Termane Wood, 49, is scheduled to be killed on Nov. 13 for the murder of a 19-year-old in 2002. Photo courtesy of Oklahoma Department of Corrections/Website
Nov. 5 (UPI) — A divided five-member parole board in Oklahoma voted Wednesday to recommend clemency for a 46-year-old man on death row for the 2001 New Year’s Eve stabbing death of a 19-year-old during a botched robbery.
The Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board voted 3-2 to grant Termane Wood clemency, though the final decision rests with Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, a Republican.
Wood is scheduled to be executed Nov. 13.
He currently has appeals over the alleged withholding of evidence before the Oklahoma appeals court and the U.S. Supreme Court.
Wood was convicted of killing Ronnie Wipf.
According to court documents, Wood, his brother, Zjaiton “Jake” Wood, and two women, Lanita and Brandy, were celebrating New Year’s Eve at a brewery. There, the women were approached by Wipf and Arnold Kleinsasser, who invited them back to their motel.
Prosecutors said the Wood brothers and the two women made a plan to rob Wipf and Kleinsasser. Posing as prostitutes, the two women joined their targets back at the motel, where Termane and Jake barged in. Wipf was stabbed to death. Termane was convicted of being the one who killed Wipf, despite his claims that his brother was responsible for the teen’s death.
Zjaiton Wood was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole, and died in prison in 2019.
Termane’s new attorneys argued before the board on Wednesday that their client received inadequate representation during his trial during which the jury was improperly instructed.
His lawyer, Amanda Bass Castro Alves, told the board at least one juror would not have voted in favor of the death penalty if they were aware a unanimous decision was not required for them to go home.
“And we know that if the jury had been properly instructed, at least one juror, Jera Burton, the only Black person on Termane’s jury, would have voted to spare Termane’s life.”
One vote is all that was needed for Termane to receive a life sentence.
The state’s prosecution, in turn, argued that despite the issues, Termane remains a threat to society, even from behind bars.
“The crimes for which he was convicted were not acts of desperation or impulse, they were deliberate, predatory attacks on innocent strangers who crossed into his path simply because they were seen as easy targets,” the state’s attorney general, Gentner Drummond, said in his remarks to the board.
“Termane Wood has continued to manipulate, exploit and harm others. His pattern of violence and deceit has not ceased, it has merely adapted. The same vicious intent that fueled his original crimes endures today, revealing a hardened, unrepentant mind driven by deceit and a complete disregard for human life.”
Following the decision, Drummond said he was “disappointed,” pointing to Termane’s alleged criminal activity that has continued in jail.
“My office will continue to pursue justice for Ronnie Wipf,” he said in a statement. “We intend to make our case to the governor on why clemency should not be granted and why the death sentence, as determined by a jury, should be carried out.”
On the other hand, the Oklahoma Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty celebrated the decision, telling UPI in an emailed statement that it rightly granted the recommendation of clemency, by recognizing that “justice at the hands of the state has been miscarried.”
“The state claims that elaborate illegal activity is taking place while someone is in prison, making a case against a person without affording that person due process,” OK-CAD Chair Elizabeth Overman said.
“Termane’s conviction is the product of a broken system. The death penalty is the product of that deeply faulty system, which obviates justice under the guise of being tough on crime.”
There has been a surge in executions in the United States this year, with 41 already killed in 11 states, including Oklahoma.
In March, Wendell Grissom was executed for the kidnapping and killing of a woman in 1999.
In June, John Hanson was executed for the 1999 murder of a 77-year-old woman.
