Robin Lovitt
Encyclopedia
Robin McKennel Lovitt is a convicted murder
er in the U.S. state
of Virginia
. He is serving life in prison without parole after being convicted of the November 18, 1998 stabbing murder of Clayton Dicks in Arlington County, Virginia
.
He was granted clemency by Virginia Governor Mark R. Warner on November 29, 2005, the day before he was scheduled to be executed by lethal injection
at the Greensville Correctional Center
.
Robin Lovitt would have been the first person executed by the Commonwealth of Virginia since James Edward Reid on 9 September 2004. It would have been the 1000th execution in the United States since the Supreme Court
ruled in Gregg v. Georgia
that new capital punishment laws were constitutionally
permissible in 1976.
, working the night shift
. He was the only employee there from 3 a.m. onwards. Casel Lucas, an inmate who befriended Lovitt in prison testified that Lovitt told him that he hid in a bathroom until he knew there would be no other people in the pool hall. He then went to jimmy open the cash register but was disturbed by Dicks. Lovitt had previously worked as a cook at the pool hall. The manager, Amy Hudon, said that he had helped her pry open the cash register with scissors a few months before the murder. Lovitt ceased working there about two months before the murder.
Jose Alverado and Carlos Clavell entered the pool hall at 3:25 a.m. and witnessed two men fighting behind the counter. One of the men fighting proceeded to stab the other with a silver-colored weapon and then kicked him as he lay on the ground. Alverado and Clavell said that they ran from the pool hall to a service station and rang 9-1-1
. Dicks was stabbed five times in his chest and once in his back. Four of these wounds were lethal. He was still alive when paramedic
s arrived but died after reaching hospital.
Police found that the cash register had been broken into and one of its money boxes was missing. A canine unit located a pair of bloodied, orange-handled scissors nearby that were identified as being a pair that were kept next to the cash register. DNA testing showed that the blood on them was from Dicks. Lovitt's cousin testified that Lovitt had come to his house on the night of 18 November carrying a metal box, which they opened with a screwdriver and split the money. Lovitt told police that he had seen a Hispanic man stabbing Dicks, and then took the cash box, which was lying on the floor of the pool hall. A forensic scientist testified that the cash box that was at the cousins house came from the cash register at the pool hall.
Lovitt appealed his conviction on the basis that there is no physical evidence linking him to the crime. He claims the entire case is based on circumstantial evidence
and the testimony of witnesses, one of whom was a prisoner. Jose Alverado was only 80% certain that the man he saw fighting behind the counter was Lovitt. Witness testimony was contradictory and according to Lovitt and his lawyers, the evidence in the case just as easily points to Jose Alverado and Carlos Clavell being the murderers.
Casel Lucas, the prisoner who testified is a drug addict, who had been convicted of a dozen felonies
including attempted rape
. It was not revealed to the jury that this was the fifth time that Lucas has testified in cases involving people he befriended in prison.
On May 2, 2001 a new law came into effect in Virginia that required all biological evidence in capital cases to be sent to a state laboratory for safe-keeping. But less than three weeks later, Robert C. McCarthy, Chief Deputy Clerk of the Circuit Court of Arlington County had the evidence in the Lovitt case destroyed. Two other clerks said they told McCarthy not to order the destruction of the evidence because it was a capital case. McCarthy told them that he thought he was authorized to destroy the trial exhibits after Lovitt's convictions were affirmed by the Supreme Court of Virginia
.
In October 2000, Lovitt's case was taken up on a pro bono basis by the law firm of Kirkland & Ellis
. Kirkland worked with the University of Notre Dame
's Washington Semester Program in pursuing Lovitt's appeals. Lovitt was also represented by the Virginia Capital Representation Resource Center. When Kirkland began representing Lovitt, Kenneth Starr
, currently Dean
of the Pepperdine University
School of Law and former United States Solicitor General
, became involved in the case. Starr is pro-capital punishment and has stated that:
The Supreme Court of Virginia, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia and the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
have all denied his appeals for overturning his conviction since the evidence has been destroyed. The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals said they would only overturn if it could be shown that McCarthy acted in "bad faith."
