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Wednesday, September 21st, 2011 -- 8:49 pm
Tags: "Dating back to his time in the Illinois State Senate, President Obama has worked to ensure accuracy and fairness in the criminal justice system, especially in capital punishment cases," Press Secretary Jay Carney said ahead of the planned execution.
"However, it is not appropriate for the president of the United States to weigh in on specific cases like this one, which is a state prosecution."
The comments came as Davis's lawyers were filing last-ditch appeals to delay the execution of the man in Georgia for his conviction in the 1989 killing of a police officer.
A legion of Davis supporters contend there is evidence supporting his innocence, but the courts have not been swayed.
The president cannot pardon Davis, because he was convicted of a state crime. But he could delay the execution by ordering a federal investigation into the case.
Updated with additional reporting by Raw Story
Obama won't weigh in on Georgia execution
Published 08:20 p.m., Wednesday, September 21, 2011
News
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama is refusing to weigh in on the pending execution in Georgia of inmate Troy Davis.
Less than half-hour before Davis' scheduled execution Wednesday, White House press secretary Jay Carney issued a statement saying that Obama has long worked to ensure accuracy and fairness in the criminal justice system especially in capital cases. But Carney said it would not be appropriate for the president of the United States to weigh in on specific cases like this one, which is a state prosecution.
Davis was convicted of killing off-duty police officer Mark MacPhail in 1989. His attorneys say key witnesses against him have disputed their testimony. But courts have ruled against granting him a new trial.
Davis appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court Wednesday evening.
Less than half-hour before Davis' scheduled execution Wednesday, White House press secretary Jay Carney issued a statement saying that Obama has long worked to ensure accuracy and fairness in the criminal justice system especially in capital cases. But Carney said it would not be appropriate for the president of the United States to weigh in on specific cases like this one, which is a state prosecution.
Davis was convicted of killing off-duty police officer Mark MacPhail in 1989. His attorneys say key witnesses against him have disputed their testimony. But courts have ruled against granting him a new trial.
Davis appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court Wednesday evening.
Troy Davis asks Supreme Court to stop execution
By GREG BLUESTEIN , 09.21.11, 08:53 PM EDT
JACKSON, Ga. -- Troy Davis, the condemned inmate who convinced hundreds of thousands of people but not the justice system of his innocence, filed an eleventh-hour plea Wednesday asking the U.S. Supreme Court to stop Georgia authorities from executing him for the murder of an off-duty police officer.
His execution had been set to begin at 7 p.m., but Georgia prison officials were still waiting for the high court's decision nearly two hours later.
Though Davis' attorneys say seven of nine key witnesses against him have disputed all or parts of their testimony, state and federal judges have repeatedly ruled against granting him a new trial. As the court losses piled up Wednesday, his offer to take a polygraph test was rejected and the pardons board refused to give him one more hearing.
Davis' supporters staged vigils in the U.S. and Europe, declaring "I am Troy Davis" on signs, T-shirts and the Internet. Some tried increasingly frenzied measures, urging prison workers to stay home and even posting a judge's phone number online, hoping people will press him to put a stop to the lethal injection. President Barack Obama deflected calls for him to get involved.
"They say death row; we say hell no!" protesters shouted outside the Jackson prison where Davis was to be executed. In Washington, a crowd outside the Supreme Court yelled the same chant.
The crowd outside the prison swelled to more than 500 as night fell and a few dozen riot police stood watch. About 10 counterdemonstrators also were there, showing support for the death penalty and MacPhail's family.
"He had all the chances in the world," Anneliese MacPhail said of Davis in a telephone interview. "It has got to come to an end."
At a Paris rally, many of the roughly 150 demonstrators carried signs emblazoned with Davis' face. "Everyone who looks a little bit at the case knows that there is too much doubt to execute him," Nicolas Krameyer of Amnesty International said at the protest.
Davis' execution has been stopped three times since 2007, but on Wednesday the 42-year-old appeared to be out of legal options.
As his last hours ticked away, an upbeat and prayerful Davis turned down an offer for a special last meal as he met with friends, family and supporters.
