Innocent Woman Scheduled For Execution in Mississippi

On Thursday, Mississippi is scheduled to execute the first woman, Michelle Byrom, 57, in the state since 1944, even though her son, Edward Byrom Jr., repeatedly confessed to the killing that she is slated to die for — evidence the jury did not hear because her defense attorneys--their first capital murder trial-- never admitted the confession letters into evidence. Ms. Byrom was a lifelong victim of  abuse, both as a child and in the marriage that ended in her husband’s death. Not to mention, at the time of her husband's death, Ms. Byrom was in the hospital for double pneumonia while on mind-altering drugs.

“As I sat on my bed, tears of rage flowing, remembering my childhood my anger kept building and building, and I went to my car, got the 9mm, and walked to his room, peeked in, and he was asleep. I walked about 2 steps in the door, and screamed, and shut my eyes, when I heard him move, I started firing.” -- Edward Byrom Jr

Despite corroborating evidence supporting the son's confessions such as the gunpowder found on his hands, Byrom Jr. pinned the murder plot on his mother after prosecutors convinced him to take a plea deal in exchange for a reduced sentence.

“When they got me here, I gave them a bullshit story after another, trying to save my own ass, but when David Smith started questioning me, and told me what happened, I was so scared, confused, and high, I just started spitting the first thought out, which turned into this big conspiracy thing, for money, which was all BS, that's why I had so many different stories,"--Edward Byrom Jr.

So authorities allege that Byrom Jr., his mother and his friend, Joey Gillis, colluded to kill Byrom Sr, in order for Michelle Byrom to collect on her husband’s life insurance policy. However, both Byrom Jr. and friend, Joey Gillis--accused of pulling the trigger despite the gun powder residue on Byrom Jr.'s hand-- walk free today.

The only certainty here is that Michelle Byrom did not have competent attorneys nor did she get a fair trial, the case in so many people who have been executed or who await their execution.

“I have attempted to conjure up in my imagination a more egregious case of ineffective assistance of counsel during the sentencing phase of a capital case. I cannot."--Judge Jess Dickinson

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The Science of Killing a Human Being.

In the documentary below, former Conservative MP, Michael Portillo pushes his body to the brink of death in an investigation into the science of execution. At the very beginning he states, "If the state's going to kill people, you want to do it as humanely as possible, I think most people agree on that." I'm not so sure. From my very limited perspective, I think the man who invented the lethal injection protocol, Dr. Jay Chapman's response,  "My basic attitude is so they suffer a little pain, who cares?" might just be the attitude shared by most.

Of course, as I've stated repeatedly, I do not believe in the death penalty under any circumstances, but if the state insists upon executing people, the least they could do is spare the doomed individual as much pain as possible. As I have also stated many times before, I think the lethal injection protocol is, as they say in the film "torture disguised as a medical procedure." And that's whether they carry it with two or three drugs. I mean, just imagine not getting enough of the drug that is supposed to cause unconsciousness, before getting the paralyzing drug (most likely used for aesthetic reasons) that renders you unable to signal your distress, followed by a heart-stopping drug, which "feels like a fire traveling through the vein to the heart.” The chance of this occurring is extremely high because it is administered by ill-trained staff.  After all, doctors and nurses are supposedly bound by the "Hippocratic Oath" or take a pledge to do no harm.

It's not just a lack of expertise that contribute to the controversy over lethal injection; it's the second drug in the cocktail: pancuronium bromide, the paralyzing agent  Carol Weihrer, who has testified in 15 court cases against lethal injection, knows all too well the pain this drug can cause. During a routine eye operation, in which she was given anesthesia and then pancuronium bromide, the anesthesia failed to work, leaving her fully aware of the excruciating pain as the pancuronium bromide coursed through her veins, but unable to tell anyone or move. She said if felt like "ignited jet fuel going through your body feeling like you're absolutely on fire." Carol believes that most executed inmates go through the same experience as she did.  She states that the anesthetic used in the lethal injection protocol is  "short-acting, five minute version" and that that lethal injection "takes between 10-12 minutes on a good day."  In other words, the inmate is put out for a couple of minutes, and then conscious, thus feels the pancuronium bromide painfully charge through their veins without being able to alert anyone and dies from suffocation before their heart is stopped.

One example:

Angel Diaz

On December 13, 2006,  Angel Diaz took more than a half-hour to die and required a second dose of the chemicals. After the first injection, he continued to move and was squinting and grimacing as he tried to mouth words.  The medical examiner stated that the needle had gone through Mr. Diaz's vein and out the other side, so the deadly chemicals were injected into soft tissue rather than the vein.

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Man Sentenced to Death For Killing Two Men Who Raped Him As a Child.

Pennsylvania is preparing to execute Terrance Williams for killing two men who used their positions as a church leader and booster to get access to young boys, and who brutally raped Williams as a child. 

According to witnesses, Terrance Williams was allegedly sexually abused for years by these men as well as other older individuals throughout his life. His mother had abused him frequently and his father was absent from the home. His first experience with sexual assault was when he was just six years old, and the abuse continued steadily for the next 12 years of his life.

According to The Nation, "It was not until this past winter that another witness would come forward, a former pastor named Charles Pointdexter, who knew Norwood for thirty years. He admitted having known that he had sexually abused teen boys.

“Amos seemed to have lots of close relationships with young men…” he stated in an affidavit signed February 9, 2012, saying that he began to suspect that they were “inappropriate” in nature. A few years before Amos’s death, one of the parishioners, the mother of a 15-year-old boy, told him that he had “touched her son’s genitals” during a car ride and that “Amos had inappropriately touched a number of boys at the church.” Pointdexter kept the knowledge to himself.

