David Eugene Matthews

This will be my fourth case that involves a death penalty case out of the state of Kentucky. One would think so many of them would be rather routine or at least similar in nature, but if these four cases show anything it shows that anything can happen, every case is different and you never know what legal maneuvers will be tried and which ones will fail and which ones will succeed. Some only succeed temporarily.

Marco Chapman murdered two children, injured their mother and sister and in the end volunteered for the death penalty. Yet the courts had to decide if he had that right. Thomas Bowling Jr. was convicted and sentenced to death for the killing a couple in their car and shooting their son but in my opinion there was insufficient evidence. He died in prison of cancer. John Garland was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of three people. He maintained his innocence until his natural death in prison, blaming his son. This latest case is one in which David Matthews was convicted of killing two people and claiming at trial that he suffered from “extreme emotional distress” and actually got a court to overturn his conviction before the United States Supreme Court stepped in and reinstated his conviction.

Death penalty cases are riddled with appeals. I do not believe that every state, but many have automatic appeals when it comes to death penalty cases. This case actually had more appeals than I have seen before due to the fact that it was appealed to the 6^th District Circuit Court at the federal level and then that was appealed up to the United States Supreme Court. Appeals are great because you get a lot of information out of them but they can also be tiring and mundane because sometimes they can drag on and on and it is easy to miss some things.

David Matthews had been married to his wife, Mary “Marlene” for about two and a half years in 1981. The lived in Louisville Kentucky. The last year of their marriage had apparently been full of many separations and court filings. David would move out of the home where Marlene and her young daughter stayed apparently because the home was owned by a family member of hers and she rented from them. David would go and live with his mother. It was said that within the five weeks previous to the end of June two warrants had been issued against David in relation to their relationship. The first one was a warrant in which it was claimed, apparently by Marlene, that David has sexually abused her then six year old daughter. The second one was a warrant related to David breaking into her home. It was said that David was arrested on the first warrant and was released but was forbidden to contact Marlene. He was not served with the second warrant before June 29^th.

Around mid-morning of June 29, 1981 Lawrence Cruse, Marlene's father, had gone to her home. It is not clear whether he was still married to Marlene's mother, Mary “Magdalene.” Because of this it was not clear whether Magdalene was living with Marlene or had simply spent the night in her home with her. Regardless, Lawrence walked into a nightmare. Magdalene was in bed with a gunshot wound to the back of her head. Amazingly, and sadly, she was still alive. It was determined later that she had laid in agony and convulsing for about eight hours before she would die. Inside the other bedroom Lawrence would find his daughter, Marlene. She had a gunshot wound in the back and one in the chest. It was determined later that she likely died almost immediately. The side door of the house had the screen cut and the glass broken; a pocket knife was found on the steps.

I can only assume that because of the history between David and Marlene he became the number one suspect and law enforcement immediately wanted to talk to him. They found him at his mothers house later that morning. It was said that he had already began washing the clothes that he had been wearing. I am unsure if he was technically arrested at that time or whether he was just asked to go to the station for questioning. Of course he could be arrested on the warrant for the previous burglary on Marlene's house. I did not find specifics on things but I would gander to guess that before going over to find him at his mother's home that law enforcement had ran a check on him, if for no other reason than to get an address and would have found the warrant at that time. It was said that the warrant was not served until after the crime. The warrant alone would have given them reason and cause to arrest him.

Seemingly while David was at the police station a search was done at his mother's home. It was said that the murder weapon, a .22 caliber handgun he had “purchased with borrowed funds just hours before the crime,” was found in a “secret” area below the floorboards of a shed that was in the backyard at his mother's home. Meanwhile back at the station David was denying that he was involved in the crime.