"Troy Davis has impacted the world," his sister Martina Correia said at a news conference. "They say, `I am Troy Davis,' in languages he can't speak."
Correia, who is battling breast cancer and using a wheelchair as she helps coordinate rallies and other events, called on people to push for change in the justice system. Then she said, "I'm going to stand here for my brother," and got up with help from people around her.
His attorney Stephen Marsh said Davis would have spent part of Wednesday taking a polygraph test if pardons officials had taken his offer seriously.
"He doesn't want to spend three hours away from his family on what could be the last day of his life if it won't make any difference," Marsh said.
Amnesty International says nearly 1 million people have signed a petition on Davis' behalf. His supporters include former President Jimmy Carter, Pope Benedict XVI, a former FBI director, the NAACP, several conservative figures and many celebrities, including hip-hop star Sean "P. Diddy" Combs.
"I'm trying to bring the word to the young people: There is too much doubt," rapper Big Boi, of the Atlanta-based group Outkast, said at a church near the prison.
The U.S. Supreme Court gave Davis an unusual opportunity to prove his innocence in a lower court last year, though the high court itself did not hear the merits of the case.
He was convicted in 1991 of killing MacPhail, who was working as a security guard at the time. MacPhail rushed to the aid of a homeless man who prosecutors said Davis was bashing with a handgun after asking him for a beer. Prosecutors said Davis had a smirk on his face as he shot the officer to death in a Burger King ( BKC - news - people ) parking lot in Savannah.
No gun was ever found, but prosecutors say shell casings were linked to an earlier shooting for which Davis was convicted.
Witnesses placed Davis at the crime scene and identified him as the shooter, but several of them have recanted their accounts and some jurors have said they've changed their minds about his guilt. Others have claimed a man who was with Davis that night has told people he actually shot the officer.
"Such incredibly flawed eyewitness testimony should never be the basis for an execution," Marsh said. "To execute someone under these circumstances would be unconscionable."
State and federal courts, however, have repeatedly upheld Davis' conviction. One federal judge dismissed the evidence advanced by Davis' lawyers as "largely smoke and mirrors."
"He has had ample time to prove his innocence," said MacPhail's widow, Joan MacPhail-Harris. "And he is not innocent."
The latest motion filed by Davis' attorneys in Butts County Court disputes testimony from the expert who linked the shell casings to the earlier shooting involving Davis, and challenged testimony from two witnesses. Superior Court Judge Thomas Wilson and the Georgia Supreme Court rejected the appeal, and prosecutors said the filing was just a delay tactic.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, which has helped lead the charge to stop the execution, said it was considering asking President Barack Obama to intervene.
Obama cannot grant Davis clemency for a state conviction. Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, said he could halt the execution by asking for an investigation into a federal issue if one exists.
Press secretary Jay Carney issued a statement saying that although Obama "has worked to ensure accuracy and fairness in the criminal justice system," it was not appropriate for him "to weigh in on specific cases like this one, which is a state prosecution."
Dozens of protesters outside the White House called on the president to step in, and about 12 were arrested for disobeying police orders.
"The fact that the White House hasn't addressed this issue is completely disrespectful," college student Talibah Arnett said.
Davis was not the only U.S. inmate scheduled to die Wednesday evening. In Texas, white supremacist gang member Lawrence Russell Brewer was headed to the death chamber for the 1998 dragging death of a black man, James Byrd Jr., one of the most notorious hate crime murders in recent U.S. history.
Davis' best chance may have come last year, in a hearing ordered by the U.S. Supreme Court. It was the first time in 50 years that justices had considered a request to grant a new trial for a death row inmate.
The high court set a tough standard for Davis to exonerate himself, ruling that his attorneys must "clearly establish" Davis' innocence - a higher bar to meet than prosecutors having to prove guilt. After the hearing judge ruled in prosecutors' favor, the justices didn't take up the case.
The planned execution has drawn widespread criticism in Europe, where politicians and activists made last-minute pleas for a stay. A vigil was planned outside the U.S. Embassy in London.
