Home & Sexual Violence
Home abuse survivor who was inspiration for brand new reduced-sentencing legislation loses bid for launch
A 55-year-old home abuse survivor convicted for the 1998 homicide of her former fiance has misplaced her bid for freedom underneath a brand new legislation that she partly impressed. (Picture from Shutterstock)
A 55-year-old home abuse survivor convicted for the 1998 homicide of her former fiance has misplaced her bid for freedom underneath a brand new legislation that she partly impressed.
April Wilkens, who was sentenced to life in jail with the potential of parole, should serve the remainder of her sentence, Choose David Guten of Tulsa County, Oklahoma, dominated Thursday.
Publications with protection embody the Oklahoman, Fox 23 News, KOCO, KFOR, KTUL and Public Radio Tulsa.
The Oklahoma Survivors’ Act, signed into legislation in Could 2024, requires courts to think about proof of abuse in sentencing mitigation hearings after conviction and in resentencing hearings after incarceration.
The legislation requires survivors comparable to Wilkens to show by clear and convincing proof that their abuse was associated to their offense and a considerable contributing issue to the crime. She mentioned she killed her former fiance, Terry Carlton, after being handcuffed and sexually assaulted, KOCO previously reported.
Wilkens’ lawyer Colleen McCarty launched proof that her consumer killed Carlton due to a sample of abuse that included beatings, rapes, monetary extortion, psychological abuse and compelled drug use. McCarty is the chief director of the Oklahoma Appleseed Heart for Legislation & Justice.
However a prosecution witness, forensic psychologist Jarod Steffan, testified that the first components within the killing had been psychological sickness and drug use.
Guten agreed with prosecutors. Though Wilkens was a home abuse survivor, her lawyer had not proven that it was the rationale for the crime, Guten mentioned. He additionally rejected the testimony of an professional witness who testified for Wilkens, describing the witness as “an advocate, not an professional.”
McCarty instructed Public Radio Tulsa that she “will pursue each avenue of reduction” for Wilkens, and, “We aren’t abandoning her now, identical to we haven’t for the final three years.”
In an announcement posted to Instagram, McCarty mentioned: “Over two days of hearings, the court docket heard testimony from a sitting federal choose who represented Ms. Wilkens in a protecting order in opposition to her abuser, from a former worker of the sufferer’s household who spoke in regards to the abuser’s predatory conduct, and from certainly one of Oklahoma’s foremost consultants on coercive management and home violence. Regardless of this highly effective proof, the court docket selected to not credit score testimony from the protection and as an alternative relied totally on the state’s professional.
“This ruling is a profound setback—not just for April however for the motion of survivors throughout Oklahoma who believed this legislation might present a significant path to justice. … April’s case reveals simply how a lot work stays. We won’t cease till survivors are actually seen, heard and given the prospect for justice they deserve.”
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