Indiana’s Supreme Court set a May 20 execution date for convicted murderer Benjamin Ritchie. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Newsmakers)
Indiana Supreme Court justices on Tuesday set a May 20 execution date for death row inmate Benjamin Ritchie, who was convicted in 2002 for killing a law enforcement officer from Beech Grove.
The high court’s decision followed a series of exhausted appeals previously filed by Ritchie and his legal team. The inmate’s request for post-conviction relief was denied in Tuesday’s 13-page order, penned by Chief Justice Loretta Rush, although she disagreed with the decision in her opinion.
Included in the death row inmate’s post-conviction filings are claims that his trial and post-conviction counsel “provided ineffective assistance” by not investigating Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD) and by failing to “analyze the effect of Ritchie’s childhood exposure to excessive amounts of lead.”
Additionally, counsel emphasized that Ritchie was only 20 years old at the time of the crime, and “recent developments in the law” require the state supreme court to consider his age at sentencing. Ritchie’s team held, too, that the state “engaged in prosecutorial misconduct” throughout his jury trial.
Indiana justices weigh in
Justices said Ritchie “has not persuaded a majority of the Court that there is a reasonable possibility he is entitled to relief,” however.
Even so, Rush said she believed evidence submitted to the court suggests “a strong likelihood” that Ritchie suffered from FASD when he murdered William Toney, the police officer, in 2000.
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Order – SPCR and execution date
She noted that Ritchie has recently been evaluated by two FASD experts. Rush preferred to hold off on an execution date so the court has more time to “receive and consider” the experts’ evaluations.
“If those evaluations both confirm that Ritchie suffers from FASD and explain its effect on his behavior when he committed his crimes, a successive petition for post-conviction relief would be authorized,” the chief justice wrote in her opinion.
But Justices Derek Molter and Geoffrey Slaughter disagreed with Rush.
“… what Ritchie’s experts turned up is irrelevant. The issue before us is not whether Ritchie suffered from FASD in 2000 or whether he does so today; it is whether his trial counsel were constitutionally ineffective during sentencing for failing to investigate the possibility that Ritchie suffered from FASD then,” Slaughter wrote.
“On this claim, Ritchie cannot show a ‘reasonable possibility’ of relief,” the justice continued. “Even if he suffered from FASD in 2000, as he now claims for the first time, he did not preserve that claim, so it is procedurally defaulted. And he cannot avoid his default of this claim because his counsel were not ineffective under either standard for assessing counsel’s performance.”
Justice Christopher Goff dissented, in part, saying he “would have temporarily stayed the execution date to consider Ritchie’s claim.”
Justice Mark Massa did not weigh in.
Next steps could bring clemency hearings
When asked to comment, Ritchie’s defense attorneys told the Indiana Capital Chronicle only that they’re “considering next steps,” which is likely to include a clemency petition.
With clemency, the governor — in tandem with Indiana’s Parole Board — can elect to commute a death sentence to life imprisonment or grant a pardon for a criminal offense.
Benjamin Ritchie (Mugshot from the Indiana Department of Correction)
The Indiana Constitution gives the governor exclusive authority to grant reprieves, commutations and pardons for all offenses — including capital crimes — except for treason and impeachment. The parole board is tasked by state law with assisting in that process.
The five-member board, specifically, is responsible for conducting an investigation into the merits of a clemency petition.
Three clemencies have been granted in Indiana since 1976, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita — whose office requested an execution date for Ritchie last fall — told the Capital Chronicle on Tuesday that he had been “expecting” an execution date, and that “everything is going to plan.”
If and when Ritchie files for clemency, Rokita said “we’ll continue on like we do with any other one.”
“Nothing’s changing our plans or procedures based for this fellow versus the last,” he said.
Per court documents, the underlying crime began as a police pursuit of a stolen van on Sept. 29, 2000. Toney, the Beech Grove police officer, later pursued Ritchie on foot. Ritchie ultimately fired four shots at Toney, who did not survive the shooting.
Executions were put on hold for 15 years in Indiana until convicted killer Joseph Corcoran was put to death in December. The state paid $900,000 on execution drugs but won’t say how much was purchased.
Ritchie and six other men remain on the state’s death row at the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City.
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