Convicted Indian spy dies in Pakistan

Published May 01, 2013

Associated Press

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  Sarabjit Singh's wife Sukhpreet Kaur, right, sister Dalbir Kaur, second from left, and daughters Poonam, left, and Swapandeep hold hands and walk after entering Indian soil at the India-Pakistan border area of Wagah, India, Wednesday, May 1, 2013. The family members traveled to Pakistan Sunday to meet Singh, an Indian spy on death row in Pakistan, who was critically injured Friday when he was attacked with a brick by two other prisoners inside a prison in the eastern city of Lahore. (AP Photo/Prabhjot Gill)The Associated Press

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  Dalbir Kaur, sister of Sarabjit Singh, an Indian spy on death row in Pakistan, addresses the media as Singh’s wife Sukhpreet Kaur, right, and daughters Poonam, left, and Swapandeep, second from right, stand beside her after entering Indian soil at the India-Pakistan border area of Wagah, India, Wednesday, May 1, 2013. The family members traveled to Pakistan Sunday to meet Singh, who was critically injured Friday when he was attacked with a brick by two other prisoners inside a prison in the eastern city of Lahore. (AP Photo/Prabhjot Gill)The Associated Press

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  Family members of jailed Indian spy Sarabjit Singh, leave en route to India at Wagah border near Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, May 1, 2013. Singh who is on death row was critically injured when he was attacked with a brick inside a prison in the eastern city of Lahore. Singh was arrested in 1990 for his role in series of bombings in Lahore and Faisalabad that killed 14 people. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)The Associated Press

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  Family members of jailed Indian spy Sarabjit Singh, leave for India at Wagah border near Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, May 1, 2013. Singh who is on death row was critically injured when he was attacked with a brick inside a prison in the eastern city of Lahore. Singh was arrested in 1990 for his role in series of bombings in Lahore and Faisalabad that killed 14 people. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)The Associated Press

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ISLAMABAD –  Pakistan state TV says a convicted Indian spy who was on death row has died from a head injury after two other inmates attacked him with a brick.

State TV announced Sarabjit Singh's death before dawn on Thursday.

Singh was attacked on Friday at a jail in the eastern city of Lahore and was later moved to a hospital for treatment.

Singh was arrested in 1990 for his role in series of bombings in Lahore and Faisalabad that killed 14 people. His family maintained he was innocent.

He was convicted of spying and carrying out the bomb blasts and sentenced to death in 1991. The sentence was later upheld by Pakistani superior courts.

Former military ruler Pervez Musharraf rejected his mercy petition in 2008.

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Texas executes convicted killer for 2001 murder of teenager

Published April 16, 2013

Associated Press

HUNTSVILLE, Texas –  A North Texas man convicted in the fatal shooting of a teenager during a carjacking outside a nightclub 12 years ago has been executed.

Forty-year-old Ronnie Threadgill received lethal injection Tuesday evening in Huntsville less than two hours after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a last-day appeal.

Threadgill expressed love to friends and supporters and said he was "going to a better place."

He was pronounced dead almost 30 minutes later.

Attorneys for the 40-year-old Threadgill argued his case deserved review because he had deficient legal help during his 2002 capital murder trial when he was sentenced to die for the killing of 17-year-old Dexter McDonald.

State attorneys contended the appeal was only an attempt to delay the punishment.

The execution is the third this year in Texas.

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Texas executes convicted killer for 2001 slaying

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  This undated photo provided by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice shows Ronnie Threadgill. Threadgill faces lethal injection Tuesday evening in Huntsville, Texas for fatally shooting Dexter McDonald near Corsicana, about 60 miles south of Dallas. (AP Photo/Texas Department of Criminal Justice)The Associated Press

HUNTSVILLE, Texas –  A North Texas man was executed Tuesday evening for fatally shooting a teenager during a carjacking outside a nightclub 12 years ago.