Spencer Lawton, the district attorney who secured Davis' conviction in 1991, said he was embarrassed for the judicial system - not because of the execution, but because it has taken so long to carry out.
"What we have had is a manufactured appearance of doubt which has taken on the quality of legitimate doubt itself. And all of it is exquisitely unfair," said Lawton, who retired as Chatham County's head prosecutor in 2008. "The good news is we live in a civilized society where questions like this are decided based on fact in open and transparent courts of law, and not on street corners."
Associated Press reporters Russ Bynum in Savannah, Kate Brumback and Marina Hutchinson in Jackson, Eric Tucker and Erica Werner in Washington and Sohrab Monemi in Paris contributed to this report.
Execution of inmate delayed by top court appeal
Related Video
JACKSON, Georgia |
(Reuters) - Georgia was set to execute on Wednesday a man convicted of
murdering a police officer in one of the highest-profile U.S. capital
punishment cases in years.Troy Davis was set to be executed by lethal injection at 7 p.m. local time (2300 GMT) but the execution was delayed for more than two hours while the U.S. Supreme Court considered whether to hear a last-minute appeal by his lawyers.
The case has attracted international attention and an online protest that has accumulated nearly a million signatures because of doubts expressed in some quarters over whether he killed police officer Mark MacPhail in 1989.
MacPhail was shot and killed outside a Burger King restaurant in Savannah, Georgia, as he went to the aide of a homeless man who was being beaten. MacPhail's family say Davis is guilty and should be executed.
Outside Georgia Diagnostic and Classification prison, hundreds of protesters chanted "Please don't let Troy Davis die" and "I am Troy Davis" and other slogans and a cheer briefly went up when it was reported that the execution had been delayed.
The demonstrations, which began in the early afternoon, took place amid a heavy police presence and at least two people were arrested.
"Our hearts go out to them (MacPhail's family). We have nothing but sympathy and prayers for them but they are not getting justice if the wrong person is paying for what happened to their son, their brother," civil rights leader Al Sharpton told reporters at the prison.
Since Davis's conviction, seven of nine witnesses have changed or recanted their testimony, some have said they were coerced by police to testify against him and some say another man committed the crime.
No physical evidence linked Davis to the killing.
APPEALS PROCESS
Once a death warrant was signed, Davis's best hope of avoiding execution had rested with the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles but on Tuesday it denied him clemency following a one-day hearing.
On Wednesday, his lawyers requested a polygraph in a bid to halt the execution and show his innocence, but prison officials rejected the entreaty.
The lawyers also filed a motion to stay in the county where the execution is set to take place. That was denied and Georgia's Supreme Court later turned down an appeal, according to media reports.
Defense lawyers appealed that ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court, said Sara Totonchi, executive director of the Southern Center for Human Rights.
Defendants in capital cases in Georgia are much less likely to face the death penalty if they can afford legal counsel and Davis was assigned a court-appointed lawyer who was overworked and underfunded, Totonchi said.
"Davis was poor, from a poor neighborhood and was given a court-appointed lawyer at a time when Georgia was providing next to no funding (for the defense in capital cases) ... He slipped through the cracks," she said.
A handful of supporters of capital punishment in the case also protested separately from Davis' supporters.
"I came here today because I want to see justice done. I am very sensitive to law officers getting hurt and injured in the line of duty," said Janet Reisenwitz, who said her daughter is a police officer in Georgia's DeKalb County.
(Editing by Eric Walsh)
Last minute delay to inmate's execution
Last updated 13:22 22/09/2011
DEATH PENALTY: An undated file photo of death row inmate Troy Davis.
Americas
Davis was sentenced to death for the killing of off-duty Savannah officer Mark MacPhail.
He had been set to die by lethal injection at 7pm local time (11am today, NZ time), but as the hour arrived, Georgia prison officials were still waiting for the high court's decision.
Davis' final bid for life came after a Georgia judge has refused to halt the execution of the death row inmate after a last-minute appeal by his attorneys.
