Kimberly McCarthy Update: Reprieve for Texas convict scheduled to be first woman executed since 2010

By: Crimesider Staff
Topics: Daily Blotter

Kimberly McCarthy

/ AP Photo/Texas Department of Criminal Justice, File

(CBS/AP) HUNTSVILLE, Texas - Kimberly McCarthy, the first woman scheduled to be executed in the U.S. since 2010, won a reprieve Tuesday. It came only hours before she was to be taken to the Texas death chamber.

State District Judge Larry Mitchell, in Dallas, rescheduled McCarthy's execution for April 3, 2013 so lawyers for the former nursing home therapist could have more time to pursue an appeal focused on whether her predominantly white jury was improperly selected on the basis of race. McCarthy is black.

Dallas County prosecutors, who initially contested the motion to reschedule, chose to not appeal the reprieve.

District Attorney Craig Watkins said the 60-day delay was "appropriate." If no irregularities are discovered, he said he'd move forward with the execution.

"We want to make sure everything is done correctly," he said.

The 51-year-old McCarthy was convicted and sent to death row for the 1997 stabbing, beating and robbery of a 71-year-old neighbor. She learned of the reprieve less than five hours before she was scheduled for lethal injection. She was already in a small holding cell a few feet from the death chamber at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice Huntsville Unit.

"I'm happy right now over that," she told prison agency spokesman John Hurt. "There's still work to be done on my case."

A Dallas County jury convicted her of killing neighbor Dorothy Booth at the retired college psychology professor's home in Lancaster, about 15 miles south of Dallas.

Investigators said Booth had agreed to give McCarthy a cup of sugar before she was attacked with a butcher knife and candelabra. Booth's finger also was severed so McCarthy could take her wedding ring. It was among three slayings linked to McCarthy, who'd been addicted to crack cocaine.

McCarthy would have been the 13th woman executed in the U.S. and the fourth in Texas, the nation's busiest death penalty state, since the Supreme Court allowed capital punishment to resume in 1976. In that same time period, more than 1,300 male inmates have been executed nationwide.

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January 29, 2013 - Kimberly McCarthy Execution: Texas convict to be first woman executed in U.S. since 2010

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by KansasCity-2012 January 29, 2013 8:19 PM EST: Death Penalties are expensive in Texas and everywhere else.

It is the most expensive form of justice possible.

Better justice exists, but Texas has a very closed mind about it.

Killing and getting revenge is what Republicans tout to get votes around election time. It's strange that they want to reduce the cost of government, but mention their expensive appetite to execute, then they change the subject.; Reply to this comment


by GeorgeLinKC January 29, 2013 7:07 PM EST: In 1989, Roderick Nunley kidnapped, raped and killed Kansas City teenager Ann Harrison. The death of the 15-year-old girl is still fresh in the minds of many around Kansas City.

On March 22, 1989, Harrison walked to the end of her driveway near 68th and Manchester to wait for her school bus. Retired detective Pete Edlund remembers that day all too well.

"Every parent's worst nightmare, their child is snatched off the street at the end of her driveway waiting for a school bus. That doesn't happen every day," he said.

* * *

Nunley drove Harrison to his mother's house. She was forced to crawl down to the basement. Each man accused the other of raping Harrison, but eventually, DNA testing linked Taylor directly to the rape.

The men then forced Harrison into the trunk of the car and tied her up. Both men testified that Harrison begged for her life, offering them money if they would spare her.

Instead, Nunley and Taylor grabbed two knives from the kitchen and both men stabbed the girl.

"Here was an innocent child, who was brutally sexually assaulted and murdered and it wasn't like they stabbed her once and walked away, it was brutal," Edlund said.

In Nunley's videotaped confession, he says he knew Harrison would die in the trunk.

The medical examiner testified that it took about half an hour for the girl to die after her kidnappers stabbed her 10 times.

It has been almost 24 years since Ann Harrison was murdered by these two men and both are still alive and well. Ann's parents are still waiting for "justice to be done".; Reply to this comment


by linfinster January 29, 2013 6:40 PM EST: Was there no information that could be included in this article that was presented at trial? Like witnesses, forensics, her statements. Just questioning the jury ethics. Wow! I will have to search and see what was reported to know how stupid the legal system is to allow this delay.; Reply to this comment