By the time David went on trial in October of 1982 he had changed his story. His defense attorney's not longer claimed that he had not committed the murders. They argued however that he had done so under “extreme emotional distress.” While David himself did not testify on his own behalf a psychiatrist who he had spoken to did. According to the psychiatrist he had been drinking heavily and doing drugs when he broke into Marlene's home around one or two in the morning. He said that he found Magdalene in a bed and shot her, believing her to be dead. That would be a good guess since the coroner would later say that the gunshot wounds indicated that the gun had been no more than eighteen inches away. He then went into Marlene's room where he said he had sex with her one or two times before staying with her until about six that morning. At that point he shot her. He claimed to have shot her twice because he believed the first one had missed.

I did not find or read through a lot of things from the trial and most articles and information revolved around his claim of “extreme emotional distress” but everything I found and read, from articles, to appeals to anything else claimed there was an overwhelming amount of evidence that made his guilt clear. This sometimes happens when there is a core issue that is disputed. You lose a lot of the little things that were said and done throughout the trial because appeals are generally very narrow in their findings and their reasons. In this case the big dispute came first whether the courts had applied the law correctly pertaining to extreme emotional distress and then later whether federal courts had the authority to make decisions.

On October 8, 1982 the jury convicted David Matthews of two counts of capital murder and one count of first degree burglary. On November 11, 1982 he was sentenced to death, times two and also given a twenty year sentence for the burglary. Over the years the Kentucky courts denied all of his appeals. In 2008 U.S. Judge stated that he believed that while Matthews evidence of guilt was “quite clear” that the trial court had not followed the law when considering the defense of extreme emotional distress. He claimed, and apparently it was true, although, subjective, that when a defendant showed clear evidence of extreme emotional distress that the law at the time required that the prosecutors showed that this was not true. If the prosecutors failed to do so, as this judge felt they had here, then the person could not be convicted of first degree murder, but of manslaughter instead, which did not qualify for the death penalty. He ordered that the case should be reviewed and either order a new trial, or of course they could overrule his decision.

This is where it gets a bit confusing. From my understanding this case then went back to the Kentucky courts who ruled that while he had claimed extreme emotional distress he had not shown “beyond a reasonable doubt” as required that this was the case, therefore the prosecutor did not in fact have to prove that he did not suffer from this. Their interpretation of the law, which is what they do, was that the prosecutor was required to disprove this only when there was overwhelming and convincing evidence from the defense. It appears to me that the only real evidence they had was a psychiatrist who testified about what Matthews had said to him and likely rendered an opinion as to his state of mind. As I stated earlier I did not find a lot of trial information but I am going to gander to guess that the prosecution had their own witness who likely testified differently as to Matthews state of mind or they felt they cross examined the psychiatrist adequately to meet the burden of proof they needed.

Then in 2011 a habeas corpus was filed in federal court. Basically a habeas corpus means that the person is claiming that their Constitutional right to “unlawful or indefinite” imprisonment is being violated. This was heard by the 6^th District Circuit Court. From the way I understood it, they agreed with the judge in 2008 that the prosecution had not, yet should have, proven “beyond a reasonable doubt” that Matthews did not suffer from extreme emotional distress. This led to another appeal that made its way to the United State Supreme Court in 2012. They finally ruled that both federal courts were wrong in their decisions. The ruled that not only had they both given poor examples of cases they used to bolster their decision but they ruled it was wrong that they were “using a federal habeas corpus review as a vehicle to second guess the reasonable decision of the state courts.” They ruled that the 6^th District “had no authority” to rule on this case at all. So when it was all said and done David Matthews' conviction and sentencing remained as they had been in the beginning.

I cannot tell you if today in 2022 what “line” Matthews lies in the “longest serving death row inmate in the state.” At one point he was listed third, then I saw he had “moved up” to second. He may be first at this point. He is not “moving up” because Kentucky is executing inmates, it is because they are dying. Some of illnesses; some of old age. Currently Matthews is seventy-three years old and has been in the Kentucky prison system, with a death sentence since 1982. The last thing I found surrounding his fight for release was in 2013. He had as a federal court to grand him funds to pay for a MRI to be used with “an expected clemency petition.” It was rejected on the grounds that this was not a federal case and they had no position or stake in the case.