Though Davis' attorneys say seven of nine key witnesses against him have disputed all or parts of their testimony, state and federal judges have repeatedly ruled against granting him a new trial. As the court losses piled up Wednesday, his offer to take a polygraph test was rejected and the pardons board refused to give him one more hearing.
When news of the latest delay came out, there was cheering from the crowd of protesters gathered at the prison.
His attorneys filed an appeal earlier in the day, US time, challenging ballistics evidence linking Davis to the crime and eyewitness testimony identifying Davis as the shooter. They say the evidence was "egregiously false and misleading."
Pope Benedict XVI has also weighed in, asking that Davis' life be spared. Prosecutors have stood by their case.
Davis' lawyers have long argued Davis was a victim of mistaken identity. Prosecutors say they have no doubt that they charged the right person with the crime.
As his last hours ticked away, an upbeat and prayerful Davis turned down an offer for a special last meal as he met with friends, family and supporters. His attorney Stephen Marsh said Davis would have spent part of that time taking a polygraph test if pardons officials had taken his offer seriously.
"He doesn't want to spend three hours away from his family on what could be the last day of his life if it won't make any difference," Marsh said.
Amnesty International says nearly 1 million people have signed a petition on Davis' behalf. His supporters include former President Jimmy Carter, Pope Benedict XVI, a former FBI director, the NAACP and several conservative figures.
The US Supreme Court gave Davis an unusual opportunity to prove his innocence in a lower court last year, though the high court itself did not hear the merits of the case.
He was convicted in 1991 of killing MacPhail, who was working as a security guard at the time. MacPhail rushed to the aid of a homeless man who prosecutors said Davis was bashing with a handgun after asking him for a beer. Prosecutors said Davis had a smirk on his face as he shot the officer to death in a Burger King parking lot.
No gun was ever found, but prosecutors say shell casings were linked to an earlier shooting for which Davis was convicted.
Witnesses placed Davis at the crime scene and identified him as the shooter, but several of them have recanted their accounts and some jurors have said they've changed their minds about his guilt. Others have claimed a man who was with Davis that night has told people he actually shot the officer.
"Such incredibly flawed eyewitness testimony should never be the basis for an execution," Marsh said. "To execute someone under these circumstances would be unconscionable."
State and federal courts, however, have repeatedly upheld Davis' conviction. A federal judge dismissed the evidence advanced by Davis' lawyers as "largely smoke and mirrors."
"He has had ample time to prove his innocence," said MacPhail's widow, Joan MacPhail-Harris. "And he is not innocent."
The White House said Obama would not weigh in on the pending execution.
WHITE SUPREMACIST EXECUTED FOR TEXAS DRAGGING
White supremacist gang member Lawrence Russell Brewer has been executed for the infamous dragging death slaying of James Byrd Jr, a black man from East Texas.
Byrd, 49, was chained to the back of a pickup truck and pulled whip-like to his death along a bumpy asphalt road in one of the most grisly hate crime murders in recent Texas history.
Brewer, 44, was asked if he had any final words, to which he replied: "No. I have no final statement."
He glanced at his parents watching through a nearby window, took several deep breaths and closed his eyes. A single tear hung on the edge of his right eye as he was pronounced dead at 6.21pm, 10 minutes after the lethal drugs began flowing into his arms, both covered with intricate black tattoos.
Byrd's sisters also were among the witnesses in an adjacent room.
"Hopefully, today's execution of Brewer can remind all of us that racial hatred and prejudice leads to terrible consequence for the victim, the victim's family, for the perpetrator and for the perpetrator's family," Clara Taylor, one of Byrd's sisters, said.
She called the punishment "a step in the right direction".
"We're making progress," Taylor said. "I know he was guilty so I have no qualms about the death penalty."
Appeals to the courts for Brewer were exhausted and no last-day attempts to save his life were filed.
Besides Brewer, John William King, now 36, also was convicted of capital murder and sent to death row for Byrd's death, which shocked the nation for its brutality. King's conviction and death sentence remain under appeal. A third man, Shawn Berry, 36, received a life prison term.
