It has been a deadly summer in Henderson County, with three murders in the last three months:
- June 8: Cedrick Collins was shot to death in Athens. Raheem Mark Miller, 18, of Athens has been arrested and charged with Capital Murder.
- July 21: Victoria Ann Wyatt, 4, was killed near Athens. Her mother, Stacie Marie Parsons, 25, of Athens has been arrested and charged with Capital Murder.
- Aug. 2: Deborah Denise Allen was killed near Payne Springs. Clyde Jason Tennison, 50, of Payne Springs was arrested and charged with Murder.
Two of those suspects — Raheem Miller and Stacie Parsons — have been charged with Capital Murder, which means the state intends to leave the death penalty as a punishment option for a jury.
It also means some big bills.
Tuesday, Henderson County Commissioners’ Court approved an $86,200 emergency expenditure to help the District Attorney’s Office as it works on the Capital Murder cases. But that is just the start. District Attorney R. Scott McKee has also included more than $400,000 in his 2015 budget for the two cases.
And depending on how the cases progress, that still may not be enough money.
McKee said he used the county’s last Capital Murder trial, which found Randall Mays guilty of killing sheriff’s deputies Tony Ogburn and Paul Habelt, as a reference. He also visited with the Smith County District Attorney’s Office, which currently has 19 active Capital Murder cases.
McKee said he believes a Capital Murder case will take between one-and-a-half to two years and will cost between $400,000 and $700,000.
McKee’s estimate is in line with information from the national Death Penalty Information Center. Last year, the center’s executive director, Richard C. Dieter, said:
“Virtually every step in the criminal justice process will take longer in a death penalty case and be more complicated. In terms of costs, it means that whatever expenses there are in an ordinary criminal case, they will be much higher in a capital case. More experienced lawyers will be needed, more experts will be employed, more questions will be asked of potential jurors, more time will be taken for the trial and appeals.”
Expert testimony could become an important factor in the Stacy Parsons case, in particular. Commissioner Ronny Lawrence acknowledged that “the mental issue” and a possible insanity defense could come into play.
McKee said he could not comment because of a gag order in the case.