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Douglas
Franklin WRIGHT
Classification:
Serial killer
Characteristics:
Number of victims: 7 +
Date of murders: 1969 / 1984 / 1991
Date of birth:
March 25,
1940
Victims profile: An Oregon woman and her mother
/ Luke Tredway, 10-year-old boy /
Four homeless men
Method of murder: ???/ Shooting (.357 Sturm Ruger Blackhawk)
Location: Oregon, USA
Status:
Executed
by lethal injection in Oregon on September 6, 1996
Douglas Franklin
Wright (1940-03-25
- 1996-09-06) was the first criminal executed by lethal injection in
Oregon on September 6th, 1996.
His crime
Wright was
sentenced to death on 1993-10-11 for luring three homeless white men
to a remote area of Wasco County aboard the Warm Springs Indian
Reservation with a false promise of work, and then killing them.
Wright later
admitted killing a fourth man, one Anthony Nelson, a Makah Indian.
If Wright had not quit his appeal process, he would have been tried
before a federal court in the Nelson case because killing a Native
American is a federal crime.
Douglas Franklin Wright
Wasco County - Oregon
Born: 3/25/40
Sentenced to death: 10/11/1993
Wright was convicted of killing three street people. He would lure
them from a homeless shelter to the Warm Springs Reservation with a
promise of work and then kill them. After the Oregon Supreme Court
upheld his conviction and sentence, Wright, 56, abandoned the rest
of his appeals.
Interesting fact: Wright admitted killing a fourth man, Anthony S.
Nelson, 31. Had Wright avoided execution, he would have been tried
in federal court because Nelson was a member of the Makah Tribe.
Douglas Franklin Wright
On Friday, September 6, 1996,
Inmate Douglas Franklin Wright, 56, became the first person executed
by lethal injection in Oregon.
With promises of jobs, the convicted murderer
lured five homeless men to the Warm Springs Indian Reservation in
1991 and shot four of them in cold blood. The fifth man escaped and
alerted police.
Wright was convicted on October 6, 1993 of eight
counts of aggravated murder, among other crimes, for three of the
murders. In the days leading up to his execution he confessed to an
additional kidnapping and murder in 1984, that of a ten-year-old
boy.
Oregon Execute Killer
September 7, 1996
New York Times
A man who admitted killing three homeless men and a 10-year-old boy
he lured off the streets was executed today in Oregon.
The execution in Oregon was the first there in 37
years.
In Oregon, the condemned man, Douglas Franklin
Wright, had no final words but mouthed, ''I'm sorry,'' to the mother
of one of his victims before he died. She nodded.
Mr. Wright, 56, had refused to appeal his
execution. He was charged with killing a fourth homeless man, but
that case never went to trial. He served 12 years in prison for the
1969 murders of an Oregon woman and her mother. Last week, he
confessed to kidnapping, molesting and killing a 10-year-old boy who
disappeared from Portland 12 years ago.
Oregon is the only state where voters have
outlawed capital punishment twice, in 1914 and 1964. They voted to
re-establish it in 1920 and 1978.
19 F.3d 1442
United States of America, Plaintiff-appellee,
v. DouglasFranklinWright, Defendant-appellant
United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.
Argued and Submitted March 8, 1994.
Decided March 18, 1994
Before: BROWNING, KOZINSKI and NOONAN, Circuit
Judges.
Wright
appeals his conviction and sentence for two counts of violating 18
U.S.C. Sec. 922(g).
A. Wright
first argues the district court erred in not changing venue because
it should have presumed prejudice. The record, however, does not
demonstrate a level of "prejudicial and inflammatory media publicity"
such that prejudice should have been presumed. United States v.
Rewald, 889 F.2d 836, 863 (9th Cir.1989), amended 902 F.2d 18 (9th
Cir.1990); Harris v. Pulley, 885 F.2d 1354, 1361 (9th Cir.1988).
While we are mindful of the difficulties inherent in questioning
prospective jurors as to their knowledge of Wright's
background, the district court properly dealt with the situation by
asking whether they recognized Wright by
face or appearance. See Mu'Min v. Virginia, 111 S.Ct. 1899, 1906
(1991) (noting wide discretion granted trial judge in this area).
Wright
makes much of the fact that, after questioning by the district court,
one juror indicated that he had heard something about the charges
pending against Wright. This post-trial
questioning was discretionary with the district court and did not
reveal that any information about these charges played a role in the
jury's deliberations. While Wright contends
the district court erred in denying his request for post-verdict
juror interviews and in not, at a minimum, holding an evidentiary
hearing upon learning about one juror's vague recollection, we
conclude the district court did not abuse its "considerable
discretion" in this area. See United States v. Barrett, 703 F.2d
1076, 1083 (9th Cir.1983).
