Executioner's Song, The - Norman Mailer [383]
Earl telephoned the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver-Utah being one of the six states in the Tenth Circuit-to speak to the Clerk, Howard Phillips, and tell him the Utah Attorney General's office was fearful some last-minute and, legally speaking, curious efforts might be made to prevent the execution. He wanted, therefore, to be able to contact the Court over the weekend, particularly on Sunday, in case the A.G. needed to make a countermove at the eleventh hour.
Dorius had his secretary check airline schedules, and learned that the last flight from Salt Lake to Denver was at 9:20 on Saturday and Sunday nights which information he passed on to Mike Deamer, Hansen's Deputy Attorney General. It meant that if they had to get to the Tenth Circuit Sunday night after 9:20, special transportation would be necessary.
Earl's next call was to Michael Rodak, the Clerk of the United States Supreme Court. Rodak and he discussed the mechanics of last-minute appeals to Washington, D.C. They also agreed on a special code Rodak could use if the Supreme Court had to reach Dorius.
That was very important. They did not want some crank or overmotivated party to be able to call Utah State Prison at the last moment and claim they were the Supreme Court and announce a Stay of Execution.
The prison had to know it was the Clerk, and only the Clerk, of the U.S. Supreme Court speaking. So Michael Rodak now told Dorius that his nickname was Mickey, and he had been raised in Wheeling, West Virginia. The code would be "Mickey from Wheeling, West Virginia, is calling."
Friday afternoon, two cases landed on Earl. The first was from Gil Athay representing his Death Row client, Dale Pierre, one of the hi-fi killers convicted for pouring Drano down customers' throats in a stereo and hi-fi store. Athay was arguing the execution of Gary Gilmore would create a public atmosphere that would injure his client's chances for appeal.
Just as Dorius was walking over to Hansen's office to discuss this development, another call came. The ACLU was bringing a taxpayers' suit before Judge Conder in State District Court. Two cases and one afternoon to do them in.
It was decided Bill Evans and Earl Dorius would oppose Gil Athay, and Bill Barrett and Michael Deamer would argue the other.
A couple of hours later they came back with victories in both cases. It was mainly, Earl thought, because the plaintiffs couldn't show any rights denied by the execution. Gilmore's immediate family might be able to claim standing, but there it ended. You simply couldn't have everybody going to Court. Thank God for standing, thought Earl. That afternoon, he had argued the public would be harmed by any further delay of execution, and he meant it. The nightmare of public circuses was that the longer they went on, the more they could make everything worthwhile look ridiculous.
3
Friday afternoon after Court, Phil Hansen found himself thinking again about Nicole and Gary Gilmore. After a couple of meetings with Nicole had failed to come off, he had kept thinking about Gilmore and assumed his girl friend would get in touch with him for the appeal. Hansen was so busy with his own practice that it was hard to sit down on any given day and take positive steps about something not even in his office. Before he knew it, therefore, Gilmore was refusing to appeal. At that point, Phil began to wonder how he could possibly step in. Could you save a man who didn't want it? Still, the idea of Gilmore being executed was personally offensive. Phil hadn't spent his years saving a few lives nobody else could-it was in fact the pride of his career-without deciding that the death sentence was an obscenity. If you were a devout Catholic, and a great football coach, it would be obscene if you were coaching Notre Dame and they lost 79-0. This particular week, the execution had been hanging over every puff of cigar smoke in the corridors of every Court in Salt Lake. Hansen came to the end of Friday afternoon with the realization he had had