Review of death penalty ordered

In a unanimous decision, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals concluded Friday that the attorney representing Joe L. Lambright did not properly prepare arguments for the sentencing hearing that might have convinced the judge that his client should not be sentenced to death.

According to testimony at their trial, Sandra K. Owen was kidnapped by Lambright and another man while hitchhiking in Tucson and then driven into the desert northwest of the city and raped and killed.

Police in Texas and Louisiana began investigating the case after they heard reports that two men in Houston had talked about committing a murder in Tucson.

Lambright and Robert D. Smith were arrested near the Texas-Louisiana border in 1981; Owen's body was found in a shallow grave by a hunter about a week later.

Lambright was convicted of murder, kidnapping and rape — convictions that were upheld on appeal.

But the appellate panel, in an unsigned ruling, said Lambright might have escaped the death penalty had attorney Carmine Brogna done more than what the judges called a "woefully inadequate investigation" of factors that might have convinced Pima County Superior Court Judge Michael Brown to instead impose a lighter sentence.

"Brogna failed to call any of Lambright's family members or friends to testify about his abusive childhood, his history of mental instability, his suicide attempts, or his drug use," the appellate judges wrote. "Nor was any testimony offered to humanize Lambright or situate the crime within Lambright's troubled history."

Instead, the attorney called only one witness — a detention officer from the Pima County jail — and he failed to offer any support for various assertions in his written arguments saying there are reasons to spare Lambright the death penalty.

The judges said lawyers have a "duty to investigate all potentially mitigating evidence related to a defendant's mental health, family background and prior drug use."

Brogna, who now is retired, declined to comment on Friday's ruling. But Brogna said he testified at a prior federal court hearing on the issue that he believes Lambright had adequate representation.

Smith, the co-defendant , also was sentenced to death and remains in prison.