"One down and one to go," Billy Rowles, the retired Jasper County sheriff who first investigated the horrific scene, said. "That's kind of cruel but that's reality."
It was about 2.30am on Sunday, June 7, 1998, when witnesses saw Byrd walking on a road not far from his home in Jasper, a town of more than 7000 and about 125 miles northeast of Houston. Many folks knew he lived off disability cheques, couldn't afford his own car and walked where he needed to go. Another witness then saw him riding in the bed of a dark pickup.
Six hours later and some 10 miles away on Huff Creek Road, the bloody mess found after daybreak was thought at first to be animal road kill. Rowles, a former Texas state trooper who had taken office as sheriff the previous year, believed it was a hit-and-run fatality but evidence didn't match up with someone caught beneath a vehicle. Body parts were scattered and the blood trail began with footprints at what appeared to be the scene of a scuffle.
"I didn't go down that road too far before I knew this was going to be a bad deal," he said at Brewer's trial.
Fingerprints taken from the headless torso identified the victim as Byrd.
Testimony showed the three men and Byrd drove out into the county about 10 miles and stopped along an isolated logging road. A fight broke out and the outnumbered Byrd was tied to the truck bumper with a 24 1/2-foot logging chain. Three miles later, what was left of his shredded remains was dumped between a black church and cemetery where the pavement ended on the remote road.
Brewer, King and Berry were in custody by the end of the next day.
The crime put Jasper under a national spotlight and lured the likes of the Ku Klux Klan and the Black Panthers, among others, to try to exploit the notoriety of the case which continues - many say unfairly - to brand Jasper more than a decade later.
King was tried first, in Jasper. Brewer's trial was moved 150 miles away to Bryan. Berry was tried back in Jasper. DNA showed Byrd's blood on all three of them.
Brewer was from Sulphur Springs, about 180 miles to the northwest, and had been convicted of cocaine possession. He met King, a convicted burglar from Jasper, in a Texas prison where they got involved in a KKK splinter group known as the Confederate Knights of America and adorned themselves with racist tattoos. Evidence showed Brewer had violated parole and was involved in a number of burglaries and thefts in the Jasper area.
King had become friends with Berry and moved into Berry's place. Evidence showed Brewer came to Jasper to stay with them.
- AP
Troy Davis asks Court to halt execution amid protests in Georgia
GREG BLUESTEIN
JACKSON, GA.— The Associated Press
Published
Last updated
Troy Davis, the condemned inmate who convinced hundreds of thousands
of people but not the justice system of his innocence, filed an
eleventh-hour plea Wednesday asking the U.S. Supreme Court to stop
Georgia authorities from executing him for the murder of an off-duty
police officer.
His execution had been set to begin at 7 p.m., but Georgia prison officials were still waiting for the high court’s decision nearly two hours later.
“It is killing me, to tell you the truth. I don’t know what to expect any more,” said Anneliese MacPhail, mother of Mark MacPhail, the man Mr. Davis was convicted of killing in 1989.
Though Mr. Davis’s attorneys say seven of nine key witnesses against him have disputed all or parts of their testimony, state and federal judges have repeatedly ruled against granting him a new trial. As the court losses piled up Wednesday, his offer to take a polygraph test was rejected and the pardons board refused to give him one more hearing.
Mr. Davis’s supporters staged vigils in the U.S. and Europe, declaring “I am Troy Davis” on signs, T-shirts and the Internet. Some tried increasingly frenzied measures, urging prison workers to stay home and even posting a judge’s phone number online, hoping people will press him to put a stop to the lethal injection. President Barack Obama deflected calls for him to get involved.
“They say death row; we say hell no!” protesters shouted outside the Jackson prison where Mr. Davis was to be executed. In Washington, a crowd outside the Supreme Court yelled the same chant.
The crowd outside the prison swelled to more than 500 as night fell and a few dozen riot police stood watch. About 10 counter-demonstrators also were there, showing support for the death penalty and MacPhail’s family.
“He had all the chances in the world,” Anneliese MacPhail said of Mr. Davis in a telephone interview. “It has got to come to an end.”
