State's High Court Rejects 1 Death Sentence, Upholds Another

OLYMPIA - The state Supreme Court yesterday overturned the death sentence of a Pierce County killer and, in another death-penalty case, upheld the sentence of a Spokane man.

In the Pierce County case, the death sentence of Sammie Luvene was overturned because prosecutors were late in filing notice of their intent to seek execution.

In the other case, the court upheld the death sentence of Blake Richard Pirtle in the slayings of two Burger King workers in Spokane.

In the Luvene ruling, the court said that although prosecutors had prepared a notice to seek execution, they failed through simple inadvertence to file it within the allotted time, Justice Pro Tem Bob Utter wrote for the majority in the 6-3 decision.

The justices upheld Luvene's conviction for aggravated first-degree murder.

The ruling means the case will be returned to Pierce County Superior Court for Luvene to be resentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole.

In a dissenting opinion, Chief Justice Barbara Durham argued that the state's death-penalty law "explicitly provides for an extension of the notice to seek the death penalty if the failure to file was `external to the prosecutor.' "

She pointed out that the judge assigned to the case was out of town and was unavailable to sign the extension order.

"Surely the absence of a judge on the last two days of the filing period amounts to a reason external to the prosecutor," Durham wrote.

Luvene, now 28, was convicted of the July 2, 1992, shooting death of Carroll Bond, a Milton liquor-store clerk, during a robbery attempt.

In upholding Luvene's conviction, the high court turned aside several arguments asserting misconduct by prosecutors.

Utter, who resigned from the Supreme Court last year because of his opposition to the death penalty, said Luvene failed to offer sufficient proof of misconduct by the prosecutor.

While Luvene will be taken off death row, he can still appeal his life-without-parole sentence.

In the Spokane case, the high court upheld Blake Pirtle's death sentence, rejecting arguments on several appeal issues.

Pirtle, 27, admitted killing Dawnya Calbreath, 20, and Tod Folsom, 24, and robbing the restaurant of $4,200 in cash in May 1992. A Spokane County Superior Court jury found that part of his motive for slaying Calbreath was revenge for her role in his firing from the restaurant a few weeks earlier on grounds of sexual harassment.

Pirtle, who is on death row at the Washington State Penitentiary at Walla Walla, appealed the sentence on several grounds, including the contention he was abused as a child, had no history of violent crime and suffered from brain damage due to drug abuse.

"Pirtle's argument ignores the fact the jury must consider these mitigators against the nature of the crime, including the aggravating factors," the court said in an opinion written by Justice Johnson.

"Here, the jury has found two very brutal murders planned and committed to facilitate a robbery, along with revenge. Given these facts, the jury could well have felt the mitigating factors were insufficient to merit leniency," the court said.

Pirtle used a knife, blunt instrument and hacksaw blade to kill the victims.