The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and the State Board of Pardons and Paroles turned down condemned two-time murderer Warren Hill’s request for a stay of tonight’s schedule execution despite his claims that he is intellectually disabled.
With that loss, Hill has only one remaining option in his effort to stop his execution scheduled for 7 p.m., the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Parole Board did not give a reason for its decision to deny clemency. In addition to hearing testimony during the meeting Monday, the board thoroughly reviewed Hill’s parole case file, which includes the circumstances of the death penalty case, his criminal history and a comprehensive history Hill’s life.
The federal appeals court said Hill had already challenged Georgia’s requirement that he prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he was not eligible for a death sentence because of his disability. He has an IQ of 70, which is widely recognized as being intellectually disabled. The court said heis not entitled to a second appeal unless there was new evidence.
Hill is scheduled to die this evening for the 1990 beating death of his cellmate, Joseph Handspike. Hill was serving a life sentence at a prison in Lee County for the 1986 murder of his 18-year-old girlfriend when he used a nail-studded board to attack Handspike, also a convicted murderer.
Hill’s lawyer focused some of his argument before the Parole Board Monday on last spring’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling that death penalty states could not solely use an IQ score to determine if a convicted murder is ineligible for execution. Though Georgia does not have such a benchmark, state law does require proof of intellectual disability beyond a reasonable doubt — the highest standard of proof and one that not other state requires.
That same issue is the focus of his pending appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court.
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