His execution was originally scheduled for July 11, 2005, but was stayed by the Supreme Court of the United States
to give themselves more time to consider his appeal. They decided not to hear the case again, resulting in a new execution date of November 30, 2005 being set.
Little more than 24 hours before the execution Governor
Mark R. Warner commuted Lovitt's sentence to life in prison without parole. He said that the destruction of evidence was improper and that the:
It was the first time Warner had granted clemency during his governorship.
It was revealed during the penalty phase of the trial that Lovitt had been charged with assault and placed in protective supervision at age of 11 in October 1975. Then in August 1979 he was charged with burglary
and larceny
. Between 1983 and the murders he was convicted multiple times of larceny, burglary and possession
of marijuana
and cocaine
.
Murder
Murder is the unlawful killing, with malice aforethought, of another human being, and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide...
er in the U.S. state
U.S. state
A U.S. state is any one of the 50 federated states of the United States of America that share sovereignty with the federal government. Because of this shared sovereignty, an American is a citizen both of the federal entity and of his or her state of domicile. Four states use the official title of...
of Virginia
Virginia
The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...
. He is serving life in prison without parole after being convicted of the November 18, 1998 stabbing murder of Clayton Dicks in Arlington County, Virginia
Arlington County, Virginia
Arlington County is a county in the Commonwealth of Virginia. The land that became Arlington was originally donated by Virginia to the United States government to form part of the new federal capital district. On February 27, 1801, the United States Congress organized the area as a subdivision of...
.
He was granted clemency by Virginia Governor Mark R. Warner on November 29, 2005, the day before he was scheduled to be executed by lethal injection
Lethal injection
Lethal injection is the practice of injecting a person with a fatal dose of drugs for the express purpose of causing the immediate death of the subject. The main application for this procedure is capital punishment, but the term may also be applied in a broad sense to euthanasia and suicide...
at the Greensville Correctional Center
Greensville Correctional Center
Greensville Correctional Center is a prison facility located in unincorporated Greensville County, Virginia, near Jarratt. It is operated by the Virginia Department of Corrections. Greensville houses the execution chamber used to carry out capital punishment by the Commonwealth of...
.
Robin Lovitt would have been the first person executed by the Commonwealth of Virginia since James Edward Reid on 9 September 2004. It would have been the 1000th execution in the United States since the Supreme Court
Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...
ruled in Gregg v. Georgia
Gregg v. Georgia
Gregg v. Georgia, Proffitt v. Florida, Jurek v. Texas, Woodson v. North Carolina, and Roberts v. Louisiana, 428 U.S. 153 , reaffirmed the United States Supreme Court's acceptance of the use of the death penalty in the United States, upholding, in particular, the death sentence imposed on Troy Leon...
that new capital punishment laws were constitutionally
United States Constitution
The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It is the framework for the organization of the United States government and for the relationship of the federal government with the states, citizens, and all people within the United States.The first three...
permissible in 1976.
Murder
Clayton Dicks was a manager at an Arlington pool hallPool hall
A billiard/billiards, pool or snooker hall is a place where people get together for playing cue sports such as pool, snooker or carom billiards...
, working the night shift
Night Shift
A night shift is either a group of workers who work during the night, or the period in which they work. See shift work.Night Shift may also refer to:* Night Shift , a fictional team of supervillains in the Marvel Universe...
. He was the only employee there from 3 a.m. onwards. Casel Lucas, an inmate who befriended Lovitt in prison testified that Lovitt told him that he hid in a bathroom until he knew there would be no other people in the pool hall. He then went to jimmy open the cash register but was disturbed by Dicks. Lovitt had previously worked as a cook at the pool hall. The manager, Amy Hudon, said that he had helped her pry open the cash register with scissors a few months before the murder. Lovitt ceased working there about two months before the murder.
