D. A. now, Lynn Switzer, has stated in Ch 64 Pleadings and Answers filed with the court that all of this evidence is intact, the chain of custody has been preserved and the evidence is capable of providing probative results as to who killed my girlfriend and her sons. As to the fingernail scrapings, the M.E. (Medical Examiner) at pretrial hearings testified that she was called in to view the bodies in situ (as they were found and where). She immediately recognized the importance of the hands and fingernails and bagged them at the scene.

Also the “purported murder weapons”. (By the way, just for reference, I use the terms “clutched” hairs in her hand and “purported murder weapons” in quotation marks and or italics all the time because those are the state’s words not mine and, I have no independent direct knowledge of such things. However, the main points that I think should resonate with anyone out there is that what I’m saying all come from the state; so, it’s not some defense angle or spin. I am innocent of this crime and damn it, why can’t anyone who matters see that, Jerry E. Smith and company? You’re a judge? Ha. You’re a damned sad excuse for one, sir, with no due respect, (from me).

One last thing I forgot: Judge Smith says I “walked” to Andrea Reed’s house “in the dark”. I’d like to know where in the record he finds any support for that contention? First of all, I didn’t “walk” anywhere. I staggered, holding on to fence posts, chain link fences, trash dumpsters, gas meters and anything else I could find, but mostly I crawled to Andrea’s and, what ordinarily would’ve been a five minute walk took me over 40-45 minutes to get there, mostly on my hands and knees.

Secondly, it was not dark at all – that used to be a high crime section of town and there are lights everywhere down there and sodium vapor or mercury vapor high intensity street lights on nearly every corner. In fact, there’s one directly over Andrea Reed’s property shining right on her house.

It was not my intention to go to her house; I was going to Howard Mitchell’s another two blocks down the street but I simply could not make it that far and I barely made it to Andrea’s. I vaguely remember I just kept thinking “go toward the light, go to the light” because it was a story I’d once read in Readers’ Digest about a kid who died of mouth cancer, from dip. Strange what you think when you’re that drunk and sick, delirious, needing help.

So….there’s that. Now, in Springsteen and Scott’s case there were not one but two full confessions which corroborated each other, yet they’re now free men. Charles Raby also supposedly confessed, yet he got DNA testing.

I, on the other hand, never confessed, as the lead PPD detective acknowledged in 2000, yet none of the evidence in my case has ever been tested and I’m still sitting here, for a crime I didn’t commit and this judge, Jerry E. Smith is still perpetuating the state’s lies and trying to usher me to my death. Why? That’s what the public should be demanding to know! So, why aren’t you?

There’s a lot more to this story that none of you have ever heard; but, I assure you, if the state tries to kill me, you’ll hear/read it all.

To all the P.T.O members: I thank you all for your support. You’ve been very kind. I’m sorry I can’t respond to each of you individually, but most of my energies right now must remain focused on my case. Stories being put out there by some busybody, messy, drama queen that I’m “not writing anyone”, that I’ve “gone off the rails”, “lost it”, “cracked”, etc. are simply not true. While I do spend a lot of time in my cups and sad, it’s due to the situation and the conditions here – I may address more of that, later. I may not. Just don’t know yet.

Well as I was writing this, Lester sent his little shakedown team to terrorize me again and here we ain’t even been off lockdown a week. You’re a real ho – ho, Timothy Lester. Ha/ha. You sure 8

keep me laughing.

You notice every time I start clowning these fools they start shooting at my butt hole? Man, that ought to really tell you something about their sexual orientation, huh. I’m not making any admissions here, but if I were a TDCJ official and some ol’ convict had been beading me like that for 5+ years with nothing but his butt, I’d find that to be embarrassing as hell and it’s absolutely the last thing I’d want to put out in the media – talk about cuttin’ off your nose to spite your face!

Whooo-eeee! For those who think I should be embarrassed, well the allegations made against me in that regard are spurious; I’m talking here about the guy at Estelle whom they caught with phone and charger in his butt. (;-). Y’all have a good one.

Sincerely, Hank Skinner http://www.hankskinner.org

999143 Polunsky Unit H W Hank Skinner 3872 FM 350 South Livingston TX 77351-8580 Another death penalty case becomes focus of scrutiny

By James Kimberly and Mile Tolson, The Houston Chronicle, June 28, 2000 An investigation by a Chicago-area journalism class and an Associated Press reporter is raising questions about a Texas death penalty case.

Northwestern University Professor David Protess said he believes the evidence his eight students uncovered exonerates Henry W. Skinner for the 1993 murders of his live-in girlfriend and her two mentally-impaired sons in the Panhandle city of Pampa.

At the very least, Protess said, the evidence should be grounds for DNA tests of physical evidence collected at the bloody murder scene.

“I think DNA evidence will establish once and for all Henry Skinner’s longstanding contention of innocence”, Protess said Wednesday.

One of Skinner’s appellate attorneys stopped short of backing Protess’ claims of innocence, but does accuse Gray County authorities of conducting a sloppy investigation that makes the truth hard to determine.

