Attorneys for William Andrews, who is scheduled to be executed Thursday, have filed a lawsuit that says the Utah Board of Pardons violated Andrews' rights when it denied his request for a commutation hearing during a closed session. The suit was filed late Thursday with the Utah Supreme Court.
Meanwhile, Andrews' attorneys on Friday filed an emergency request for a stay of execution with the U.S. Supreme Court pending a review of his latest appeal.The application was filed with Justice Byron White because the court currently is not in session. White handles emergency matters for the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals area. He can act alone or refer the request to the full court.
Last week, Andrews asked the U.S. Supreme Court to consider an appeal, contending jurors may have sentenced him to death simply because they felt it was the only way to ensure he would never be paroled, but Utah has since adopted laws allowing a life sentence without parole.
The nation's high court would not normally review that petition for acceptance of an appeal until it reconvenes next October. Andrews asked the Utah Supreme Court to stay his execution while he awaited word about his appeal from the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Utah court denied that request Thursday. So Andrews' lawyers filed a request for a stay with the U.S. Supreme Court - seeking a quick review even though it is adjourned for a summer recess.
Meanwhile, Gov. Norm Bangerter said Thursday, "my heart aches for William Andrews," but the governor maintained Utah's Board of Pardons is the only entity that can change Andrews' death sentence.
Bangerter also expressed sympathy for the "heavy responsibility" borne by members of the Board of Pardons.
The board said it denied Andrews' petition for a new hearing because "the petition and supporting documents fail to raise new and substantial issues."
However, Andrews' attorneys contend in the lawsuit before the Utah Supreme Court that their client's constitutional rights were violated because the board made its decision in a closed session.
That suit says Andrews had asked the board four times this month to conduct hearings "in compliance with the Utah Open and Public Meetings Act" but got no response.
"The failure of the board to conduct this business in meetings open to the public denied petitioner the ability to be informed of the nature and stage of the board's proceedings, the law under which it was acting, the evidence it was considering, and other aspects of its procedure which would be apparent at a meeting open to the public and which petitioner was entitled to know in order to perfect his application for commutation and protect his legal rights therein," the suit says.
The suit says Andrews had requested that the board hear from him personally or review videotapes of recent conversations from him and hear from witnesses and review records involving his character and record.
The suit alleges that the board's actions denied Andrews the right to communicate directly with the board, submit evidence, challenge "incorrect and unreliable evidence and information," know the basis for the board's actions and be present when the board communicated with representatives of the Utah attorney general's office.
"All these are minimal requirements of due process of law," the suit says.
Andrews was convicted of three counts of capitol homicide for his part in the 1974 robbery and murder at the Ogden Hi Fi Shop. Prosecutors contend Andrews helped poison five victims with a liquid drain cleaner before co-defendant Pierre Dale Selby shot them. Selby was executed in 1987.
Two of the five people at the shop survived.
Andrews' case has attracted international interest, including a letter from a representative of Pope John Paul II to Bangerter asking for clemency. Amnesty International and the NAACP also have lobbied on Andrews' behalf, with the NAACP contending that the trial and sentence of Andrews, who is black, were tainted by racial prejudice.
Washington correspondent Lee Davidson and Associated Press contributed to this article.