Eighth Amendment Project
Fall 2018 Requests for Proposals
Reduce Executions/Sentences: Litigation or advocacy strategies to reduce use of the
death penalty (new death sentences and/or executions) or to “gum up the works.”
Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
August 8, 2018
PROPOSAL NARRATIVE
Summary Paragraph
a) By 2020 VADP will develop enough support for a legislative debate about death penalty
abolition. In the interim Republicans will introduce reform bills recommended by the 2013
ABA Virginia Death Penalty Assessment Team. 8AP funding will enable VADP to continue
its work to reveal flaws in the capital system and move legislators toward abolition.
We will support legislation to reverse the execution drug secrecy law enacted under the
previous Governor in 2016. Given that the final three men on Virginia’s death row could
receive execution dates in the next eighteen months, this bill — if enacted — could render the
Commonwealth unable to carry out executions.
VADP will also continue its campaign to pass severe mental illness (SMI) exclusion
legislation in the state Senate. It is clear that our grasstops educational work in key
legislative districts is generating greater support for death penalty reform bills.
Organization Background
b) History: On November 9, 1991, a steering committee of 13 committed citizens gathered and
formed Virginians Against State Killing. In 1994 the organization’s name was changed to
Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (VADP).
In its early years VADP was an “outsider” group, focused on protest against the frequent use
of capital punishment. Then board chair Jon Sheldon led a process that transformed VADP
into an “insider” organization with a more professional structure and expertise that has
earned bipartisan credibility with the media, legislators, and administration officials.
c) Mission and Values: VADP is a citizens’ organization dedicated to educating the public
about alternatives to the death penalty. Our goal is to end capital punishment in Virginia
through education, organizing, and advocacy. Our key organizational value is bipartisanship.
Proposal
d) Description of Work:
Goal 1; Educate Virginians about the death penalty to build support for reform & abolition.
Objective 1: Meet with local faith, business, and civic leaders in eight key districts and
identify conservative supporters for death penalty reform legislation.
Thanks to a 2017 grant from the Bon Secours Sisters, VADP hired a full-
time Field Director in May 2017 to work in eight key legislative districts.
Fall 2018 Grant Application Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
Thus far the Field Director has spent multiple week each in each of these
eight target districts. He has met with over 150 local leaders and
identified new allies in each district willing to work with VADP.
Our goal is to identify 5-10 leaders in each district to meet with legislators
after the November election and before the 2019 General Assembly.
Objective 2: Give presentations on the death penalty, execution drug secrecy, and the
SMI exemption in each of the eight target legislative districts
The VADP Field Director has already scheduled educational sessions for
Libertarian groups in Rockingham & Chesterfield Counties and for a
local Republican Women's group in Spotsylvania County. He has verbal
commitments from four other Republican Women’s groups that have not
yet confirmed a speaking date.
Objective 3: Present information on execution drug secrecy and the SMI exemption at
five regional VADP meetings
Five regional meetings will be held in Norfolk, Richmond, Charlottesville,
Roanoke, and northern Virginia between October 22 and November 16,
2018. We will soon schedule those meeting dates.
Objective 4: Circulate conservative sign-on letters in support of execution drug secrecy
repeal and open discovery in capital cases during the appeals process.
Last year VADP got 18 conservatives and Libertarians to endorse a sign-
on letter that was written in collaboration with the American Bar
Association and Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty.
VADP will create two similar letters this fall supporting legislation to (a)
repeal the execution drug secrecy law enacted under Gov. Terry
McAuliffe and (b) mandate open discovery in capital cases during the
appeals process. We will collaborate with Conservatives Concerned
About the Death Penalty, Reprieve International, and Virginia Capital
Representation Resource Center on the text of these sign-on letters.
We will approach signatories of the SMI exemption letter that include
former Attorneys General Ken Cuccinelli and Mark Earley and former
Congressman Tom Bliley.
Objective 5: Explore the possibility of getting op-eds by conservative authors supporting
the repeal of execution drug secrecy in key newspapers.
Several Republican legislators have told VADP and its partner
organizations that op-eds written by conservative leaders Shaun Kenney
and Kevin Walsh in 2016 strongly influenced them to vote against the
Governor’s execution drug secrecy proposal. We want to pursue this
strategy once again with a new effort in 2019 to repeal that policy.
Our coalition will approach possible authors for execution drug secrecy
op-eds for major Virginia newspapers like the Washington Post,
Richmond Times-Dispatch, and the Roanoke Times.
We will also consider newspapers that serve our target legislative districts:
Martinsville Bulletin, Danville Bee, Winchester Star, Daily News-Record
2
Fall 2018 Grant Application Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
(Harrisonburg), Staunton News Leader, News & Advance (Lynchburg),
and Bristol Herald Courier.