B. In both his opening brief and
his supplemental brief after remand, Wright
challenges the district court's denial of his motion for a Franks
hearing. Although Wright contends that the
district court applied an incorrect legal standard in ruling on the
motion, our review of the record indicates otherwise. See, e.g., ER
at 22. And in applying the correct standard, the district court
properly denied Wright's request.
Wright did not make a substantial
preliminary showing that Agent Samuel either deliberately or
recklessly omitted a material fact from his affidavit. United States
v. DiCesare, 765 F.2d 890, 894 (9th Cir.), amended 777 F.2d 543 (9th
Cir.1985). In any event, addition of the facts
Wright asserts were omitted would not negate the showing of
probable cause. Id. at 895.
Wright's
request to subpoena Magistrate Juba was properly denied as any such
testimony would have been irrelevant. Lastly, because a Franks
hearing was not necessary, the district court was justified in
denying Wright's request to cross-examine
Agent Samuel as to his supplemental affidavit; as the court has made
clear, it never relied on that affidavit. See District Court Order
of 9/30/93 at 4-5.
C. Wright
asserts that there wasn't probable cause to believe he'd committed a
crime, let alone to search his apartment and car. The record,
however, flatly contradicts this claim. There was plenty of evidence
for the magistrate to "conclude that it would be reasonable to seek
the evidence" in Wright's apartment and
car. United States v. Peacock, 761 F.2d 1313, 1315 (9th Cir.1985);
see United States v. Bertrand, 926 F.2d 838, 842 (9th Cir.1991).
Samuel's affidavit adequately supported such a conclusion and,
contrary to Wright's assertions, it was not
ambiguous as to where to look.
D. Nor are we persuaded by
Wright's claim that the gun found in his
car should have been suppressed because the warrant authorized the
search of a pickup truck. Although Wright
argues that under the criteria of United States v. Turner, 770 F.2d
1508, 1511 (9th Cir.1985), the search here was illegal, we conclude
that Turner supports the search. While the warrant's description was
partially inaccurate, it was sufficiently particular "to enable the
executing officer to locate and identify the premises with
reasonable effort"; in addition, there was not a "reasonable
probability that another premise might be mistakenly searched." Id.
at 1510.
E. Wright
challenges the inclusion of his 1969 assault conviction in his
criminal history score. We find this conviction was properly counted
under U.S.S.G. Sec. 4A1.2(e)(1). Looking to Fed.R.Crim.P. 45(a), we
count back fifteen years from the day before commencement of the
offense at issue--August 30, 1991--and find Wright
spending his last day in prison for the 1969 assault.
F. Finally,
Wright's uncounted prior convictions properly served as a
basis for upward departure under U.S.S.G. Sec. 4A1.3(a). The
district court adequately explained its reasons for departing and
the basis of its departure, see United States v. Cruz-Ventura, 979
F.2d 146, 150 (9th Cir.1992); United States v. Notrangelo, 909 F.2d
363, 367 (9th Cir.1990), and the extent of its departure was
reasonable.
AFFIRMED.
79 F.3d 112
UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee,
v. Douglas Franklin WRIGHT, Defendant-Appellant.
No. 95-30054
United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.
Argued and Submitted
January 10, 1996--Portland, Oregon
Filed March 7, 1996
On Appeal from the United
States District Court for the District of
Oregon Owen M. Panner, Chief District Judge,
Presiding
Before: John T. Noonan, Jr., Edward
Leavy and Michael Daly Hawkins, Circuit
Judges.
Opinion by Judge Hawkins
OPINION
HAWKINS, Circuit Judge:
I. FACTS AND JURISDICTIONAL
SETTING
The events central to
consideration of this appeal, which would
become known as the Warm Springs Murders,
were set in motion in the Fall of 1991 when
two young homeless men were approached in
downtown Portland by a man offering them
work outside the city. One of the young men
was Randy Henry, who sometimes used the name
Marty McDaniel. The other was McDaniel's
friend Tony Nelson. The pair accepted the
man's offer and left with him in a Toyota
bearing Oregon license plates.
After a brief stop at the
driver's apartment in a nearby town, the
trio drove to the Mt. Hood area. They then
drove off the highway and into a forested
area which, it turns out, was within the
exterior boundaries of the Warm Springs
Indian Reservation. Exiting the Toyota, the
driver and Tony Nelson walked away from the
car while McDaniel stood facing the opposite
direction. Suddenly McDaniel heard a gunshot.
Turning to the direction
of the sound, he saw the driver with a long-barrelled
revolver.
McDaniel did not stop to
ask questions, but sprinted off barefoot
through the woods to the highway where he
was able to flag down a motorist named Ervie
Dominguez. Dominguez drove McDaniel to a
rest area and called the police. While
Dominguez was calling authorities, McDaniel
left the area.
