Governor Kevin Stitt has rejected a recommendation to commute the death sentence of Death Row inmate Julius Jones, whose case has drawn national attention. The governor will not make a decision about Jones's fate until after a clemency hearing in late October.
Transcript:
Dick Pryor: This is Capitol Insider, your weekly look inside Oklahoma politics, policy and government. I'm Dick Pryor with eCapitol news director Shawn Ashley. Shawn, fall is the time of year when agencies submit budget requests to the governor and legislature. The latest one is from the State Department of Education. They're asking for an appropriation increase, but not too much relative to their very large budget. What is SDE asking for?
Shawn Ashley: The State Department of Education is requesting an increase of $96 million to their budget for fiscal year 2023. Now that's on top of the 3.2 billion the agency received for the current fiscal year, its largest state appropriation ever. Now, a large part of that additional request would flow through the state aid funding formula and be distributed to local school districts.
Dick Pryor: The fate of Julius Jones hangs in the balance while we await a clemency hearing that could determine whether the death row inmate lives or dies. Gov. Kevin Stitt did not accept the Pardon and Parole Board's recommendation for commutation and will wait for the clemency hearing before making a decision. Why does the governor believe the clemency hearing is required?
Shawn Ashley: Well, Jones’s September 13th commutation hearing was historic. It was the first for a death row inmate in state history, and it was controversial. When Jones submitted his commutation application in 2019, there was a debate among board members and staff about whether a death row inmate could even apply for commutation. The board voted in June 2020 to seek an attorney general's opinion on the issue.
Before then, Attorney General Mike Hunter even received that formal request, he sent a letter to the board in which he cited a 2012 attorney general's opinion that found the board had the constitutional authority to recommend commutation for offenders serving sentences under the state's eighty-five percent law and the governor to grant those commutations. Hunter wrote to the board: “the same analysis applies to your proposed question.”
In his letter Tuesday to the Pardon and Parole Board, Stitt wrote he was not accepting its recommendation to commute Jones's sentence because and I quote, “a clemency hearing, not a commutation hearing, is the appropriate venue for our state to consider death row cases.” And he added, “clemency hearings are more intensive and thorough than a commutation hearing and include the option for the inmate to speak publicly before the Pardon and Parole Board, as well as the victim's family and attorneys for both sides.”
Dick Pryor: Jones maintains he did not commit the murder for which he was convicted. His legal challenge has received national attention. The outcome of the clemency hearing on October 26th could determine whether he is executed on November 18th. But then again, it may not. How will this process play out?
Shawn Ashley: The board will hear from the Oklahoma County District Attorney's Office which prosecuted Jones for the 1999 murder of Paul Howell during a carjacking in Edmond. It will also hear from Jones's defense team, and it will hear from surviving members of Howell's family. And for the first time, it may hear directly from Julius Jones himself, which Governor Stitt and Pardon and Parole Board member Richard Smotherman, who voted against Jones’s commutation, have said is important. The board will then vote whether to grant clemency, which would reduce Jones’s sentence to life without parole. But the board could go further and again commutate his sentence. At the September 13th commutation hearing, the board recommended Jones’s sentence be reduced to life with the possibility of parole, which would have set the stage for his eventual release from prison. If the board recommends clemency, it will again be up to Stitt to accept or reject that recommendation. And if the board recommends further commutation of Jones's sentence beyond life without the possibility of parole, Stitt can accept, reject or modify that recommendation. If the board recommends clemency and Stitt rejects it, we likely will see a flurry of appeals from Jones's defense team in a last-ditch effort to spare his life.
Dick Pryor: Now to a different issue. One of our listeners asked us a question: Why when we have separation of church and state Franklin Graham is allowed to hold his “God Loves You Tour” on the South Lawn of the State Capitol. That's the question. We looked into this and you found the answer.
Shawn Ashley: The Office of Management and Enterprise Services manages certain public spaces within the Capitol and the State Capitol Park, and this is what they told me. “OMES manages these spaces and is careful to comply with the First Amendment, which prohibits OMES from discriminating on the basis of viewpoint in reserving the space. Groups wishing to reserve a space must request so in writing and comply with the rules promulgated by OMES. The group holding the event at the Capitol requested the space in writing and agreed to comply with OMES rules. After confirming their event did not conflict with any other event going on at the Capitol their application was approved just like any other group.”
Dick Pryor: Okay, and there's your answer. Thanks, Shawn.
Shawn Ashley: You're very welcome.
Dick Pryor: And that's Capitol Insider. We'd like to hear from you. Email your questions to news@kgou.org or contact us on Twitter @kgounews and @ecapitol. You can also find us online at kgou.org and ecapitol.net. Until next time with Shawn Ashley, I'm Dick Pryor.