At a Paris rally, many of the roughly 150 demonstrators carried signs emblazoned with Mr. Davis’s face. “Everyone who looks a little bit at the case knows that there is too much doubt to execute him,” Nicolas Krameyer of Amnesty International said at the protest.
Mr. Davis’s execution has been stopped three times since 2007, but on Wednesday the 42-year-old appeared to be out of legal options.
As his last hours ticked away, an upbeat and prayerful Mr. Davis turned down an offer for a special last meal as he met with friends, family and supporters.
“Troy Davis has impacted the world,” his sister Martina Correia said at a news conference. “They say, `I am Troy Davis,’ in languages he can’t speak.”
Ms. Correia, who is battling breast cancer and using a wheelchair as she helps co-ordinate rallies and other events, called on people to push for change in the justice system. Then she said, “I’m going to stand here for my brother,” and got up with help from people around her.
His attorney Stephen Marsh said Mr. Davis would have spent part of Wednesday taking a polygraph test if pardons officials had taken his offer seriously.
“He doesn’t want to spend three hours away from his family on what could be the last day of his life if it won’t make any difference,” Mr. Marsh said.
Amnesty International says nearly 1 million people have signed a petition on Mr. Davis’s behalf. His supporters include former President Jimmy Carter, Pope Benedict XVI, a former FBI director, the NAACP, several conservative figures and many celebrities, including hip-hop star Sean “P. Diddy” Combs.
“I’m trying to bring the word to the young people: There is too much doubt,” rapper Big Boi, of the Atlanta-based group Outkast, said at a church near the prison.
The U.S. Supreme Court gave Mr. Davis an unusual opportunity to prove his innocence in a lower court last year, though the high court itself did not hear the merits of the case.
He was convicted in 1991 of killing Mr. MacPhail, who was working as a security guard at the time. Mr. MacPhail rushed to the aid of a homeless man who prosecutors said Mr. Davis was bashing with a handgun after asking him for a beer. Prosecutors said Mr. Davis had a smirk on his face as he shot the officer to death in a Burger King parking lot in Savannah.
No gun was ever found, but prosecutors say shell casings were linked to an earlier shooting for which Mr. Davis was convicted.
Witnesses placed Mr. Davis at the crime scene and identified him as the shooter, but several of them have recanted their accounts and some jurors have said they’ve changed their minds about his guilt. Others have claimed a man who was with Mr. Davis that night has told people he actually shot the officer.
“Such incredibly flawed eyewitness testimony should never be the basis for an execution,” Mr. Marsh said. “To execute someone under these circumstances would be unconscionable.”
State and federal courts, however, have repeatedly upheld Mr. Davis’s conviction. One federal judge dismissed the evidence advanced by Mr. Davis’s lawyers as “largely smoke and mirrors.”
“He has had ample time to prove his innocence,” said Mr. MacPhail’s widow, Joan MacPhail-Harris. “And he is not innocent.”
The latest motion filed by Mr. Davis’s attorneys in Butts County Court disputes testimony from the expert who linked the shell casings to the earlier shooting involving Mr. Davis, and challenged testimony from two witnesses. Superior Court Judge Thomas Wilson and the Georgia Supreme Court rejected the appeal, and prosecutors said the filing was just a delay tactic.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, which has helped lead the charge to stop the execution, said it was considering asking President Barack Obama to intervene.
Mr. Obama cannot grant Mr. Davis clemency for a state conviction. Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, said he could halt the execution by asking for an investigation into a federal issue if one exists.
Press secretary Jay Carney issued a statement saying that although Mr. Obama “has worked to ensure accuracy and fairness in the criminal justice system,” it was not appropriate for him “to weigh in on specific cases like this one, which is a state prosecution.”
Dozens of protesters outside the White House called on the president to step in, and about 12 were arrested for disobeying police orders.
“The fact that the White House hasn’t addressed this issue is completely disrespectful,” college student Talibah Arnett said.
