The Utah Supreme Court is now deciding whether death row inmate Ralph Leroy Menzies should be granted another competency hearing in district court and whether his scheduled execution by firing squad on Sept. 5 should be delayed pending that decision.
If the execution is delayed, Matt Hunsaker doesn’t believe it will ever happen.
“I’m sticking to my firm belief that if we don’t execute him on Sept. 5, there will not be an execution,” said Hunsaker, a son of victim Maurine Hunsaker.
Attorneys for Menzies and the state presented their arguments Thursday before the state’s highest court. The main issue is whether 3rd District Judge Matthew Bates erred in not granting Menzies a new competency hearing.
“There was a lot of legal discussion today,” Hunsaker noted after the hearing was over.
Menzies, 67, was found guilty of kidnapping and brutally murdering Hunsaker’s mother in 1986 when she was 26.
Several of Hunsaker’s family attended the Supreme Court hearing and listened to arguments about whether the decision to deny Menzies another competency evaluation was correct, as well as whether the judge’s decision to sign the execution warrant while defense appeals were still pending was correct. Sitting on the other side of the aisle was Randy Gardner, brother of Ronnie Lee Gardner — the last person executed by firing squad in Utah — and others opposed to the death penalty.
According to Menzies’ attorneys, their client has “advanced vascular disease resulting in dementia, with severe brain atrophy,” and his condition has declined so much since the June 6 ruling of competency that it raises a “substantial” question of his current state. They argued that his last finding of competency was based on evaluations that happened over a year ago and that two recent evaluations found “that he no longer meets the statutory awareness standard” with “medical records demonstrating cognitive and physical decline,” according to their appeal to the Utah Supreme Court.
The state, however, believes “the judge did not abuse his discretion when he signed the execution warrant and declined to further stay Menzies’ execution while Menzies appeals the competency determination.”
The high court justices spent an hour questioning the defense about where the evidence is for what is known as a “prima facie” issue and whether allegations of Menzies’ incompetency should be taken as fact. Prima facie is a legal term referring to having enough evidence to support a claim. In this case, Lindsey Layer, one of Menzies’ attorneys, said there are enough specific facts to support the allegations of their client being incompetent.
“He is always getting worse,” Layer told the justices.
Several justices raised questions, however, about how a “substantial” change in Menzies’ competency is being measured. How much understanding does Menzies need to have about his punishment for a crime he committed? And if his illness is progressive, what’s to stop the cycle of continuously bringing Menzies’ competency into question?
“I was very impressed with the amount of questions that were asked by the justices,” Hunsaker said, adding that he believes the main argument before the justices is whether Bates should have halted the execution proceedings.
“I believe that’s what it comes down to today, mostly. I don’t think the competency (question) is as much at hand as whether or not ... Judge Bates issued the right ruling,” he said.
“It’s like I said in court, if Judge Bates hadn’t put the death warrant on the table, we would have been just crawling along. Now that the death warrant is on the table, and everybody is up against the wall, things are moving at miraculous speeds. We’re seeing filings daily. These hearings are quickly coming. It’s like I said, this is forcing their hand to do something, and I do believe Judge Bates did what was right,” Hunsaker said.
He believes the Supreme Court’s decision will be the “last big hurdle” to determining whether Menzies is executed by firing squad.
“If we don’t execute Menzies on (Sept. 5), I don’t think they’re going to execute him,” he said, while noting that if a new competency hearing is granted, “I give up.
“If this doesn’t happen this go around, it’s like they even said in there, the statutes are written so this can’t be a merry-go-round. If they open this back up, we’re on a merry-go-round. I said this over a year ago when I told Judge Bates in his courtroom, ‘I’ll accept whatever you decide. If you decide he’s incompetent, we move on. We’re done, game over. I don’t have any more fight in me,’” Hunsaker said.
A decision on whether Menzies will be granted a new hearing may come next week.
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