Hooks v. Allen (DEATH PENALTY)

Filing 53

ORDER overruling the 50 Objections; 44 Recommendation; denying the 29 MOTION for Discovery. An opinion will follow by separate filing. Signed by Chief Judge William Keith Watkins on 9/30/2011. (br, )

IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF ALABAMA
NORTHERN DIVISION
JOSEPH B. HOOKS,

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Petitioner,
v.
KIM T. THOMAS,
Commissioner, Alabama
Department of Corrections,
Respondent.

ORDER
Before the court are the Recommendation of the Magistrate Judge (Doc. # 44)
and Petitioner Joseph B. Hooks’s Objections (Doc. # 50). The Magistrate Judge
recommends the denial of Mr. Hooks’s Motion for Discovery (Doc. # 29), in which
Mr. Hooks requests permission to obtain modern brain imaging at his own expense
to prove his frontal lobe dysfunction and his claim that the Eighth Amendment’s
prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment bars his execution because he suffered
from a frontal lobe dysfunction of his brain at the time he committed the murders for
which he was convicted and sentenced to death. The court, having independently
reviewed the file in this case and conducted a de novo review, see 28 U.S.C.
§ 636(b)(1), it is ORDERED as follows:

1.

Mr. Hooks’s Objections (Doc. # 50) are OVERRULED.

2.

The Recommendation (Doc. # 44) is ADOPTED.

3.

Mr. Hooks’s Motion for Discovery (Doc. # 29) is DENIED.

An opinion will follow by separate filing.
DONE this 30th day of September, 2011.
/s/ W. Keith Watkins
CHIEF UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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