Innocent Man Executed?

[CBL4]

I looked into the cases reported by Justice Denied. Their (biased) conclusion sound very repetitive. For example,

Roy Roberts was convicted of capital murder for allegedly holding down a prison guard while other inmates stabbed him to death. No physical evidence ever tied Roberts to the crime. Although it was a bloody murder, the clothes Roberts was wearing on the day had no blood on them. Immediately after the riot, prison officials did a thorough search and confiscated all bloodied clothes from inmates. Roberts's clothes were not confiscated because they were not bloody.

Roberts was convicted based on what has been called "evolving testimony," that is testimony that evolves over time to fit the facts of the crime. No one implicated Roberts in the murder in the two weeks following it. None of the eyewitnesses mentioned Roberts as being anywhere near the victim, much less holding him down, as was later alleged in testimony, despite the fact that Roberts, a large man weighing over 300 pounds, stood out in a crowd.

Two weeks after the murder, the Department of Corrections submitted a 17-page internal investigative report. It failed to identify Roberts as a participant in the murder. It confirmed that no one knew who, if anyone, had held down the victim. Nonetheless, three guards later testified that Roberts held down the victim. All of these guards knew Roberts prior to the murder and yet failed to identify him as a participant in the murder immediately following it. One of these officers was hypnotized to bolster his memory, and still did not identify Roberts. Roberts's lawyer cross-examined only one of the eyewitnesses about inconsistencies between his initial statements and his trial testimony. This eyewitness maintained that he had simply forgotten to report seeing Roberts holding Jackson. Roberts's attorney never cross-examined the other three.

Robert Drew was tried and convicted largely on the testimony of one man, Bee Landrum, who claimed to be an eyewitness to the murder. Landrum's testimony was extremely shocking, powerful, and graphic. He claimed he could see all the people at the crime scene and that he saw Drew pull the victim's head back and slash his throat. He even re-enacted the killing for the jury. A tape-recorded interview with Landrum, made several hours after the murder in which he admitted that he had not seen the killing, was not offered into evidence at trial.

It took two trials to convict Freddie Lee Wright. The first trial, with a mixed-race jury, voted eleven to one in favor of acquittal, resulting in a mistrial. An all-white jury convicted him of armed robbery and capital murder in the second trial.

The prosecution in Wright's first trial relied on the testimony of two of his co-defendants. One later recanted his testimony, saying the prosecutor threatened him with the electric chair if he did not name Wright as the shooter. The other later provided a written affidavit saying that he, too, was pressured by the prosecution to name Wright. This second co-defendant named another man as the killer. ...
The state's new witness was Doris Lambert, Wright's former girlfriend and the mother of their child. She claimed Wright had confessed his guilt to her, although in his first trial she had planned to testify for him, and was never called to the stand. The prosecution suppressed Lambert's history of drug addiction and mental illness.

Gary Graham was convicted based on the testimony of one eyewitness, Bernadine Skillern, who witnessed the crime from 30 to 40 feet away while she sat in her car in the store parking lot at 9:30 at night. She remembered the killer as being clean-shaven with a short afro. She failed to identify Graham in a photo display. However, Graham's photo was the only one fitting her description, and she remarked that it might be him. The next day she viewed a line-up in which Gary Graham was the only person she had seen previously in the photo array. She then identified him as the killer. The jury did not hear evidence that Skillern had failed to identify Graham in her initial review of photos. In fact, she testified that she initially did identify him, despite the police report that said she did not.

There were four other eyewitnesses in the parking lot or the store that night. Two were called for a line-up, but failed to identify Graham. They were not asked specifically if Graham was the shooter. The other two witnesses were certain that Graham was not the shooter. They had seen a man, whom they described as the killer, waiting in front of the store. Neither of these witnesses was ever heard by the jury that convicted Graham or by any judge reviewing his appeals at either the state or federal level.

CBL

 

[The Fool]

If you support the practice of state killings then you really have to be prepared to accept the killing of innocent people too as the two activities have proven impossible in practice to separate.

 

[CBL4]

It's a gloomy day for me. This thread has made me look into the topic of death penalty innocence and it is clear that it is a common occurence but there's not much I can do about it.

