Death row inmate set for execution asks for clemency

SALT LAKE CITY — Attorneys for Ralph Leroy Menzies, who is scheduled to be executed by firing squad on Sept. 5, argued in a request to the Utah Board of Pardons and Parole Wednesday that he should be granted clemency.

His attorneys cited Menzies’s mental health, specifically dementia that they claim is getting worse, along with comments from the judge who sentenced Menzies, saying he made a mistake when issuing the death sentence.

Third District Judge Matthew Bates signed an execution warrant for Menzies, 67, on July 9 after denying a request to stay the case again and determining there are no legal reasons why Menzies should not be executed.

Menzies was found guilty of murdering Maurine Hunsaker, a 26-year-old mother of three who worked at a gas station in Kearns, in 1986. She called to tell her husband she had been abducted, and her body was found in Big Cottonwood Canyon two days later.

The Utah Department of Corrections said Monday it is making preparations for the execution just after midnight on Sept. 5. The pardons board will now decide whether to set a commutation hearing.

‘Cruelty disguised as punishment’

The attorneys said in a press release that the clemency petition “outlines in stark detail how Mr. Menzies’ mind has been overtaken by disease and how multiple systemic failures render his death sentence unfair and excessive.”

The petition claims he is confused and no longer understands why Utah is trying to kill him. It said that although his attorney, Eric Zuckerman, advised Menzies to sign the petition, he did not understand it or the clemency process.

“The Ralph Menzies who was sentenced to death in 1988 no longer exists. Executing him now, decades later, when he is physically and cognitively impaired, does not serve the ends of justice,” the petition argues.

It says executing someone with dementia is “cruelty disguised as punishment,” and would be “a hollow, inhumane spectacle devoid of moral or societal value.”

The petition said the board has not granted clemency since the death penalty was reinstated and Utah has never executed someone with dementia.

“If ever there were a case that warrants (clemency), this is the case,” it says.

New options

The clemency petition said Judge Raymond Uno, who died last year, initially sentenced Menzies to death because of a belief that he was too dangerous to incarcerate, but Menzies has not received a violent infraction while in prison.

“Mr. Menzies’ record for nearly 40 years on death row confirms he poses no threat to anyone in prison if given a life-without-parole sentence,” his attorney Lindsey Layer said in the statement.

When he was sentenced, there was no option for a sentence of life without the possibility of parole; only life with parole was available. However, the clemency petition argues that such a sentence could be imposed now. It also said Uno’s opinion was partially based on perjured testimony from a jailhouse informant that he had boasted about the crime.

In a sworn statement cited in the petition, Uno said the sentence should be reduced to life in prison without parole, based on misapplied law and evidence of Menzies’ mental illnesses at the time. The petition said the judge’s statement was struck from Menzies’ record as irrelevant and not considered during appeals.

According to the petition, former Supreme Court Justice Christine Durham, who upheld Menzies’ death sentence four times, also no longer believes Menzies should be executed. It cited a decision she agreed with while on the Salt Lake City District Attorney’s Conviction Integrity Panel.

The petition cites multiple instances where Menzies’ attorneys believe there were issues with the investigation or evidence, such as Menzies having a darker shirt on than the others in the lineup where he was identified.

Ultimately, the petition said Menzies should have his sentence reduced to life without the possibility of parole.

“This case would not withstand scrutiny today and cannot support the ultimate punishment,” the petition argues.

Competency dispute continues

The board’s clemency decision is not the only legal step that could affect whether Menzies’ execution occurs in seven weeks. He filed a recent petition that the district court will consider and has an appeal before the Utah Supreme Court.

Menzies is currently asking Bates to consider whether his mental health has deteriorated significantly enough in the last few months to make him incompetent to be put to death. He claims his mental health has deteriorated even further over the past few months and he is now on oxygen.

Bates ruled in June that Menzies was competent after the execution process was put on hold for over a year to consider the earlier competency petition. The new petition will be considered in a hearing on July 23, where the judge could put the case on hold.

Menzies has also appealed Bates’s June decision that he was competent.