New Hearing for Mississippi Murderer: Daily Journal reporter Patsy Brumfield has this story on the Mississippi Supreme Court decision to grant a hearing to review claims raised by Marlon Howell, convicted in 2000 of murdering a 61-year-old retiree who supplemented his income by delivering newspapers. Howell, on felony probation at the time, told friends that he needed money to pay supervision and other fees to his probation officer. He said that he “needed to make a sting” and that he was looking for “an easy lick” to rob in order to avoid being “locked up.” The U.S. Supreme Court rejected Howell's attack on state jury instructions in its 2005 decision in Howell v. Mississippi when it found he had not properly presented his federal claim to the state court first.

Ohio Murderer Richard Cooey, who is scheduled for execution on October 14 for killing two college students in 1986, says he committed another murder in the 1980s according to this AP story by Andrew Welsh-Huggins. Cooey recently filed a federal lawsuit arguing that he was too fat to be executed.