Goal 2: Convene VADP supporters to provide opportunities for education and advocacy
Objective 1: Host a VADP 27th anniversary awards luncheon
VADP has scheduled this event for Saturday, October 20, 2018 at St. John
Neumann Catholic Church in Reston.
Actor & activist Mike Farrell, President of Death Penalty Focus, will give
the keynote address. VADP will honor Joe Giarratano who was
sentenced to death in 1979 for a crime he did not commit, Unable to
prove his innocence in court, Virginia Gov. Douglas Wilder granted Joe
a conditional pardon commuting his sentence to life. Given parole last
year, Joe now works for the Innocence Project at UVA.
Objective 2: Organize a series of five VADP regional meetings in the fall of 2018 and
spring of 2019
VADP Executive Director Michael Stone initiated regional meetings in
2015. The autumn sessions provide education on priorities for the
following year’s legislative session and encourage VADP supporters to
be involved in advocacy with their state Delegates and Senators.
The spring meetings present the results of the legislative session and
encourage VADP supporters to be involved in death penalty educational
work in their localities. These regional meetings also help identify new
leaders for local action and potential board membership.
Goal 3: Provide opportunities for VADP supporters to be involved in legislative advocacy
Objective 1: Convene regular meetings of the death penalty legislative coalition partners
VADP convenes meetings with its traditional partners — the Virginia
Catholic Conference, ACLU of Virginia, and capital defense attorneys —
to agree on a common legislative agenda, plan strategy, coordinate
actions, and evaluate its joint efforts. In the past three years, NAMI
Virginia and other mental health organizations have worked with the
coalition on the SMI exemption.
Objective 2: Organize visits with eight legislators in their home districts with
constituents from VADP as well as our coalition partners
Given our experience in past legislative sessions, the Virginia death
penalty coalition identified 8 key legislators for meetings in their home
districts to discuss death penalty reform bills. The VADP Field Director
is identifying local leaders to participate in these eight meetings before
the 2019 General Assembly.
These target legislators are: Delegates Les Adams (Chatham), Ben Cline
(Amherst), Chris Collins (Winchester), and Todd Gilbert (Woodstock) as
well as Senators Ben Chafin (Lebanon), Mark Peake (Lynchburg), Bill
Stanley (Moneta), and Glen Sturtevant (Richmond).
Fall 2018 Grant Application Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
Objective 3: Send action alerts to VADP supporters during the General Assembly session
and in response to execution dates.
During the 2019 session VADP will send e-mail action alerts on execution
drug secrecy repeal legislation, discover in capital cases during the
appeals process, the SMI exemption bill, and any pro-death penalty
legislation at key times in the legislative process. The VADP database
has over 2,000 supporters with 1,867 e-mail addresses.
Our EveryAction database enables VADP to send e-mail blasts to all
Virginia supporters or to individuals in specific legislative districts.
VADP’s web site hosts action alerts that generate customizable messages
to Virginia legislators.
e) Local Opportunities: Several important trends in Virginia present opportunities for VADP
and its partner organizations to make significant progress toward abolition in coming years.
First, there have been no death sentences in Virginia since September 2011. There have been
nearly 2,100 murders since then and no jury has returned a death sentence, not even for John
Ragin and Jesse Mathews who were convicted of multiple highly publicized crimes. In the
summer 2017 Russell Brown III received a life sentence for killing a state trooper.
Second, death penalty supporters have ceased efforts to expand the death penalty after VADP
and its partners successfully blocked proposals to repeal the “triggerman rule” in four
consecutive legislative sessions. No expansion legislation has been introduced in five years.
Third, votes in the last three legislative sessions on the electric chair and execution drug
secrecy measures revealed a core group of Republican legislators who have consistently
voted against death penalty bills. A much larger group of Republican Delegates and Senators
have mixed voting records on similar execution method bills. Individual meetings with these
legislators by VADP and its partner organizations have shown deep ambivalence about the
death penalty with serious concern expressed about executing an innocent person.
Fourth, Republican leaders are increasingly willing to express public opposition to the state’s
capital punishment system. Last year eighteen prominent conservatives and Libertarians
supported legislation to exempt people with severe mental illness from the death penalty —
including two former Republican Attorney Generals, a former Executive Director of the
Republican Party of Virginia, and a former member of Congress. VADP had planned to
launch a Virginia chapter of Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty in May 2018,
but had to delay those plans due to CCADP staff turnover.
Finally, Republican Del Greg Habeeb recently announced that he is resigning his seat at the
end of August. Given that Republican narrowly control the House of Delegates by a 51-49
margin, this special election could deadlock the House, force a power-sharing agreement, and
result in a new chair for the House Courts of Justice Committee. If that happens, VADP and
its partners will have a strong opportunity to pass both the execution drug secrecy repeal and
SMI exemption bills.
f) Implementation: The results of the 2018 legislative session illustrate the opportunities and
challenges as well as the political landscape for the abolition movement in Virginia.
