Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard 2010 Annual Report

Criminal Division (continued)
Money and guns were found in a home in Manlius, NY, as a result of a search warrant executed in cooperation between the Arizona Attorney General’s office and Manlius Police Department
for a fraud investigation. Defendants Gordon and Majda Deibler were charged with fraud schemes, insurance fraud and theft. They had fled to New York and attempted to hide assets.
Both Gordon Deibler and his wife pleaded guilty to felonies. Gordon Deibler was sentenced to five years in prison and ordered to pay more than $1 million in restitution. Majda Deibler was
placed on probation.
Bible v. Ryan
Richard Bible was sentenced
to death for the kidnapping,
molestation and murder of a
9-year-old girl in Flagstaff in
1988. After 17 years of litigation
of Bible’s claims in state
and federal court, the Ninth Circuit
affirmed the district court’s
denial of Bible’s habeas corpus
petition. The U.S. Supreme
Court denied Bible’s petition for
certiorari. We requested a warrant
of execution in the Arizona
Supreme Court based on Bible’s
exhaustion of his appeals. The
Court continued the motion
based on Bible’s last-minute
request for DNA testing.
State v. Donald Edward Beaty
On May 9, 1984, 13-year-old
Christy Ann Fornoff disappeared
while collecting for her Phoenix
Gazette newspaper route at
the Rock Point Apartments in
Tempe. Two days later, Donald
Edward Beaty, the resident
maintenance manager for the
complex, was arrested. On June
20, 1985, jurors convicted him
of first-degree murder and
sexual assault. Judge Rufus C.
Coulter, Jr. sentenced Beaty to
death. The Arizona Supreme
Court affirmed his convictions
and death sentence.
His case was litigated for the
next two decades in the state
and federal courts during which
time the trial judge died and the
victim’s parents aged waiting for
finality. In 2009, for the third
time, the U.S. Supreme Court
refused to review Beaty’s case.
After DNA testing, the State requested
a warrant of execution.
The Arizona Supreme Court
denied the request after Beaty
responded that he would be
filing his eighth post-conviction
relief petition challenging Arizona’s
lethal injection protocol.
(With other death row inmates,
Beaty had also challenged the
protocol in federal court. That
civil case is pending before the
Ninth Circuit.) In March 2010,
the trial court dismissed Beaty’s
eighth petition for post-conviction
relief. Beaty has asked
the Arizona Supreme Court to
review that decision.
State v. Eric John King
On December 27, 1989, shortly
after midnight, Eric John King,
recently released from prison,
robbed a U-Totem convenience
market at 48th Street and
Broadway in Phoenix. He killed
both Ron Barman, the store
manager, and Richard Butts,
the security guard. The robbery
and murder of Ron Barman was
captured on two video cameras.
Jurors convicted him of two
Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard • 2010 Annual Report
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