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The Utah Supreme Court has denied a request from death-row inmate Michael Anthony Archuleta to have his 1988 murder case reopened based on a claim of inefficient counsel.
In an opinion released Tuesday, the high court rejected a request from Archuleta's new attorney, James Slavens, to send Archuleta's case — for killing a gay acquaintance — back to district court for a new trial.
The opinion marked the fifth time the high court had denied appeals from Archuleta.
"We find none of Archuleta's numerous claims in either of these appeals availing, and we accordingly reaffirm his conviction for first-degree felony murder and sentence of death," justices wrote in an unanimous opinion.
Slavens had argued that Archuleta, now 49, deserves a whole new trial, or at least a new penalty phase, in light of a 2009 statement from Archuleta's co-defendant, Lance Conway Wood.
In Wood's statement to Slavens in 2009, Wood accepted primary responsibility for torturing Gordon Church, a 28-year-old Southern Utah University theater student who had told Archuleta and Wood that he was gay shortly before the two attacked him.
Wood's confession, given "without hesitation," could have swayed a jury to give Archuleta a life sentence rather than death in the brutal slaying of Church, Slavens argued.
Slavens also said that the affidavit from Wood was something that Archuleta's previous attorneys could have easily procured during a 2002 post-conviction fight.
Slavens argued that Archuleta was present during Church's murder, but did not participate in a lengthy assault that including binding the victim with tire chains and a bungee cord and throwing him in the trunk of a car. Archuleta and Wood then drove Church 76 miles to a remote Millard County location where they took him out of the trunk, attached battery cables to his testicles and attempted to electrocute him.
The two beat Church's head with a tire jack and tire iron, then proceeded to insert the tire iron into Church's rectum, until the tire iron had been forced 18 inches into his body and punctured his liver, court documents state. Archuleta and Wood then brought Church's body up a hill, where they tried to cover it with branches and dirt.
Slavens had argued that Archuleta did not participate in the torture, but only carried Church's corpse from the scene.
At oral arguments in the case last May, however, Chief Justice Christine Durham said Wood's 2009 confession, which contradicts his sworn testimony in court, wasn't sufficient evidence to clear Archuleta's role in the assault.
Archuleta's own testimony was "plenty to convict him" of aggravated murder, Durham said. "It's hard to see how a jury would have been swayed by that [additional] evidence, if they had it."
Assistant Attorney General Thomas Brunker said in May that Slavens failed to offer proof that Archuleta's attorneys were ineffective, either at trial or during post-conviction stages.
Archuleta and Wood were on parole when they killed Church. In separate trials, Archuleta and Wood each were convicted of capital murder. Wood was sentenced to life in prison. Archuleta was sentenced to death.
Archuleta's case will now likely move into the federal court system, where he can make another round of appeals.
Twitter: @mrogers_trib —
Justices warn attorneys against 11th-hour requests to file briefs
The Utah Supreme Court criticized defense attorney James Slavens in an opinion denying the 1988 murder case involving Michael Anthony Archuleta be reopened.
The supreme court justices flagged Slavens in their opinion for a pattern of filing last-minute motions to draft "overlength briefs." Slavens showed a "blatant disregard" of the high court's order and rule, justices wrote, and his conduct infringed on the high court's need to resolve issues in a timely manner.
The justices also used Archuleta's opinion to warn other attorneys to avoid such conduct in the future.
"We stop short of a formal reprimand here, but we will not regard such conduct lightly going forward," the opinion states.