Jose Alverado and Carlos Clavell entered the pool hall at 3:25 a.m. and witnessed two men fighting behind the counter. One of the men fighting proceeded to stab the other with a silver-colored weapon and then kicked him as he lay on the ground. Alverado and Clavell said that they ran from the pool hall to a service station and rang 9-1-1
9-1-1
9-1-1 is the emergency telephone number for the North American Numbering Plan .It is one of eight N11 codes.The use of this number is for emergency circumstances only, and to use it for any other purpose can be a crime.-History:In the earliest days of telephone technology, prior to the...
. Dicks was stabbed five times in his chest and once in his back. Four of these wounds were lethal. He was still alive when paramedic
Paramedic
A paramedic is a healthcare professional that works in emergency medical situations. Paramedics provide advanced levels of care for medical emergencies and trauma. The majority of paramedics are based in the field in ambulances, emergency response vehicles, or in specialist mobile units such as...
s arrived but died after reaching hospital.
Police found that the cash register had been broken into and one of its money boxes was missing. A canine unit located a pair of bloodied, orange-handled scissors nearby that were identified as being a pair that were kept next to the cash register. DNA testing showed that the blood on them was from Dicks. Lovitt's cousin testified that Lovitt had come to his house on the night of 18 November carrying a metal box, which they opened with a screwdriver and split the money. Lovitt told police that he had seen a Hispanic man stabbing Dicks, and then took the cash box, which was lying on the floor of the pool hall. A forensic scientist testified that the cash box that was at the cousins house came from the cash register at the pool hall.
Trial and appeals
Lovitt was arrested on November 24, 1998 and convicted by a jury of capital murder during the commission of a robbery on September 20, 1999.Lovitt appealed his conviction on the basis that there is no physical evidence linking him to the crime. He claims the entire case is based on circumstantial evidence
Circumstantial evidence
Circumstantial evidence is evidence in which an inference is required to connect it to a conclusion of fact, like a fingerprint at the scene of a crime...
and the testimony of witnesses, one of whom was a prisoner. Jose Alverado was only 80% certain that the man he saw fighting behind the counter was Lovitt. Witness testimony was contradictory and according to Lovitt and his lawyers, the evidence in the case just as easily points to Jose Alverado and Carlos Clavell being the murderers.
Casel Lucas, the prisoner who testified is a drug addict, who had been convicted of a dozen felonies
Felony
A felony is a serious crime in the common law countries. The term originates from English common law where felonies were originally crimes which involved the confiscation of a convicted person's land and goods; other crimes were called misdemeanors...
including attempted rape
Rape
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...
. It was not revealed to the jury that this was the fifth time that Lucas has testified in cases involving people he befriended in prison.
On May 2, 2001 a new law came into effect in Virginia that required all biological evidence in capital cases to be sent to a state laboratory for safe-keeping. But less than three weeks later, Robert C. McCarthy, Chief Deputy Clerk of the Circuit Court of Arlington County had the evidence in the Lovitt case destroyed. Two other clerks said they told McCarthy not to order the destruction of the evidence because it was a capital case. McCarthy told them that he thought he was authorized to destroy the trial exhibits after Lovitt's convictions were affirmed by the Supreme Court of Virginia
Supreme Court of Virginia
The Supreme Court of Virginia is the highest court in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It primarily hears appeals from the trial-level city and county Circuit Courts, as well as the criminal law, family law and administrative law cases that go through the Court of Appeals of Virginia. It is one of...
.
In October 2000, Lovitt's case was taken up on a pro bono basis by the law firm of Kirkland & Ellis
Kirkland & Ellis
Kirkland & Ellis LLP is an international law firm with headquarters in Chicago, known for its profitability and its litigation, bankruptcy, intellectual property and private equity departments. Kirkland & Ellis is currently ranked as the ninth most prestigious law firm in the United States by...
. Kirkland worked with the University of Notre Dame
University of Notre Dame
The University of Notre Dame du Lac is a Catholic research university located in Notre Dame, an unincorporated community north of the city of South Bend, in St. Joseph County, Indiana, United States...