Mr. Davis was not the only U.S. inmate scheduled to die Wednesday evening. In Texas, white supremacist gang member Lawrence Russell Brewer was headed to the death chamber for the 1998 dragging death of a black man, James Byrd Jr., one of the most notorious hate crime murders in recent U.S. history.
Mr. Davis’s best chance may have come last year, in a hearing ordered by the U.S. Supreme Court. It was the first time in 50 years that justices had considered a request to grant a new trial for a death row inmate.
The high court set a tough standard for Mr. Davis to exonerate himself, ruling that his attorneys must “clearly establish” Mr. Davis’s innocence – a higher bar to meet than prosecutors having to prove guilt. After the hearing judge ruled in prosecutors’ favour, the justices didn’t take up the case.
The planned execution has drawn widespread criticism in Europe, where politicians and activists made last-minute pleas for a stay. A vigil was planned outside the U.S. Embassy in London.
Spencer Lawton, the district attorney who secured Mr. Davis’s conviction in 1991, said he was embarrassed for the judicial system – not because of the execution, but because it has taken so long to carry out.
“What we have had is a manufactured appearance of doubt which has taken on the quality of legitimate doubt itself. And all of it is exquisitely unfair,” said Mr. Lawton, who retired as Chatham County’s head prosecutor in 2008. “The good news is we live in a civilized society where questions like this are decided based on fact in open and transparent courts of law, and not on street corners.”
His execution had been set to begin at 7 p.m., but Georgia prison officials were still waiting for the high court’s decision nearly two hours later.
“It is killing me, to tell you the truth. I don’t know what to expect any more,” said Anneliese MacPhail, mother of Mark MacPhail, the man Mr. Davis was convicted of killing in 1989.
Though Mr. Davis’s attorneys say seven of nine key witnesses against him have disputed all or parts of their testimony, state and federal judges have repeatedly ruled against granting him a new trial. As the court losses piled up Wednesday, his offer to take a polygraph test was rejected and the pardons board refused to give him one more hearing.
Mr. Davis’s supporters staged vigils in the U.S. and Europe, declaring “I am Troy Davis” on signs, T-shirts and the Internet. Some tried increasingly frenzied measures, urging prison workers to stay home and even posting a judge’s phone number online, hoping people will press him to put a stop to the lethal injection. President Barack Obama deflected calls for him to get involved.
“They say death row; we say hell no!” protesters shouted outside the Jackson prison where Mr. Davis was to be executed. In Washington, a crowd outside the Supreme Court yelled the same chant.
The crowd outside the prison swelled to more than 500 as night fell and a few dozen riot police stood watch. About 10 counter-demonstrators also were there, showing support for the death penalty and MacPhail’s family.
“He had all the chances in the world,” Anneliese MacPhail said of Mr. Davis in a telephone interview. “It has got to come to an end.”
At a Paris rally, many of the roughly 150 demonstrators carried signs emblazoned with Mr. Davis’s face. “Everyone who looks a little bit at the case knows that there is too much doubt to execute him,” Nicolas Krameyer of Amnesty International said at the protest.
Mr. Davis’s execution has been stopped three times since 2007, but on Wednesday the 42-year-old appeared to be out of legal options.
As his last hours ticked away, an upbeat and prayerful Mr. Davis turned down an offer for a special last meal as he met with friends, family and supporters.
“Troy Davis has impacted the world,” his sister Martina Correia said at a news conference. “They say, `I am Troy Davis,’ in languages he can’t speak.”
Ms. Correia, who is battling breast cancer and using a wheelchair as she helps co-ordinate rallies and other events, called on people to push for change in the justice system. Then she said, “I’m going to stand here for my brother,” and got up with help from people around her.
His attorney Stephen Marsh said Mr. Davis would have spent part of Wednesday taking a polygraph test if pardons officials had taken his offer seriously.
“He doesn’t want to spend three hours away from his family on what could be the last day of his life if it won’t make any difference,” Mr. Marsh said.
Amnesty International says nearly 1 million people have signed a petition on Mr. Davis’s behalf. His supporters include former President Jimmy Carter, Pope Benedict XVI, a former FBI director, the NAACP, several conservative figures and many celebrities, including hip-hop star Sean “P. Diddy” Combs.
