South Carolina death row inmate attempts to voluntarily die after friend execution

Columbia, South Carolina (AP) – The prisoner has been executed in less than a year after his best friend and four other fellow prisoners, and the South Carolina prisoner wants to become his own attorney, which could mean he executes his own attorney in weeks or months.

A federal judge has ordered James Robertson to speak with him for another attorney to be delayed for a 45-day delay and ensure he does want to fire his attorney and deal with the possible fatal consequences of his decision.

Robertson, 51, has been on death row since 1999 because both of his parents killed his parents at their Rock Hill home. He defeated his father with a hammer and the claws of a baseball bat and stabbed his mother. Prosecutors said he tried to make it look like a robbery, hoping he would get a portion of his own in the $2.2 million legacy.

Robertson previously fired his attorney. Shortly after he arrived at the death row, he wanted to give up his appeal because a card playing a partner never appealed his death penalty because his daughter caught fire outside her ex-wife’s home.

Letters from death row prisoners

Robinson's page-by-page letter landed in the federal judge's mailbox on April 7, four days after South Carolina executed its fifth inmate in seven months. It says Robertson and his attorney have different opinions.

“No ethics lawyer will withdraw the appeal that would lead to client executions,” Robertson said, preparing to represent himself.

Robertson's attorney Emily Paavola responded in court documents that Robertson did not take depression medications and suffered chronic back pain and skin conditions, which made him even more frustrated and bothered by the five executions that reduced the close-range crowd from 30 to 25.

Paavola said that included Robertson's best friend on death row, Marion Bowman Jr., killed by a fatal injection on Jan. 31.

Paavloa asked the judge to conduct a four-month request based on Robertson's request so that he could conduct a comprehensive psychiatric assessment to determine whether he was mentally competent. The prosecutor advises the judge to speak with Robertson himself and decide whether he can serve as his own lawyer.

Judge Mary Gordon Baker decided to have another lawyer conversation with Robertson to make sure he understood the meaning and consequences of his decision and reported in early July.

Not the first time

Back in the early 2000s, Robertson also tried to abandon all his appeals. When he believed he was living in prison without parole, he told a judge that every attorney he had encountered since his arrest disappointed him.

A judge asked Robertson at a 2002 hearing about his friend Michael Passaro's decision to volunteer for the death chamber.

“It didn't change my perspective. It did what made me understand – a little bit augmented reality – to see my best friend from playing cards with me one day to not being here the next day.” “He basically took a similar route, and I now choose to take the route, and we often talk about his decision.”

Volunteer death

Since the death penalty was restored 50 years ago, volunteers have been called volunteers in the death penalty circle. According to the Center for Death Penalty Information, about 10% of U.S. executions are prisoners who agree to die before completing all appeals.

Research by the center and scholars found that almost all volunteers suffer from mental illness, which may lead them to decide that they no longer want to live.

The speed of volunteers steadily declines with the number of executions.

From 2000 to 2009, 65 of the 590 executions in the United States involved a prisoner, including Timothy McVeigh, who killed 148 people in the Oklahoma City bomb explosion, including Timothy McVeigh. From 2020 to the present, only 7 out of 111 people in the center are considered volunteers.

Prosecutors know not to compete with the death penalty

Prosecutors who travelled to the death row said he could understand why the inmates chose to stop fighting the sentence.

“If you tell me — be imprisoned for the rest of your life, or go ahead and go to the Lord, you know, I might choose the latter too,” said Tommy Pope, a spokesman for South Carolina House.

But the Pope said 26 years ago that he also observed a young man with above-average intelligence, who likes to work where he can, and often thinks he is smarter than a lawyer.

“Like Jimmy, like Jimmy, it remains to be seen until its final effect,” the pope said.