A federal appeals court has ordered a new sentencing hearing for a death row inmate convicted of killing a hitchhiker for $13 in gas money almost three decades ago in western Pennsylvania.
Scott Wayne Blystone, 55, of Fairchance, was convicted by a Fayette County jury of the 1983 murder of Dalton Charles Smithburger Jr. Prosecutors said Blystone picked up the victim, demanded money for gas, then robbed and shot him six times in the back of the head.
The defense called no witnesses during his trial, and the defendant did not testify and offered no evidence in the penalty phrase, in which jurors decided that he should be executed. He blamed his attorney, but state courts ruled that Blystone himself decided to present no defense against the advice of his attorney and after being questioned by the judge.
A federal judge in 2005 declined to overturn the verdict but ordered a new sentencing hearing, saying the attorney should have offered testimony about his client's mental problems. Prosecutors appealed, arguing that the defendant's statement during the penalty phase that he did not want to testify or call his parents as witnesses was comparable to other murder cases in which defendants had refused similar efforts to avoid a capital sentence.
The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the lower court ruling Thursday, agreeing that the defendant's statement did not necessarily mean that he would have forbidden his lawyer from calling an expert witness. The appeals court also refused to order a new trial despite Blystone's allegations of prosecutorial misconduct, agreeing with the judge that there was overwhelming evidence of guilt including witness testimony and a recording of the defendant bragging about the slaying.
Unless the new ruling is appealed, state courts will have 120 days to hold a new sentencing hearing, or Blystone's sentence will automatically be reduced to life in prison.
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