“I’m trying to bring the word to the young people: There is too much doubt,” rapper Big Boi, of the Atlanta-based group Outkast, said at a church near the prison.
The U.S. Supreme Court gave Mr. Davis an unusual opportunity to prove his innocence in a lower court last year, though the high court itself did not hear the merits of the case.
He was convicted in 1991 of killing Mr. MacPhail, who was working as a security guard at the time. Mr. MacPhail rushed to the aid of a homeless man who prosecutors said Mr. Davis was bashing with a handgun after asking him for a beer. Prosecutors said Mr. Davis had a smirk on his face as he shot the officer to death in a Burger King parking lot in Savannah.
No gun was ever found, but prosecutors say shell casings were linked to an earlier shooting for which Mr. Davis was convicted.
Witnesses placed Mr. Davis at the crime scene and identified him as the shooter, but several of them have recanted their accounts and some jurors have said they’ve changed their minds about his guilt. Others have claimed a man who was with Mr. Davis that night has told people he actually shot the officer.
“Such incredibly flawed eyewitness testimony should never be the basis for an execution,” Mr. Marsh said. “To execute someone under these circumstances would be unconscionable.”
State and federal courts, however, have repeatedly upheld Mr. Davis’s conviction. One federal judge dismissed the evidence advanced by Mr. Davis’s lawyers as “largely smoke and mirrors.”
“He has had ample time to prove his innocence,” said Mr. MacPhail’s widow, Joan MacPhail-Harris. “And he is not innocent.”
The latest motion filed by Mr. Davis’s attorneys in Butts County Court disputes testimony from the expert who linked the shell casings to the earlier shooting involving Mr. Davis, and challenged testimony from two witnesses. Superior Court Judge Thomas Wilson and the Georgia Supreme Court rejected the appeal, and prosecutors said the filing was just a delay tactic.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, which has helped lead the charge to stop the execution, said it was considering asking President Barack Obama to intervene.
Mr. Obama cannot grant Mr. Davis clemency for a state conviction. Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, said he could halt the execution by asking for an investigation into a federal issue if one exists.
Press secretary Jay Carney issued a statement saying that although Mr. Obama “has worked to ensure accuracy and fairness in the criminal justice system,” it was not appropriate for him “to weigh in on specific cases like this one, which is a state prosecution.”
Dozens of protesters outside the White House called on the president to step in, and about 12 were arrested for disobeying police orders.
“The fact that the White House hasn’t addressed this issue is completely disrespectful,” college student Talibah Arnett said.
Mr. Davis was not the only U.S. inmate scheduled to die Wednesday evening. In Texas, white supremacist gang member Lawrence Russell Brewer was headed to the death chamber for the 1998 dragging death of a black man, James Byrd Jr., one of the most notorious hate crime murders in recent U.S. history.
Mr. Davis’s best chance may have come last year, in a hearing ordered by the U.S. Supreme Court. It was the first time in 50 years that justices had considered a request to grant a new trial for a death row inmate.
The high court set a tough standard for Mr. Davis to exonerate himself, ruling that his attorneys must “clearly establish” Mr. Davis’s innocence – a higher bar to meet than prosecutors having to prove guilt. After the hearing judge ruled in prosecutors’ favour, the justices didn’t take up the case.
The planned execution has drawn widespread criticism in Europe, where politicians and activists made last-minute pleas for a stay. A vigil was planned outside the U.S. Embassy in London.
Spencer Lawton, the district attorney who secured Mr. Davis’s conviction in 1991, said he was embarrassed for the judicial system – not because of the execution, but because it has taken so long to carry out.
“What we have had is a manufactured appearance of doubt which has taken on the quality of legitimate doubt itself. And all of it is exquisitely unfair,” said Mr. Lawton, who retired as Chatham County’s head prosecutor in 2008. “The good news is we live in a civilized society where questions like this are decided based on fact in open and transparent courts of law, and not on street corners.”
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