Douglas Lovell death sentence overturned for man convicted of murder in rape conviction

The death penalty for a man who killed a woman in order to prevent her from testifying against him in a rape case was overturned by the Utah Supreme Court on Thursday.

Despite upholding Douglas Lovell’s conviction and sending the case back to a lower court for resentencing, the justices noted that Lovell’s attorneys were incompetent at his sentence hearing. According to spokeswoman Alex Curcio, the Utah Attorney General’s Office, who is in charge of the case, was unable to respond to a request for comment on Thursday regarding Lovell’s potential for another death sentence.

Lovell, 66, was sentenced to death for the 1985 murder of Joyce Yost in order to keep her from testifying against him regarding allegations that he had sexually assaulted her. He has twice been found guilty of capital murder.

According to state officials, after failing in his attempts to hire two different people to assassinate Joyce, he attempted to kill her himself by kidnapping and strangling her. He was given a death by lethal injection sentence, but he filed an appeal.

Justices criticized Lovell’s 2015 sentencing counsel in a 42-page ruling for their inability to raise objections or adequately address testimony on his excommunication from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, often known as the Mormon church, which is based in Utah. The jury was unable to adequately consider the circumstances of his offenses before finding him guilty of capital punishment, according to the justices, who claimed that this impacted his sentencing hearing.

The court ruled that Lovell was entitled to a sentencing hearing devoid of any inappropriate or biased evidence. Colleen Coebergh, his appeals attorney, opted not to comment on Thursday. When the church established guidelines for what local church officials may say before to testifying as character witnesses, a state judge determined in 2021 that the church did not meddle in Lovell’s prosecution. According to Lovell, his lawyer chosen by the court had either completely ignored the witnesses or actively suppressed them on behalf of the church.

Lovell was one of seven death row convicts in Utah. His sentence was reversed concurrently with Taberon Dave Honie, another prisoner on death row, scheduled to be executed on August 8 by lethal injection. Honie requested this week, during a two-day hearing, that the parole board in Utah commute his sentence to life in prison. Survivors’ families provided testimony in favor of his death but the decision is still pending.