Death out the family

If you’ve been following my Steven Wertz posts – which I’ve not been following myself for a while – there was an update last May. His appeal – essentially of incompetence by Bryant, his original defense (US spelling) attorney – was denied and he’s sentenced to death. The Arkansas Supreme Court statement is here (30 page PDF) and it’s interesting reading. Here’s the summary

After a jury trial, Appellant was convicted of two counts of capital murder and sentenced to death. After the Supreme Court affirmed the conviction and sentence, Appellant filed a petition for postconviction relief pursuant to Ark. R. Crim. P. 37.5, asserting twenty-three allegations of ineffective assistance of counsel. The circuit court denied the petition. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the circuit court did not err in denying Appellant’s petition, as Appellant did not receive ineffective assistance of counsel in either the guilt phase or sentencing phase of his trial.

As for why I’m at all interested it all started when I was searching for possible Bone cousins. There’s a new character in the plot, picked out from the above mentioned report. A Judy Bone, the mother of the murdered wife Kathy Watts (née Bone).