“Because of a lack of fair investigations, no one has enough information about what really happened,” said Longview attorney Steven Losch.

Skinner, 38, was convicted and sentenced to die in 1995 for the bludgeoning death of Twila Busby, 40, and the stabbings of her two sons, Elwin Caler, 22, and Randy Busby, 20. He has exhausted his state appeals, and his case is currently pending in federal court. His execution has not been scheduled.

The Busby family was killed on New Year’s Eve 1993. They and Skinner were to attend a party a few blocks from their home in a Pampa neighborhood of middle – to low-income houses. But 9

Skinner passed out on the living room couch after drinking vodka and taking codeine.

Toxicology evidence showed Skinner was still heavily intoxicated eight hours after the murders and had eight times the recommended therapeutic level of codeine in his body, Losch said.

Skinner claims he was awakened from his stupor by an injured Caler and the two of them stumbled out the front door. Skinner went to a house several blocks away. Caler stumbled next door and police were summoned.

Pampa Police Deputy Chief Terry Young led the investigation into the Busby murders. Pampa is a city of 17,000 people that sees perhaps one or two murders a year, Young said. The Gray County Sheriff’s Department and the Department of Public Safety assisted with the investigation, he said.

Young acknowledged that Skinner never confessed to the crime. He said Skinner told him he could not remember what happened the night of the killings.

Still, Young is convinced the right man was convicted.

“I have no doubts whatsoever,” he said. “I was convinced from the evidence from the investigation we had. Everything pointed to him.”

An investigation by seniors in Protess’ investigative journalism class at Northwestern University as well as a review of the case by Associated Press reporter C. Bryson Hull has raised questions about that evidence. The students have tried to build a circumstantial case against another suspect.

“This evidence wasn’t that hard to find,” Protess said. “It was found by eight 21-year olds.

The investigations found that physical evidence collected from the murder scene – hairs in Twila Busby’s hand; the contents of a rape kit; skin under her fingernails – never underwent DNA testing.

Appointed by the court to represent Skinner at his trial was former Gray County District Attorney Harold Comer, who had prosecuted Skinner twice previously. Losch said Comer had a clear conflict of interest since he was unable to object when those crimes were introduced during the punishment phase of the trial to show that Skinner was likely to pose a future danger.

A bloody palm print on a plastic bag that contained a kitchen knife did not match Skinner’s and it was not tested against any other suspects, Protess said.

One of the strongest pieces of evidence against Skinner was the testimony of the woman whose home Skinner went to the night of the murder. Andrea Reed testified Skinner threatened to kill her that night and made statements about the murders at the house.

Reed has twice recanted her testimony, first when contacted by an investigator for Losch and again when contacted by the Northwestern students.

Reed told the students that police and prosecutors threatened to charge her as an accessory to the murders if she did not testify, Protess said. She told the Associated Press that Gray County prosecutors told her what to say.

“They said, ‘Here, this is your part’, like maybe it was my script,” Reed said.

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Gray County District Attorney John Mann did not respond to several telephone messages left for him Wednesday. Mann was unseated in a Republican primary runoff election Tuesday.

The Northwestern students claim to have uncovered evidence that the Busby family was murdered by someone other than Skinner.

Protess said his students tracked down and interviewed people who attended the same New Year’s Eve Party with Twila Busby. They claimed Busby’s uncle made sexual advances toward her that night, so she left.

One of the party-goers told the students he saw the uncle, Robert Donnell, walking toward the Busby house. Donnell died in a 1997 car accident, Protess said.

Also, the students talked to a friend of Busby’s who claimed Busby confided in her that her uncle had raped her twice.

Donnell’s ex-wife told the students he was a violent man, Protess said.

The students found a new witness who claims to have seen Donnell tearing the flooring out of his car and painting the interior shortly after the killing.

Donnell was never considered a suspect during the investigation, Young said.

Young said he was not surprised to hear the Skinner case was being scrutinized.

“From what I see on the news, this is getting to be pretty common,” he said.

Indeed, the cases on Texas’ death row are being closely examined, thanks in part to Gov. George W. Bush’s Republican presidential campaign.

Texas runs the busiest death chamber in the nation. Twenty-three convicted killers have been executed so far this year. Another execution is scheduled for tonight.

Attorneys for Jessy Carlos San Miguel are asking that his death sentence for the 1991 murders of four people in Dallas be overturned because racial stereotypes were introduced during the sentencing hearing by prosecutors and his court-appointed defense attorney.

Protess and his students over the years have uncovered evidence to exonerate eight men convicted of murder in Illinois, including five men on death row. Because more people have been freed from Illinois’ death row (14) than have been executed (13) since 1976, the state has declared a moratorium on executions while it examines its criminal justice system.

“I’ve seen these kinds of miscarriages of justice occur again and again in Illinois. The question in my mind is how widespread is the problem?” Protesss said, “I think the system of capital punishment in this country is broken. It’s not just an Illinois problem.”

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