's Washington Semester Program in pursuing Lovitt's appeals. Lovitt was also represented by the Virginia Capital Representation Resource Center. When Kirkland began representing Lovitt, Kenneth Starr
Kenneth Starr
Kenneth Winston "Ken" Starr is an American lawyer and educational administrator who has also been a federal judge. He is best known for his investigation of figures during the Clinton administration....
, currently Dean
Dean (education)
In academic administration, a dean is a person with significant authority over a specific academic unit, or over a specific area of concern, or both...
of the Pepperdine University
Pepperdine University
Pepperdine University is an independent, private, medium-sized university affiliated with the Churches of Christ. The university's campus overlooking the Pacific Ocean in unincorporated Los Angeles County, California, United States, near Malibu, is the location for Seaver College, the School of...
School of Law and former United States Solicitor General
United States Solicitor General
The United States Solicitor General is the person appointed to represent the federal government of the United States before the Supreme Court of the United States. The current Solicitor General, Donald B. Verrilli, Jr. was confirmed by the United States Senate on June 6, 2011 and sworn in on June...
, became involved in the case. Starr is pro-capital punishment and has stated that:
- "…the death penalty has to be administered with the utmost caution and reserved for the gravest offenses. This is not that kind of case. Robin Lovitt maintains his innocence, and evidence that might prove his innocence has been destroyed. I'm very distressed by that.… Society had better be absolutely certain before they put someone to death who is maintaining his innocence. I feel very passionately about that."
The Supreme Court of Virginia, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia and the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit is a federal court located in Richmond, Virginia, with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following districts:*District of Maryland*Eastern District of North Carolina...
have all denied his appeals for overturning his conviction since the evidence has been destroyed. The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals said they would only overturn if it could be shown that McCarthy acted in "bad faith."
His execution was originally scheduled for July 11, 2005, but was stayed by the Supreme Court of the United States
Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...
to give themselves more time to consider his appeal. They decided not to hear the case again, resulting in a new execution date of November 30, 2005 being set.
Little more than 24 hours before the execution Governor
Governor of Virginia
The governor of Virginia serves as the chief executive of the Commonwealth of Virginia for a four-year term. The position is currently held by Republican Bob McDonnell, who was inaugurated on January 16, 2010, as the 71st governor of Virginia....
Mark R. Warner commuted Lovitt's sentence to life in prison without parole. He said that the destruction of evidence was improper and that the:
- "[…] The actions of an agent of the Commonwealth, in a manner contrary to the express direction of the law, comes at the expense of a defendant facing society's most severe and final sanction.… The commonwealth must ensure that every time this ultimate sanction is carried out, it is done fairly."
It was the first time Warner had granted clemency during his governorship.
It was revealed during the penalty phase of the trial that Lovitt had been charged with assault and placed in protective supervision at age of 11 in October 1975. Then in August 1979 he was charged with burglary
Burglary
Burglary is a crime, the essence of which is illicit entry into a building for the purposes of committing an offense. Usually that offense will be theft, but most jurisdictions specify others which fall within the ambit of burglary...
and larceny
Larceny
Larceny is a crime involving the wrongful acquisition of the personal property of another person. It was an offence under the common law of England and became an offence in jurisdictions which incorporated the common law of England into their own law. It has been abolished in England and Wales,...
. Between 1983 and the murders he was convicted multiple times of larceny, burglary and possession
Drug possession
Drug possession is the crime of having one or more illegal drugs in one's possession, either for personal use, distribution, sale or otherwise. Illegal drugs fall into different categories and sentences vary depending on the amount, type of drug, circumstances, and jurisdiction.A person has...
of marijuana
Cannabis (drug)
Cannabis, also known as marijuana among many other names, refers to any number of preparations of the Cannabis plant intended for use as a psychoactive drug or for medicinal purposes. The English term marijuana comes from the Mexican Spanish word marihuana...
and cocaine
Cocaine
Cocaine is a crystalline tropane alkaloid that is obtained from the leaves of the coca plant. The name comes from "coca" in addition to the alkaloid suffix -ine, forming cocaine. It is a stimulant of the central nervous system, an appetite suppressant, and a topical anesthetic...
.