Leon Rutherford King

Case record: Leon Rutherford King

Identification

• Name: Leon Rutherford King
• Age at execution: 44
• Education level: 11th grade

Status and last statement

Leon Rutherford King was executed by lethal injection in Texas on March 22, 1989.

In his last statement, King said:

"I would like to tell Mr. Richard that I appreciate all he has done for me. I love you all. God bless. Goodbye, David."

Background

On April 10, 1978, King and an accomplice robbed Michael Clayton Underwood, 26, and Underwood’s date as they walked from a Montrose-area nightclub. The woman survived.

King was convicted in relation to the 1978 slaying of Michael Clayton Underwood, 26, for which he was twice tried and convicted.

King was also described in court proceedings as having prior convictions for burglary, forgery and drug possession. His lawyers contended in appeals that his crimes stemmed from brain damage.

In appellate proceedings, the issue included whether a capital murder defendant was constitutionally entitled to question prospective jurors about their understanding of Texas parole law. The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit concluded that the Constitution did not require such an inquiry, and vacated a prior panel opinion to the contrary while denying King's application for a writ of habeas corpus.

The offence

King and an accomplice Allen Ray Carter kidnapped Michael Clayton Underwood, 26, and Underwood’s girlfriend Kay at gunpoint as they left a Houston nightclub in 1978.

The men threatened Kay with the same fate if she did not stop crying. They drove in King’s pickup truck to an isolated vacant lot not far from Houston’s Hermann Park.

Kay was forced to watch while King beat Underwood’s head in with a shotgun butt until it looked like a “broken egg.”

For nearly five additional hours, King and Carter repeatedly raped and sodomized Kay, continued to threaten her life, and jeered at having made her observe the execution of her “old man.”

Before they released Kay, King removed from her purse a slip of paper containing her address and again threatened to kill her if she called the police.

Kay was found, bedraggled and hysterical, slumped behind the wheel of her car at approximately 5:00 a.m., and later testified at King’s trials.

Investigation

Court records described Underwood and a 19-year-old companion as being abducted at gunpoint from a Houston club in 1978 and taken to a remote area where Underwood was beaten to death while his female companion was forced to watch.

Trial

King was twice tried and sentenced to capital punishment by Texas juries.

At the start of voir dire, the state court refused defense counsel’s request “[T]o voir dire each and every prospective juror on the question of being convicted of capital murder and in the event of a life sentence that person has to serve 20 years before becoming eligible for parole in light of the fact that the prospective juror is advised the mandatory sentence for capital murder is life or death.”

King founded this request on Tex. Const. art. 1, Sec. 19, and the fourteenth amendment to the federal constitution. Texas law at the time of trial forbade jurors to consider information bearing on parole in any criminal case.

During the punishment phase, the jurors were instructed:

“You are instructed that the punishment for capital murder is by death or confinement in the penitentiary for life ... You are not to discuss among yourselves how long the accused would be required to serve the sentence that you impose. Such matters come within the exclusive jurisdiction of Board of Pardons and Paroles and the Governor, and are no concern of yours.”

King did not request a jury instruction concerning Texas parole law.

During the punishment phase of King’s second trial, King stated to the jury:

“You all found me guilty of one of the most brutal murders that have ever been in Houston. If I had found a man guilty of that type of murder I figure he deserves the death penalty and that's what I am asking you is that the jury give me the death penalty. That's what I want.”

Appeals

King’s appeals reached the United States Supreme Court after appeals were rejected earlier Tuesday by a Federal judge in Houston and by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.

At the Supreme Court, the United States Supreme Court turned down three emergency appeals by votes of 7 to 2, 7 to 2 and 5 to 4, respectively. Justices William J. Brennan and Thurgood Marshall voted to spare King in acting on each of his three requests. Justices John Paul Stevens and Harry A. Blackmun joined them in one of the votes.

The Fifth Circuit en banc decision stated that it vacated a prior panel opinion to the contrary and denied King’s application for a writ of habeas corpus.

In the Fifth Circuit en banc decision, EDITH H. JONES delivered the opinion and ALVIN B. RUBIN joined by WILLIAMS and JOHNSON dissented.

Fifth Circuit en banc dissent

ALVIN B. RUBIN, Circuit Judge, with whom WILLIAMS and JOHNSON, Circuit Judges, joined, dissented.

The dissent included the following points and quoted phrases from reasoning about due process and sentencing alternatives. It stated that “The jury in a capital case is called upon to make a "highly subjective, 'unique, individualized judgment regarding the punishment that a particular person deserves.' " ” and referenced “ "deserves the sentence of death" ” along with “ "individual culpability is not always measured by the category of the crime committed." ”

The dissent quoted the following language about due process and sentencing alternatives, and explained disagreement with the majority’s decision that a state may deprive a defendant of the right to challenge jurors who may sentence him to death because they mistakenly believe that a sentence of life imprisonment will result in his early parole.

The dissent quoted Texas’s voir dire request and the jury charge about ignoring parole:

“to voir dire each and every prospective juror on the question of being convicted of capital murder and in the event of a life sentence that person has to serve 20 years before becoming eligible for parole[.]”
and “You are instructed that the punishment for capital murder is by death or confinement in the penitentiary for life.... You are not to discuss among yourselves how long the accused would be required to serve the sentence that you impose. Such matters come within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Board of Pardons and Paroles and the Governor, and are no concern of yours.”

Outcome

Leon Rutherford King was executed at 12:27 A.M. after the United States Supreme Court turned down his emergency appeals. He was the third person executed that year and the 107th since the Supreme Court restored the death penalty in 1976. He was the 30th inmate to be put to death in Texas.

In a final statement, King told five friends, “I appreciate what you did for me.”

Other details

• King’s accomplice, Allen Ray Carter, was given a life sentence.
• Court materials described Kay as a protective pseudonym.
• The Fifth Circuit en banc decision cited procedural and legal history about whether capital defendants could question jurors about Texas parole law.
• The Fifth Circuit en banc decision included numbered procedural history and discussion sections addressing whether any error would be harmless and the role of juror instructions and punishment phase testimony.
• The case summary included that prior to the Supreme Court action, appeals had been rejected earlier Tuesday by a Federal judge in Houston and the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.