Execution order signed for inmate

Leonard was already serving time for two prior murder convictions - one in Florida and one in Nevada - when he attacked and killed fellow inmate Joseph Wright in October 1987. Wright died of more than 20 stab wounds from a homemade knife.

Leonard was convicted in August 1989 and sentenced to death. He has been battling the conviction and sentence ever since.

His lawyers, Richard Cornell of Reno and Erik Johnson of Carson City, are asking the Nevada Supreme Court to postpone the execution, which would take place the week of Sept. 21. If the Nevada court doesn't put it off, they'll ask a federal judge to delay it pending an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Cornell said there are several issues that merit court review, including effectiveness of counsel during the original trial.

He also said Leonard's best chance for a new penalty hearing may be the Ninth Circuit Court's order granting a new hearing in the Gerald Gallego case.

Gallego won a new penalty hearing because one argument to the jury for the death sentence was that he could be eligible for clemency and eventual release.

Cornell said it wasn't true in Gallego's case, and the same instruction was given in the Leonard case.

"Like Gallego, Leonard isn't eligible for clemency," Cornell said. "You don't tell the jury Leonard could get out and be walking around in arguing for death when he couldn't. He's going to die in prison."

He also said Leonard's trial lawyer, Jim Wessel, was under extreme pressure during the trial, facing the possibility he'd be charged with felony embezzlement. As a result, Cornell said Wessel made several critical errors.

He said a Nevada Supreme Court opinion denying the appeal cites eight errors by Wessel "but each time the response was, 'Yeah, but so what.' Our position is, doesn't there come a point in time when you say enough is enough."

Cornell admitted very few such petitions win a U.S. Supreme Court hearing. But he said there are grounds for another round of appeals through the federal system because of errors during the trial even if this appeal fails.

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