Ronnie Threadgill, 40, received lethal injection in Huntsville less than two hours after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a last-day appeal.

"To my loved ones and my dear friends, I love y'all and appreciate y'all for being there," Threadgill said. "I am going to a better place. To all the guys back on the row, keep your heads up, keep fighting. I'm ready. Let's go."

He nodded to a female friend standing a few feet away behind a window, then smiled broadly, showing off a mouthful of gold teeth. As the lethal dose of pentabarbital began taking effect, he took several deep breaths, then began snoring loudly. Within a few seconds, the sounds stopped.

He was pronounced dead 25 minutes later, at 6:39 p.m. CDT. It was the third execution in Texas this year.

Attorneys for Threadgill unsuccessfully argued his case deserved court review because he had deficient legal help during his 2002 capital murder trial when he was sentenced to die for the killing of 17-year-old Dexter McDonald. The appeal argued he would not have received a death sentence if he had better legal representation, and asked that his case be returned to a lower court.

McDonald was sitting in the back seat of a friend's idling car near Corsicana, about 60 miles south of Dallas, on April 15, 2001, when Threadgill started shooting then jumped inside the vehicle and drove off. He threw McDonald from the car; the teenager died of a gunshot wound to the chest. Threadgill, who already had a long criminal record, led officers on a chase along Interstate 45 through Navarro County. He lost control of the stolen car and slid into a ditch, then ran away. Police found him hiding at a truck stop, clinging to an axle under a parked semitrailer.

A bandana that witnesses said the carjacker was wearing was found stuffed under the truck trailer. Blood on Threadgill's clothing matched McDonald's blood. Threadgill's fingerprints were found on the stolen car.

Rob Dunn, one of Threadgill's trial attorneys, said the number of people who saw the attack left "no wiggle room" to convince jurors that someone else was responsible for the crime. He said his strategy had been to try to keep him off death row.

"There was a multitude of witnesses there at that club that had seen him there and then the shooting took place, and a multitude of witnesses watched him drag the deceased out of the car at the end of the block and throw him down," Dunn said.

Prosecutors called nearly a dozen witnesses during the punishment phase to show Threadgill's reputation for trouble. He already had felony convictions for cocaine possession and burglary and misdemeanor convictions for assault, resisting arrest, theft, criminal trespass, criminal mischief and marijuana possession. Three months before the fatal carjacking, Threadgill was released from a prison on mandatory supervision, a form of parole.

A clinical psychologist testifying for the defense showed Threadgill was chemically dependent and came from a family with a history of substance abuse. His mother testified that she was on parole for drug possession at the time.

Appeals lawyer Lydia Brandt argued to the Supreme Court that jurors weren't given an accurate picture of Threadgill's abusive and tumultuous childhood, nor were they told that his mother encouraged her children in criminal activity and that his mother, male relatives and his three siblings all had criminal records.

But state attorneys told the justices his legal help throughout had been proper and competent. His appeal with the punishment fast approaching was "nothing more than a meritless attempt to postpone his execution," according to Stephen Hoffman, an assistant Texas attorney general.

At least 10 other Texas prisoners have executions scheduled in the coming months, including another inmate set to die next week.

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Freedom near for man convicted of killing NY rabbi

Published March 21, 2013

Associated Press

NEW YORK –  Prosecutors are expected to ask a judge to free a man convicted in the 1990 killing of a Brooklyn rabbi.

David Ranta is due in court on Thursday afternoon for a judge to take up a defense motion to vacate his conviction. Prosecutors have told the judge they support the request.

Ranta was convicted of murder after Rabbi Chaskel Werzberger was shot on Feb. 8, 1990, by a man fleeing a botched robbery. Thousands attended the funeral for the Hasidic rabbi.

A recent review by the Brooklyn DA's office cast doubt on witness testimony and concluded detectives had mishandled aspects of the investigation.

The 58-year Ranta has been serving time in a Buffalo prison.

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