I mentioned that Comparative Bullet Lead Analysis was used to convict Slaugher. Last week the New Jersey superior court said this about CBLA - "We conclude that the expert testimony was based on erroneous scientific foundation".
http://www.judiciary.state.nj.us/opinions/a2062-03.pdf
CBLA has been used to convict hundreds if not thousands of people and it has never been tested to see if it works. Oh, well. Only of few of them have been executed.

CBL

 

[KelvinG]

Wouldn't sound any better after someone wrongly spent 20 years in prison, IMHO.

I disagree. I think almost anything sounds better than putting an innocent person to death.
Sadly, there's no perfect system that can guarantee an innocent person will never be wrongfully convicted. But, at least by eliminating the death penalty an innocent person will never be executed by the state.

 

[KelvinG]

It's pretty tough to reverse a prison sentence, too, in the way that you mean.

Not nearly as tough as it is to bring a person back from the dead.

 

[aerocontrols]

Not nearly as tough as it is to bring a person back from the dead.

Returning someone from the dead and giving a 50-year-old his youth back are equally impossible.

 

[TragicMonkey]

Returning someone from the dead and giving a 50-year-old his youth back are equally impossible.

So are curing herpes and curing AIDS. If you had to have one of the two, which would you pick?

 

[aerocontrols]

So are curing herpes and curing AIDS. If you had to have one of the two, which would you pick?

Herpes.

And imprisonment, in the other case.

Still can't give me back my youth, though.

 

[KelvinG]

Returning someone from the dead and giving a 50-year-old his youth back are equally impossible.

At least in the latter scenario, the person is still alive.
As I've said earlier in this thread, imprisoning a person wrongfully for a long period of time is by no means a pretty thing.
But it's better than executing them, only to find out later they were innocent.

Let's say a 50 year old did get released from prison after new evidence found he was innocent after spending 20 years in jail. At least he could see his family, take a trip, smell the fresh air, etc, etc.

However, had he been executed he wouldn't be doing any of those things. He would be rotting in the ground.

To me it's a no brainer which situation I would feel worse about, despite the the fact that both are unpleasant.

 

[aerocontrols]

At least in the latter scenario, the person is still alive.
As I've said earlier in this thread, imprisoning a person wrongfully for a long period of time is by no means a pretty thing.
But it's better than executing them, only to find out later they were innocent.

Let's say a 50 year old did get released from prison after new evidence found he was innocent after spending 20 years in jail. At least he could see his family, take a trip, smell the fresh air, etc, etc.

However, had he been executed he wouldn't be doing any of those things. He would be rotting in the ground.

To me it's a no brainer which situation I would feel worse about, despite the the fact that both are unpleasant.

I refer to you The Fool's argument:

If you support the practice of [state imprisonment] then you really have to be prepared to accept the [imprisonment] of innocent people too as the two activities have proven impossible in practice to separate.

I understand your argument that one is worse than the other. (though some prisoners who commit suicide disagree, apparently) I'm just not too sure that the innocent man who is convicted and serves 25 years will be mollified by "at least we didn't kill you".

Do you oppose imprisonment as a form of punishment? It's not a pretty thing, but you don't oppose imprisonment because of a few innocent people who rot in prison for the rest of their lives, right?

MattJ

 

[TragicMonkey]

Do you oppose imprisonment as a form of punishment? It's not a pretty thing, but you don't oppose imprisonment because of a few innocent people who rot in prison for the rest of their lives, right?

Perhaps imprisonment is a necessary evil, while execution is an unnecessary one. After all, if you change all the death sentences to life in prison, society is equally safe. The only advantage execution would have over imprisonment would be deterring other people, and that doesn't seem to work anyway.

 

[KelvinG]

I refer to you The Fool's argument:



I understand your argument that one is worse than the other. (though some prisoners who commit suicide disagree, apparently) I'm just not too sure that the innocent man who is convicted and serves 25 years will be mollified by "at least we didn't kill you".

Do you oppose imprisonment as a form of punishment? It's not a pretty thing, but you don't oppose imprisonment because of a few innocent people who rot in prison for the rest of their lives, right?

MattJ

Yes, I support imprisonment. Like I've said in this thread, I wish there was a perfect system where we could always be 100% sure that all convicted persons were guilty. But, since the system is not perfect, it only seems responsible to accept the lesser of two evils - i.e. imprisonment as opposed to execution.
I don't buy the argument "Well, imprisonment is really bad and innocent people could spend years in jail, so it's OK to execute them cause it's only a little bit worse." At least with imprisonment there might be a chance to undo some (not all) of the damage.

