Dear Friends -- Can you help? Please write a letter, and forward this e mail. Katha Pollitt
Dear Friends:
I am forwarding this letter from Sara Buel and press release in hopes that you will take action to save the life of Betty Lou Beets. Please copy your letters to her attorney.
Thank you for your help.
Marya Hart
PLEASE HELP!!! As the attached press release details, the State of Texas plans to execute 62-year old battered woman, Betty Lou Beets, on February 24th unless we take immediate action. Ms. Beets has admitted to killing her very violent husband and is not seeking to be released, rather to have her death sentence reduced to life in prison.
Please write Governor George Bush, State House, Austin, TX 78701 and/or the Parole Board, Box 13401, Capitol Station, Austin, TX 78711, to request that they grant this reprieve. I know you are all so busy, but implore you to take a few minutes to help save Betty Lou Beets' life. Any one of us could so easily be in her shoes and would certainly hope that others would be stirred to plead on our behalf, especially given uncontroverted evidence of her corrupt, unethical lawyer (he has been convicted on bribery charges, disbarred and is in prison) and the lack of assistance during a lifetime of domestic and sexual abuse. THANK YOU so much for any help you can give us!
Please pass this press release on to your local media and help us save Betty Lou Beets' life! take good care and God Bless!
Sarah Buel, U of Tx School of Law Domestic Violence Clinic
For Immediate Release
February 7, 2000
BUSH TO DECIDE FATE
OF DEATH ROW
GREAT-GRANDMOTHER
> Presidential hopeful George W. Bush should be a "compassionate
> conservative" and spare the life of a great-grandmother facing execution
> in Texas, supporters of Betty Lou Beets announced today.
>
> Ms. Beets, a life-long survivor of domestic violence and sexual assault,
> was convicted in 1985 of the murder of her abusive husband, Jimmy Don
> Beets, after a trial lasting just four days. She is scheduled for execution
> on 24 February, two weeks before her sixty-third birthday--despite twice
> having her death sentence reversed on appeal.
>
> "For the first time, Governor Bush will confront the imminent execution
> of a battered wife, and the American public should be watching his
> response carefully", said John Blume, an attorney representing Ms.
> Beets. "This is a case that cries out for compassion".
>
> Defense attorneys have filed a comprehensive clemency petition with the
> Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, pointing to glaring deficiencies in
> the Beets case that make her death sentence both cruel and fundamentally
> unfair. Governor Bush will be asked to grant a reprieve in order to
> permit a full review by the pardons board. If her sentence is commuted,
> Betty Lou Beets would spend the rest of her life behind bars.
>
> "Knowing what we now do about this syndrome, a fully-informed jury
> would never sentence a battered woman to death today," Mr. Blume
> commented. "We doubt that the Beets jury would have either, except for
> her tragically incompetent legal representation," he added.
>
> Because her trial attorney failed to investigate Ms. Beets' background
> and upbringing, the jury heard no evidence of her horrific life of domestic
> violence and sexual assault, beginning with her rape at age five and
> continuing at the hands of a succession of abusive husbands. Since her
> conviction, prominent psychologist Lenore Walker has diagnosed Ms.
> Beets as suffering from both Battered Women's Syndrome and
> Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
>
> Learning disabled and hearing impaired, Ms. Beets also suffers from
> organic brain damage stemming from head injuries that included repeated
> blows at the hands of abusive men.
>
> Under Texas law at the time, Ms. Beets' crime was eligible for death
> only because she allegedly murdered her husband in order to collect
> insurance benefits. But it was her own attorney, E. Ray Andrews, who first
> suggested she file an insurance claim on her husband more than a year
> after he disappeared, the suspected victim of a boating accident.
>
> Rather than withdraw from the case and testify on her behalf at her
> trial, Andrews chose instead to continue representing Ms. Beets in exchange
> for the media rights to her story. Years later, Andrews admitted under oath
> what he had known all along: that his client had no prior knowledge of
> any benefits from her husband's death and should never have been
> charged with a capital crime. He later became the local DA, but was
> imprisoned for soliciting a bribe to fix a capital murder case.
>
> "The justice system failed to protect Betty Beets from a lifetime of
> abuse," according to attorney Joe Margulies. "The system even failed to
> protect Betty from exploitation by her own lawyer, who chose financial gain
> over
> his ethical duty to save his client's life ".
>
> Betty Lou Beets would become only the second woman put to death in
> Texas in more than a century. Karla Faye Tucker was executed in 1998
> after Governor Bush refused to intervene despite worldwide appeals,
> including pleas for mercy from the Pope and evangelist Pat Robertson.
>
> In 1990, Richard Celeste, then-governor of Ohio, granted clemency to 28
> battered women imprisoned for violent crimes, including one woman on
> death row. In 1996, Illinois Governor Jim Edgar commuted the death
> sentence of Guinevere Garcia, who was condemned for the murder of her
> abusive husband. Governors in Maryland, Illinois, Florida, and
> California, have also commuted the sentences of incarcerated battered
> women. A clemency program for battered women imprisoned for murder was
> created in Texas in 1991, while a similar program was recently endorsed
> by Governor Jeb Bush in Florida.
>
> For further information, please contact John Blume at 803-765-1044,
> <jblume at usit.net>,
> or Joe Margulies at 612-339-2673, <jmargulies at uswest.net>.
>
> For additional information, please contact Sue Osthoff, National
> Clearinghouse for the Defense of Battered Women, 1-800-903-0111 ext.
> 3, <sueo at ncdbw.org>
> or
> Sarah Buel at U of Texas Domestic Violence Clinic, 512-282-9688 ,
> <sarahbuel at cs.com>