Court to decide on Dennis execution

Friday, July 16, 2004 | 9:32 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- A decision is expected Monday or Tuesday from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on whether it will delay the Thursday execution of killer Terry J. Dennis who has asked to give up his appeals and go to his death.

The court may want more time to consider the appeal of Reno lawyer Karla Butko, who has filed a "next friend" petition trying to halt the execution by lethal injection.

The state attorney general's office on Thursday asked the court to dismiss the Butko petition, saying it was brought in "bad faith without basis in law or in fact."

Senior Deputy Attorney General Robert Wieland, who wrote the motion to dismiss the petition, said Butko's appeal is being carried "by officious intermeddlers whose only desire is to advance their own agenda to frustrate or delay by whatever means possible the execution of the sentence lawfully imposed in state court."

He said Butko had no standing to bring the appeal. She once represented Dennis but withdrew as his attorney in November last year after Dennis waived his appeal to the Nevada Supreme Court.

Wieland said Butko withdrew because Dennis' desire to proceed with the execution was so repugnant to her that she could no longer represent Dennis. Another attorney was assigned to represent Dennis, who was later found competent by a state district judge and the Nevada Supreme Court to give up his appeal and proceed to execution.

Last month Butko filed a motion as a "Next Friend" in federal district court to scrap the execution. U.S. District Judge Philip Pro denied the motion and Butko appealed to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Butko maintains Dennis is not mentally capable of making the decision to die.

Wieland said Butko is being used by Michael Pescetta, an assistant federal public defender, to advance the appeal. Pescetta, an expert in death penalty cases, was denied permission to appear as a friend of the court before the Nevada Supreme Court.

Dennis, 57, pleaded guilty to the March 1999 strangulation of Ilona Straumanis, 56, after a three-day drinking spree in a Reno motel.

Dennis told investigators he choked her to death during sex.