I've never heard an argument in favour of the death penalty that outweighed the potential pitfalls of executing an innocent person.

 

[aerocontrols]

I don't buy the argument "Well, imprisonment is really bad and innocent people could spend years in jail, so it's OK to execute them cause it's only a little bit worse." At least with imprisonment there might be a chance to undo some (not all) of the damage.

That wasn't my argument, just so we're clear.

This argument from imperfection bothers me is all.

 

[crimresearch]

There are different degrees of murder. Deliberate framing should be first degree murder while reckless incompetence would be a lesser degree or manslaughter.

CBL

That is a nice line from a TV show...but under the concept of immunity, getting the wrong person, while following the proper procedures, isn't *any* degree of murder.

 

[nightwind]

Innocent

He could have very well been innocent. And I would be pretty confident in saying, I am sure that innocent people have been executed before.

Sometimes bad circumstances, setups, poor trial procedure, weird juries, etc. result in conviction of innocent people. And if it is a bad crime they are sentenced to death.

This is why the death penalty probably needs to be re thought. Especially in these days, when juries many times rule on emotion, etc., while pretty much ignoring evidence or lack of it.

 

[Jaggy Bunnet]

That is a nice line from a TV show...but under the concept of immunity, getting the wrong person, while following the proper procedures, isn't *any* degree of murder.

If the proper procedures are followed, it is difficult to see how it could be "reckless incompetence".

 

[Meadmaker]

I found a little bit more information at this link:

http://www.demaction.org/dia/organizations/ncadp/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=413


It sure looks like this guy was innocent to me. Of course, that's based on a superficial reading of the evidence, but it really does look bad.

I remember discussing American justice with some of my Irish relatives. The thing they thought was barbaric was not the death penalty, but the American practice of electing prosecutors. Obviously, this would lead to wrongful convictions, and they are right.

 

[crimresearch]

"...I remember discussing American justice with some of my Irish relatives. The thing they thought was barbaric was not the death penalty, but the American practice of electing prosecutors. Obviously, this would lead to wrongful convictions, and they are right."

Elected prosecutors are one of the worst features of the CJ system.
They become first and foremost, career politicians, if they care at all about keeping their jobs, or moving up.

 

[Meadmaker]

I've done some googling on the subject, and it's really frustrating to investigate these things by doing web searches. The people who say he is innocent provide lots and lots of evidence, but they ignore the other side entirely. The people who say he is guilty say the evidence is overwhelming.

If anyone else is looking for information about this case, there is one piece of evidence that, if accurate, is completely damning to Jimmy Slaughter.

According to the prosecution, Jimmy Slaughter requested that a worker at a VA hospital provide a pair of underwear and some hairs from an African American man. She testified that she had done that. Those hairs and underwear were found at the crime scene. Meanwhile, Slaughter himself, when first interviewed, suggested that the victim had been sexually involved with African Americans, and gave "hints" to police that they might find things which would suggest that an African American prowler was responsible. Of course, they did find those things, but, so the prosecution contends, they were planted by Slaughter.

None of the anti-death penalty sites mentioned this piece of evidence, which, if accurate, would provide an open and shut case against Slaughter.

Furthermore, those sites talked about the importance of other pieces of evidence, such as the hair and bullets mentioned in the original post. It's true that evidence was introduced, but the case didn't hinge on that evidence. The hair in question had been identified as belonging to a coworker of Slaughter's. The more recent DNA tests showed it did not, but all that would do would be to change that hair from an important piece of evidence to an insignificant piece of evidence. But there was other, more important, evidence, specifically the planted items.

Balanced against that, there were a lot of reasons to believe that the time of death fixed by the prosecution was incorrect. The defense theory puts the deaths at a time when Slaughter had an ironclad alibi, and there was a fair amount of evidence to support that theory.

It's frustrating to me to try and find out what happened in cases like this. The presentations are so slanted that getting at the real issues is very difficult.

 

[CBL4]

Meadmaker,

I agree with everything you say about biases and difficulty in finding evidence.

My point is that significant evidence presented at the first trial was wrong. He deserved a new trial. Perhaps he would still be found guilty or perhaps he would be found innocent. I do not know and I do not profess to know whether he was actually guilty.

All I know is that he was convicted on improper evidence and that because of time deadlines and faulty forensics he was executed anyway. That is barbaric not justice.

CBL