Fall 2018 Grant Application Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
i.
Severe Mental Illness Legislation:
This was the third year of our coalition’s campaign to pass SMI exclusion legislation.
Delegate Jay Leftwich — a conservative Republican from Chesapeake — again agreed to
be the House patron of the SMI bill. He personally lobbied members of the House
Criminal Law Subcommittee, identified subcommittee members on the fence about the
bill, and asked the coalition to organize grassroots support in their legislative districts.
Last year Del. David Albo, chair of the House Courts of Justice Committee, supported
the bill. Despite his endorsement, we fell just one vote short in the Criminal Law
Subcommittee.
Given the significant gain in House Democratic seats from the November 2017 election,
we were cautiously optimistic that we could pass the SMI exemption in the House. We
had not anticipated the raw antipathy of the new Courts of Justice Committee chairman,
Del. Rob Bell. In the 2018 legislative session, Del. Bell refused to allow the SMI
exemption to be heard. He even told a NAMI Virginia lobbyist that the bill would not go
anywhere as long as he was committee chair.
VADP and its partners were unsuccessful in recruiting a Republican to sponsor the SMI
bill in the Senate. The grasstops education work of the VADP Field Director had resulted
in constituent support for the SMI exemption in several Republican Senate districts. We
thought we would fall one vote short in the Senate Courts of Justice Committee.
We made a strong presentation on behalf of the SMI exemption to the Courts of Justice
Committee. But it was referred to the Crime Commission for study by the Senate
Majority Leader, a positive sign. In the prior year the bill was defeated on a party-line
vote in committee.
Given the hostility of committee chair Del. Bell, VADP and its partners have decided not
to run the SMI exemption in the House in 2019. This assessment may change if
Democrats win the vacated seat of Republican Del. Greg Habeeb this fall and a power-
sharing arrangement produced new leadership in the House Courts of Justice Committee.
Instead the coalition will focus its SMI exemption efforts in the Senate where we may
have a chance to pass the bill. Two Republican Senators, Glen Sturtevant (Richmond)
and Bill Stanley (Moneta), have expressed a willingness to consider being the bill’s
patron in the next session.
In the House, we will work with a bipartisan group of open-government legislators to
repeal the execution drug secrecy law enacted in 2016. We will also introduce a bill
supported by capital defense attorneys that would mandate open discovery in capital
cases during the appeals process. We are currently seeking a Republican patron for these
two legislative measures.
Executions in 2019:
The final three men on Virginia’s death row are near the end of their mandatory appeals
process. Anthony Juniper (Norfolk) won his U.S. Court of Appeals hearing last fall. His
case was remanded to District Court for a hearing on a Brady violation (hidden witness
statement) that could result in a new trial. This case is the “poster child” for the proposed
bill to mandate open discovery during the appeals process of all capital convictions.
Fall 2018 Grant Application Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
Thomas Porter (Norfolk) is still awaiting a decision from the Fourth Circuit Court on his
case. If his appeal is denied, the Attorney General can seek an execution date. It is
possible that this could take place as early as November.
Mark Lawlor (Fairfax) will have his Fourth Circuit Court appeal heard in the fall. If the
decision goes against him, he could receive an execution date in the winter of 2019.
Given the very real threat of executions, VADP and its partners will work to enact
legislation to reverse the execution drug secrecy law enacted in 2016. If successful, the
Commonwealth would likely have no constitutional method to carry out death sentences.
VADP will continue to work with attorneys from the Virginia Capital Representation
Resource Center on clemency campaigns for anyone given an execution date. In 2017,
this collaboration resulted in Gov. Terry McAuliffe reducing the death sentences of Ivan
Teleguz and William Burns to life in prison without parole.
g) Benchmarks: Below are the primary benchmarks that VADP will use to evaluate the
progress of the work on this grant.
Benchmark Desired Outcome Timing
Education Meet local faith, business, and civic August to December
leaders in eight key legislative districts 2018
Give talks on the DP and SMI exemption September to
in the eight target districts December 2018
Arrange the publication of conservative November &
op-eds supporting repeal of execution December 2018
drug secrecy in major newspapers
Legislation Identify a Republican patron for the November 2018
Senate SMI bill as well as House bills
on execution drug secrecy & open
discovery during capital appeals
Organize constituent meetings with November 2018 to
legislators in eight target districts January 2019
Circulate conservative sign-on letters in September to
support of execution drug secrecy December 2018
repeal and open discovery during
capital case appeals
Work on execution drug secrecy repeal, January to March
open discovery in capital cases, & SMI 2019
exemption in House and Senate Courts
of Justice Committees
Relationships Meet with VADP supporters at five Fall 2018 &
regional meetings Spring 2019
Fall 2018 Grant Application Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
h
Recruit 20 new supporters each month Ongoing
via personal meetings, social media,
web site, and educational programs
Identify at least five new “unlikely” Ongoing
allies to work with VADP
Fundraising Meet individually with at least 12 At least one each
potential major donors month
Organize at least four “friend-raising” Two in the fall & two
events hosted by VADP supporters in the spring
Encourage at least three new faith Meet at least one
communities to provide financial faith community
support to VADP leader each month
VADP’s board of directors will evaluate these benchmarks at board meetings. Programmatic
adjustments will be made to keep the organization on track with these goals.
