Expendable For A Cause.

Direct Appeal – Los Angeles Superior Court

People v. Ramirez, No. S012944 (Cal. 2006)

4^th October 1999 – This appeal is automatic when a defendant is sentenced to death. Due to many delays and extensions of time, Ramirez’s direct appeal was finally filed, almost ten years to the day that he was sentenced to death.

6^th June 2006 – 7^th August 2006: the appeal was argued and the court affirmed the convictions, thereby denying that Ramirez had incompetent lawyers, or that his trial was unfair. The 37 claims made by his direct appeal lawyers can be found on pages 3 – 8 of his 2008 petition. In short, all the problems highlighted on this blog were dismissed. This suggests that the direct appeal was not even read. Ramirez had spent 16.6 years on death row and 21 in prison altogether.

27^th September 2006: A rehearing was denied.

The Deputy Attorney General blamed Ramirez for choosing his own lawyers, saying this should be the end of the matter. However, we now know that Ramirez was mentally incompetent. Had the Hernandezes moved for competency motions, the trial would probably not have gone ahead. While the issue of competency came up twice in the direct appeal (claims 3 and 19), because his brain damage and illnesses were not revealed at trial, the courts did not realise the extent of the miscarriage of justice. Or perhaps they did, but were more content with putting the blame on Ramirez himself.

As for the unqualified defence who should have been stopped by the judge, Justice Carol Corrigan said (in the Associated Press):

“What is it we’re supposed to do here? Say, “Mr Ramirez, you picked two doofuses as attorneys and you have no right to keep them.”

The Fresno Bee, 7th July 2006

In short, yes, Judge Tynan should have halted the trial, even at a late stage. It is Supreme Court law. Justice Carlos Moreno wrote:

“A defendant whose request to substitute counsel is granted cannot complain on appeal that the trial court should have denied the request.”

The Californian – 8th August 2006

Moreno clearly failed to read claims 3 and 19 about incompetency. Ramirez had no idea how bad the Hernandezes were.

The attorney general said the judge should only intervene when a defence attorney is unlicenced, has a physical incapacity or is unwilling to represent the client – but two of these apply to the Ramirez trial. Daniel Hernandez was often ill, and Arturo Hernandez abandoned Ramirez. Perhaps this was not known, but claim 1 was about their ineptitude.

And it comes back to Ramirez’s incompetence. So impaired in judgement was he, that he asked Daniel Hernandez to represent him in his direct appeal. He was removed. But of course, these judges could not be bothered to read it thoroughly. These Supreme Court judges may use “justice” as a title, but there is no justice here.

First State Habeas Corpus – California Supreme Court

People v. Ramirez, No. S125755 (Cal. 21^st June 2004)

A habeas corpus must be filed within 60 days of a direct appeal affirming the convictions. Because Ramirez’s case was so huge (48,325 pages of trial transcripts) his state habeas lawyers began working on it in 2004, before the direct appeal was heard. A habeas corpus presents the chance for new evidence to be submitted. Most of the 2004 declarations are contained with the 2008 petition, and can be read there (or on this very blog!).

19^th December 2007: Ramirez’s state Writ of Habeas Corpus was denied. The 19 claims that were denied can be found on pages 8 – 10 of the 2008 petition, and again, the California Supreme Court was essentially denying that anything was wrong with Ramirez’s trial, despite the huge amounts of new evidence presented by the appellate lawyers, namely his background, mental illness documents and exhibits demonstrating how inept his counsel were. This list suggests that Ramirez was also denied ineffective assistance of counsel in his direct appeal.

Writ of Certiorari – United States Supreme Court

This only asked two questions:

(1) After the United States Supreme Court’s decision in United States
v. Gonzalez-Lopez, 548 U.S. 140, 126 S.Ct. 2557, 165 L.Ed.2d 409 (2006), is
a criminal defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to counsel violated by retained
counsel’s unqualified representation in a capital case?

(2) Whether California’s death penalty law violates the Fifth, Sixth, and
Fourteenth Amendments by permitting the trier of fact to impose a sentence of death without finding the existence of aggravating factors beyond a reasonable doubt?

29^th May 2007: Certiorari was denied, suggesting that the Supreme Court also did not read the case properly, and did not care that Ramirez had incompetent lawyers. Most of the claims in the state habeas corpus related to the death penalty and how it was unconstitutional for Ramirez, so it seems the Supreme Court was also unconcerned with this issue.

Federal Writ of Habeas Corpus – California Central District Court, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals

People v. Ramirez, No. 2:07-cv-08310-BRO

17^th December 2008: Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus filed. This is the document that most of this blog’s information comes from.

His federal lawyers were hoping for evidentiary hearings with the hope that exculpatory evidence could be used in further appeals to overturn the convictions.

Second State Habeas Corpus – California Supreme Court

People v. Ramirez, No. S171312, (Cal. Mar. 16, 2009)

16^th March 2009: With more evidence, Ramirez was able to file a second state habeas.

Ramirez sadly died waiting for the outcome of these two appeals after 23 years on death row and 27 years in solitary confinement altogether. We will never know whether the Ninth Circuit would have overturned Ramirez’s convictions, but the circuit judges pay less deference to the lower courts. There is however, a precedent for allowing a ‘serial killer’ to go free. In 2010, the Ninth Circuit overturned the Skid Row Stabber’s convictions pending a retrial, but Bobby Joe Maxwell never experienced freedom. He fell into a coma and died before he could be released. The murders remain unsolved. By ‘coincidence’, Maxwell’s crimes supposedly involved ‘satanism’ and the Greyhound bus depot, so often mentioned in Ramirez’s case. Even if Ramirez had the convictions overturned, they would have charged him with the murder of Mei Leung, although he would again be incompetent to stand trial.

-VenningB-

(Originally published 8th March 2024)