Jackson. Georgia( 9/21/11). This writer is greiving. Yes, grieving over a government enforced execution….perhaps murder…of quite possibly, an innocent man, earlier tonight in Jackson, Georgia.
Troy Davis, 42, maintained his innocence right up to the very last minute. He had earlier sent a letter to the family of the man he was accused of killing in 1989, police officer Mark MacPhail, in which he stated that he did not own a gun and that he did not kill MacPhail.
After his conviction at a trial by jury in 1991, 7 of the 9 witnesses against him recanted their testimony. They said their statements about him were wrong. What is especially disturbing, there was absolutely NO physical evidence to connect him to the crime. In the meantime, Davis sat in a cell in Death Row for 22 years.
And according to the excellent reports by Veronica Roberts, an Allvoices Anchor, new witnesses have come forward to identify another person who killed the police officer.
Many other doubts about his guilt were brought out, any ONE of which should have stopped the execution.
However, the wheels of ‘justice’ were in motion, the paperwork done, and the State of Georgia was set to receive a grant from the Federal Government for carrying out the execution. That is how these things work.
There was a world wide outcry against the upcoming execution, with petitions of hundreds of thousands of names and pleas from prominent people such as The Pope, and former FBI Director,William Sessions. Still, the clock ticked closer to the state appointed time.