National Strategy: VADP seeks to move Virginia further toward de facto abolition, as
measured by the three indicators outlined in the national abolition strategy:
“No executions in the last 10 years (Virginia has 15, but only 4 in the past three years);
“¢ No more than 15 new death sentences in the last 10 years (Virginia has issued 3 death
sentences in that time, but none in nearly seven years); and
“Fewer than 15 people on death row (Virginia currently has only 3 on death row).
VADP coordinates its work with the Eighth Amendment Project, the major national
organization devoted to death penalty abolition. We hosted Henderson Hill, Executive
Director, to give the keynote address at our 25th anniversary awards luncheon in 2016.
Currently, we invite Laura Porter & Stefanie Faucher to participate in our Virginia legislative
coalition meetings via conference call.
VADP and its partners had worked closely with the Serious Mental Illness Initiative of the
American Bar Association. Aurélie Tabuteau Mangels (ABA Mental IIIness Initiative
Fellow) and Misty Thomas (Director of the ABA Death Penalty Due Process Review
Project) played key roles in the Virginia SMI campaign. They participated in all of our
legislative coalition meetings and provided invaluable assistance in drafting SMI op-eds and
other public statements on the issue.
VADP has been working more in the past year with Conservatives Concerned About the
Death Penalty (CCATDP). Field Director Dale Brumfield has participated in the regular
conference calls of conservative state organizers. He also helped staff CCATDP tables at
CPAC in February and at a Young Americans for Liberty conference in July. Contacts made
at these events have resulted in multiple speaking invitations to conservative groups.
Our state coalition includes VADP, the Virginia Catholic Conference, ACLU of Virginia,
capital defense attorneys, and NAMI Virginia. Leaders from other mental health
organizations also participate in our work on the SMI bill — Mental Health America of
Virginia, National Association of Social Workers, DisAbility Law Center, and Virginia
Counselors Association.
Fall 2018 Grant Application Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
i)
Fundraising: VADP participated in the first cohort of the Tides Foundation 2016 Capacity
Building Grant Program, and will continued in its program in 2017 and 2018. The Suddes
Group provided coaching as well as a training session for VADP board members. The
VADP Executive Director participated in national fundraising training in September 2017.
For many years VADP has sent a fundraising appeal to its supporters twice each year. The
proceeds have generated most individual giving to the organization.
For the past three years VADP has mailed a copy of our annual report to major donors. This
was intended as a “thank you” to our best supporters, and we included a donation envelope.
This “soft ask” generated $3,900 in donations in 2016, $2,750 in 2017, and $1,072 in 2018.
In the past three years VADP has held nine “friend-raisers” in Herndon, Richmond, Roanoke,
Washington (DC), Norfolk, Charlottesville, and Arlington. Three of these were held in the
first half of 2018. These events have not generated significant funds, except for one which
resulted in a first-time $5,000 donation. We have signed up 40-45 new people with the
capacity to be major donors. Five new board members were identified at these events.
Plans for other “friend-raisers” are underway for Charlottesville (October Ist), northern
Virginia, and Richmond, but dates for the latter two have not yet been scheduled.
Contributions from Virginia’s faith community to VADP so far this year has already
exceeded the total that we received from this source in 2017.
Finally, the VADP Treasurer challenged each of our 13 board members to develop a plan to
raise $1,000 in new funding by the ne of the 2018 year and to share it at our September board
meeting. I know that at least six of these board members have started working on their
fundraising plans.
Likelihood of Success: VADP has strong legislative coalition partners in the Virginia
Catholic Conference, ACLU of Virginia, and NAMI Virginia. In addition, we have
beneficial relationships with national partners as well as Virginia’s death penalty defense
attorneys and litigators.
We have a superb Republican champion in the House of Delegates for the SMI bill (Del. Jay
Leftwich). We have also identified several potential Republican Senate patrons. Many
Democrats in the House and Senate are opposed to the death penalty, and we have excellent
champions in Del. Marcus Simon, Del. Mike Mullen, and Sen. Scott Surovell. We also have
a strong relationship with the Black Caucus.
Our coalition’s influence in the General Assembly has grown steadily. We are well
positioned to become even more effective as we join with a growing number of Republican
allies in the coming years.
