SCOTUS Rejects South Dakota Murderer’s Appeal

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to hear the appeal of one of three convicted murderers who robbed, tortured and murdered a 19-year-old man in 2000.  The Associated Press reports that Briley Piper claimed his admission of guilt in the murder was involuntary and that his lawyer was ineffective for allowing it.   An earlier South Dakota Supreme Court decision on the same claim noted that Piper had an experienced defense attorney with whom he agreed that, in the face of overwhelming evidence of guilt, admitting responsibility for the crime might convince jurors to give him a life sentence.  They didn’t.

According to the lower court decision, on March 12, 2000, after getting wasted on methamphetamine and LSD,  Piper, and two accomplices decided to burglarize the Spearfish, North Dakota home of an acquaintance Chester Poage.  The trio lured Poage from his home, taking him to the home of one of the accomplices, where they knocked him unconscious.  Poage was then tied to a chair and forced to drink a mixture of crushed pills, beer and hydrochloric acid.  As Poage begged for his life, the group then drove him to a remote area covered with snow, stripped off most of his clothes,  threw him in a creek and stabbed him and kicked him repeatedly.  When Poage tried to escape, Piper and his accomplices ran him down and dragged him back to the creek.  The group finally dropped large rocks on the victim’s head, crushing it.   Piper and his two accomplices were convicted of aggravated murder.  One of them, Elijah Page, was executed in 2007.  The other, Darrell Hoadley, was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.  No execution date has been set for Piper.

The case is Piper v. Young, No. 19-1338.