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Jack Leon Ruby was an American nightclub owner and alleged associate of the Chicago Outfit who murdered Lee Harvey Oswald on November 24, 1963, two days after Oswald was accused of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. A Dallas jury found Ruby guilty of murdering Oswald and sentenced him to death. Ruby's conviction was later appealed, and he was to be granted a new trial; however, he became ill in prison and died of a pulmonary embolism from lung cancer on January 3, 1967.
Diane Alexis Whipple was an American lacrosse player and college coach. She was killed in a dog attack in San Francisco on January 26, 2001. The dogs involved were two Presa Canarios: a male named Bane and a female named Hera. Paul Schneider, the dogs' owner, is a high-ranking member of the Aryan Brotherhood and is serving three life sentence terms in state prison. The dogs were looked after by Schneider's attorneys, Robert Noel and Marjorie Knoller, a husband and wife who lived in the same apartment building as Diane Whipple. After the fatal attack, the state brought criminal charges against the attorneys. Robert Noel, who was not present during the attack, was convicted of manslaughter. Marjorie Knoller, who was present, was charged with implied-malice second-degree murder and convicted by the jury. Knoller's murder conviction, an unusual result for an unintended dog attack, was rejected by the trial judge but ultimately upheld. The case clarified the meaning of implied malice murder.
Capital punishment is a legal punishment under the criminal justice system of the United States federal government. It can be imposed for treason, espionage, murder, large-scale drug trafficking, or attempted murder of a witness, juror, or court officer in certain cases.
Henry Menasco Wade was an American lawyer who served as district attorney of Dallas County from 1951 to 1987. He participated in two notable U.S. court cases of the 20th century: the prosecution of Jack Ruby for killing Lee Harvey Oswald, and the U.S. Supreme Court's decision legalizing abortion, Roe v. Wade. In addition, Wade was district attorney when Randall Dale Adams, the subject of the 1988 documentary film The Thin Blue Line, was wrongfully convicted in the murder of Robert Wood, a Dallas police officer.
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On February 15, 1971, Rene Guzman and Leonardo Lopez abducted five law enforcement officers in West Dallas, Texas, killing three of them and injuring a fourth at a site near the Trinity River. The fifth deputy was able to escape the shooting uninjured and call for help. Guzman and Lopez were suspects in a burglary in Ellis County, Texas, and the officers were obtaining consent-to-search forms when they were abducted.
Crystal Mason is an African-American woman who was convicted of attempting to cast a vote while on federal supervised release during the 2016 United States presidential election. Mason was under supervised release after completing a five-year sentence for tax fraud. She cast a provisional ballot after arriving at her polling place and finding her name stripped from the sign-in sheets. She was convicted three months later for voter fraud and sentenced to five years imprisonment. On March 31, 2021 the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals agreed to consider Mason's appeal.
References
- ↑ Woo, Elaine (2 March 2001). "Henry Wade; Named in Roe vs. Wade, Tried Jack Ruby" – via LA Times.
- ↑ Tinsley, Anna M. (2015-03-23). "Tarrant County's 'famous' case file won't be destroyed". Fort Worth Star-Telegram . Retrieved 2019-01-08.
- Appellate Court Decision: Crim. No. 37900