South Carolina
April 15, 2005
The state of South Carolina is set to execute Richard Longworth, 37, on April 15, 2005 for the 1991 murders of Alex Hopps and James Greene in Spartanburg County.
On January 7, 1991, Longworth and accomplice David Rocheville robbed a Spartanburg movie theatre, shooting and killing employees Hopps and Greene. Police arrested both men, who later confessed to the crimes. Longworth and Rocheville were both convicted of armed robbery, kidnapping, and two counts of murder in separate trials. Rocheville was executed in December of 1999.
Longworth’s attorneys have raised several issues in his appeals, including evidence supporting claims of ineffective assistance of counsel. Longworth’s trial attorney represented both Longworth and his parents, resulting in a conflict of interest that allowed for the suppression of potentially important mitigating evidence. In interviews with her son’s attorney, Longworth’s mother mentioned a history of domestic violence and alcohol abuse while he was growing up. However, in the interest of saving the family from publicly admitting their problems, which may have resulted in the loss of her husband’s job or her position as a foster parent, Mrs. Longworth requested that the information remain private. Longworth’s attorney agreed, and this information was not brought up at trial in an effort to spare her son’s life.
The ineffective assistance of counsel claim was expanded in Longworth’s appeals to include his attorney’s incompetence and inexperience through his failure to disclose Longworth’s use of cocaine at the time of the crime and his full family and childhood background. Although the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals maintained that these claims have no merit, they refused to review them due to a procedural matter. Longworth’s attorneys failed to raise these issues in his petition for certiorari to the South Carolina Supreme Court. Because the claims were not made at the state level before turning to the federal court system, the judges in the U.S. Court of Appeals found them to be procedurally barred from their review.
Longworth’s case magnifies the problems with the United States criminal justice system, especially an outdated appeals process that places more emphasis on an abstract set of rules than to the idea of justice outlined in the Constitution. Longworth’s arguments regarding ineffective assistance of counsel as guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment may have fallen on deaf ears in the U.S. Courts, but it is not too late to spare his life. Please contact Gov. Sanford of South Carolina and request that he stop the execution of Richard Longworth.