Two days later, hunters
found the body of Tony Nelson. The next day
agents located McDaniel in downtown Portland.
Following a series of interviews in the area,
the FBI located a man who had been in prison
with defendant and who was able to identify
him as the man who had earlier picked up
Nelson and McDaniel.
Using motor vehicle
registration information, agents determined
that defendant owned a Toyota with Oregon
plates, was employed in a neighboring
community, and listed an apartment as his
address. McDaniel identified the apartment
house, but was unable to pick defendant out
of a photo lineup. While this investigation
was unfolding, ballistics tests indicated
that the firearm which had killed Tony
Nelson had also killed an Anthony Barker,
whose body had been discovered a few days
before and within one mile of the location
where Nelson's body was found.
Utilizing the information
gathered to that point in the investigation,
agents obtained a search warrant for
defendant's car and apartment. The execution
of those warrants produced two weapons, one
of which was a .357 Sturm Ruger Blackhawk.
Subsequent ballistics tests tied the .357 to
both the Nelson and Barker deaths.
A cooperative effort
involving state, federal and tribal
officials, the Warm Springs murder
investigation eventually produced four
victims and a jurisdictional jigsaw puzzle.
Because defendant had a prior felony
conviction, his possession of the two
firearms could be charged in either state or
federal court.
Defendant and three of
the victims were non-Indians, but Tony
Nelson was a member of the Makah Tribe. All
of the bodies had been found on the Warm
Springs Indian Reservation. McDaniel placed
the site of the Nelson murder there. The
result was that the State of Oregon had
jurisdiction over the three other victims,
but the Nelson murder was purely a federal
matter.
The charges against
defendant thereafter proceeded as follows:
(1) the felon-in-possession charges went to
trial in federal court where defendant was
convicted of all counts; (2) Oregon then
went forward with the murder charges
involving the non-Indian victims, where
defendant was convicted and sentenced to
death; and (3) the United States indicted
defendant on the Nelson murder, which
charges were headed for a bench trial before
the motions leading to this appeal.
The present interlocutory
appeal involves the district court's pre-trial
order denying defendant's motion to dismiss
the Nelson murder charges against him based
on a claimed double jeopardy violation, due
process grounds, and the district court's
supervisory power to dismiss indictments for
prosecutorial excess. We have jurisdiction
over defendant's double jeopardy claim,
Abney v. United States, 431 U.S. 651, 662
(1977), and we affirm. We dismiss
defendant's remaining claims for lack of
jurisdiction.
II. ANALYSIS
A. Double Jeopardy
We review de novo the
district court's denial of a motion to
dismiss on double jeopardy grounds. United
States v. Lun, 944 F.2d 642, 644 (9th Cir.
1991).
Under the test set forth
in Blockburger v. United States, 284 U.S.
299 (1932), double jeopardy exists if the
second offense contains elements identical
to, or included as a subset within, the
elements of the former charge. Defendant
concedes that the United States is not
barred under Blockburger from trying him for
murder after having convicted him of being a
felon in possession. Defendant contends,
however, that the United States should be
barred from pursuing the present prosecution
pursuant to a line of double jeopardy cases
including Brown v. Ohio, 432 U.S. 161
(1977), Harris v. Oklahoma, 433 U.S. 682
(1977), Illinois v. Vitale, 447 U.S. 410
(1980), and Grady v. Corbin, 495 U.S. 508
(1990), which he contends establish a second
double jeopardy test that focuses on the
conduct for which the defendant was
previously prosecuted rather than the
elements of the previous offense.
Defendant's argument is
foreclosed by the Supreme Court's decision
in United States v. Dixon, _____ U.S. _____,
113 S. Ct. 2849 (1993), which overruled
Grady and which made clear that, contrary to
defendant's contention, Brown, Harris and
Vitale did not themselves establish a same-conduct
double jeopardy test. Because the test set
forth in Blockburger is the only test for
analyzing a double jeopardy claim and
because defendant admits and we agree that
the present prosecution is not barred under
this test, the district court properly
denied defendant's motion to dismiss on
double jeopardy grounds.
B. Remaining Claims
Defendant, contending
that the federal government has wrongfully
conspired with the State of Oregon to
subject him to successive prosecutions, also
appeals the district court's refusal to
dismiss his indictment under the due process
clause and pursuant to the district court's
inherent supervisory power. Because these
claims do not fall within the narrow
category of claims reviewable on
interlocutory appeal pursuant to the
doctrine set forth in Abney v. United States,
431 U.S. 651, 662 (1977), we dismiss the
remainder of defendant's appeal for lack of
jurisdiction.
