Judge Grants Death Wish

Bill Bradford, an amateur photographer with a long history of violence toward women, on Thursday asked for and received a Los Angeles judge’s signature on death warrants ordering his execution for the 1984 strangling murders of two aspiring models.

It was exactly what Bradford wanted, his lawyer said.

In a move likely to rekindle the political debate over the pace at which California carries out the death penalty, the 52-year-old Bradford this week wrote Superior Court Judge Paul Boland that he was of “sound mind” and “fully agreeable” to an August execution date.

His lawyer, Jack Leavitt, said in an interview that Bradford found a certain death preferable to an uncertain wait on death row.

Boland, who presided over Bradford’s 1987 murder trial, signed seven copies of the death warrants ordering Bradford to die at San Quentin on Aug. 18. The formal death judgment, along with the lack of any appeals, sets in motion the process that could bring about Bradford’s death as initially scheduled--an almost unprecedented event in California.

In court papers, Bradford took pains to make clear his wish that court-appointed lawyers, the California Appellate Project and death penalty opponents not interfere with his execution.

As a result, Boland noted, there currently are no legal stays or other barriers to the execution. If carried out, Bradford’s execution would be the fifth in California since the state’s death penalty laws were rewritten in 1978. His would be the first execution to come from Los Angeles County’s courts since then.

Two other death row inmates--Thomas M. Thompson, 43, and Horace Kelly, 38--have execution dates next month. But appeals make it uncertain whether those sentences will be carried out before Bradford’s.

Bradford is the second condemned inmate in California to publicly abandon his appeals and try to hasten his death. The other, David Mason, a convicted killer of five, was executed in 1994 after halting the appeals process in an apparent attempt to gain redemption from his crimes by accepting his sentence with dignity.

Bradford’s lawyer, prosecutors in the case and other legal experts agreed that under the current state of the law, only Bradford can take steps to stop his execution. At this point, he seems “determined” to go through with it, according to his lawyer, Jack Leavitt of Hayward.

“The U.S. Supreme Court says that as long as the guy is mentally competent, no one else has the standing to litigate issues he has no interest in litigating,” said Peter Arenella, a law professor at UCLA.

“Unless he files an appeal or gets clemency, the execution will go forward,” said Matt Ross, a spokesman for the state attorney general’s office.

Bradford’s motives are not fully known. In the past, he has been at odds with his court-appointed lawyer, David Nickerson, and with the California Appellate Project, which provides lawyers for many death row inmates.

Bradford sought out Leavitt a year ago, after the state Supreme Court affirmed his death sentence. In his letter to Leavitt, he said his court-appointed lawyer was delaying the execution by filing appeals against his wishes. He asked Leavitt for help in hastening the execution.

“My sole objective is to avoid additional years in prison prior to execution,” he wrote.

“If we’re going to enforce a death penalty, we should do it without torturing the inmates,” Leavitt said Thursday in a telephone interview. “If we’re not going to carry out the death sentences, then we should declare a moratorium.”

“I think there’s a very good chance that his desire to be executed is sincere,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Pamela A. Bozanich, who prosecuted Bradford. “I’d like to think it’s remorse on his part.”

Bradford’s sudden emergence as a candidate for execution seemed to surprise groups that oppose capital punishment.

Actor Mike Farrell, president of Death Penalty Focus, said Bradford’s crimes and apparent desire to end his appeals come at a time when appeals involving complex issues are being fought on behalf of two other death row inmates. Bradford, Farrell said, seems the perfect “volunteer” to deflect public attention from the issues.

“He passes the monster test,” said Farrell, who suggested Bradford might be driven by “fear, tension, anxiety and fury at the system.”

As of June 1, 507 inmates were awaiting execution in California--by far the largest death row population in the world. In addition to the four inmates executed since 1978, 13 have died of natural causes and 13 others have committed suicide, said a spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections.

“This guy was a very scary person,” said former Deputy Dist. Atty. David P. Conn, who prosecuted the case with Bozanich.

“He killed for pleasure. He’s a sadistic serial killer who took body parts as souvenirs. He’s someone who clearly deserves the death penalty.”

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As Boland solemnly signed the death warrants, only the rustling of papers could be heard in his courtroom Thursday. Bozanich and Deputy Atty. Gen. David Glassman sat silently as the judge recited the history of the case and ordered the execution.

Just as Bradford had wished, no one appeared to speak in opposition to his sentence, and the proceeding lasted barely 15 minutes. Bradford was not present, nor was Leavitt, who is representing the condemned man without pay.

But in a court declaration, Leavitt wrote that his client had “no objection” to his sentence being carried out. “His 11 years on death row have been intolerable,” Leavitt said.

Bradford’s recent actions were consistent with those he took at his trial in 1987. During the final stages of the penalty phase, he fired his defense attorneys and urged jurors to issue a death sentence, hinting that he had killed others.

“You were right,” he told the panel, which had just convicted him of two counts of first-degree murder for strangling Shari Miller, 21, and Tracey Campbell, a 15-year-old neighbor.

“Think about how many you don’t even know about.”

Prosecutors Bozanich and Conn contended during the trial that Bradford used promises of modeling assignments to lure the young women to a remote campsite in the desert near Edwards Air Force Base, where he strangled them.

Bozanich said she plans to attend the execution on behalf of the victims’ families.

“When I found out that both of the victims’ mothers are deceased, I felt I had to go,” she said. “I can’t help but think that the murders of their daughters shortened their lives.”

Miller’s body was found in a parking lot on West Pico Boulevard. Police, investigating Bradford for another crime, searched his residence and found dozens of photographs of young women, Conn said. The investigation eventually led them to the badly decomposed body of the second young woman in the desert.

Bradford’s history of violence toward women dates to 1961, when he was arrested for jumping nude from a tree in front of two 12-year-old girls after helping them look for a cat. Shortly after his arrest for the murders, Bradford pleaded no contest to charges he had raped a former girlfriend in 1983 after taking her to the high desert near Lancaster to observe a space shuttle landing.

Police have said that Bradford may be responsible for at least eight other slayings.