Because Williams was embarrassed and ashamed by the abuse, he says he did not present his experiences as evidence for trial. His lawyer also failed to conduct a thorough investigation of Williams’ motivations for killing the men, and ignored obvious signs of sexual abuse.

Many notable people have come forward to state that they would like his sentence to be reduced to life without parole. Among those objecting to his sentencing include the wife of one victim, five jurors from the trial, judges, child advocates, former prosecutors, faith leaders, mental health professionals, and law professors.

Jurors from the trial now say they would not have voted for execution had they known about his experiences with sexual abuse as a child.

A widow of one victim said that she has forgiven Williams and does not want any more deaths to come of the incident. She expressed hope that Governor Tom Corbett, the Board of Pardons, and District Attorney Williams will reduce his sentence to life without parole.

Courts have agreed that Williams’ lawyer failed to give him a fair trial, but they also have stated that evidence of sexual abuse would not have made a difference in the sentencing.

Jurors, however, have signed sworn affidavits saying they would not have voted for death if they had known about his past.

Several jurors have also said that they voted for him to be executed because they believed that, if they had not, Williams would be eligible for release on parole.

However, a life sentence in Pennsylvania means the convicted will never be eligible for parole. Pennsylvania is the only state in the U.S. that does not require judges to explain to the jury that a life sentence means there is no possibility of parole.

No explanation of life sentencing was given at Williams’ trial.

Terry Williams’ death warrant for October 3 was signed by Gov. Corbett last week. Corbett is a Catholic Republican.

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4th of July and Hypocrisy Reigns Supreme.

In January of this year, Hospira, the pharmaceutical company that produces sodium thiopental - the anesthetic most states use as the first drug in a three drug cocktail to execute prisoners in the US - ceased production over concerns about its use in executions. Since that time states have been scrambling to get their hands on their next fix on a replacement. After importing sodium thiopental from non-FDA approved sources, the state of Georgia acquired a replacement from Lundbeck, the Nembutol’s Danish manufacturer, who has repeatedly sent letters requesting that it not be used in executions. The manufacturer  “explicitly warned” that “this drug is not safe for use in judicial lethal injections.”

After Georgia's supply of sodium thiopental was seized by the DEA and after acquiring this controversial new sedative,  Roy Willard Blankenship thrashed, and jerked his way to death after its administration.  Mr. Blaankenship was not the first death-row inmate who suffered from a botched lethal injection  involving pentobarbital this year. Eddie Duval Powell also suffered from the administration of this deadly drug.

A death-row prisoner who was executed using a new lethal injection drug 'suffered greatly' during the process, a leading U.S. anaesthesiologist has testified.

Roy Willard Blankenship, who was executed on June 23 using pentobarbital - also known as nembutal - was said to be conscious for approximately the first three minutes of the execution and 'suffered greatly'.

Dr David Waisel, an Associate Professor of Anaesthesia at Harvard Medical School, also said in the sworn affidavit that 'his eyes were open throughout', according to witness accounts.

He said: 'I can say with certainty that Mr Blankenship was inadequately anaesthetised and was conscious for approximately the first three minutes of the execution.

So, 35-years after the US Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment, the US still remains among the top global executioners. 139 nations abolished the death penalty, but China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, the United States and Yemen continue to execute people, in direct contradiction to international human rights law. Like the other four countries listed, the death penalty in the United States is/was frequently imposed after unfair trials, where the defendant is almost always poor, uneducated, very often black, and totally vulnerable to a process that lacks fairness and integrity.

 138 innocent people have been sent to death row, and who knows how many victims were sent to their death, guilt-free.  The claim that the US is a progressive force for human rights is complete hypocrisy.

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Stop the Execution of Reggie Clemons in Missouri!

There are several troubling aspects to this case. Apparently Cummins, one of the alleged victims, initially made a confession to police that he had murdered his two cousins by pushing them off the bridge. After the four eventual suspects were caught, Cummins retracted and said that he had been mistreated by police and coerced into giving the confession. -- US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, 2004

Reginald Clemons, (left) currently on death row in Missouri for the last 17 years, almost all of his adult life, was convicted and sentenced to die as an accomplice to first-degree murder, rather than a principal actor. His sentence remains upheld by the state and federal courts, despite police and prosecutorial misconduct, a stacked jury, and plenty of error.

Reggie was one of three African American youths sentenced to death at separate trials in St Louis City, Missouri, in 1992 and 1993 for the murder of two young white women in 1991.

The second African American youth, Antonio Richardson, who was just 16 years old, borderline retarded and neurologically impaired at the time of his offense had his death sentence reduced to life imprisonment in 2003.


The third African American youth, Marlin Gray (left) was executed at 12:07 a.m., Wednesday, October 26, 2005.

A fourth co-defendant, Daniel Winfrey, white, pled guilty to a lesser offense in return for testimony against his three black co-defendants. He has since been released from prison. Charges against the original suspect in the case, Thomas Cummins, also white, were dropped and he became a key prosecution witness before suing the police for brutality against him during interrogation.

Reginald Clemons and Marlin Gray independently made similar allegations of abuse against the same police officers, allegations which remain an issue in efforts to prevent Clemons execution.

Reginald Clemons was convicted primarily on the testimony of Cummins and Winfrey, and on his own allegedly coerced statement implicating himself in the crime. Concern about the limited foundations for this conviction is heightened by evidence that the jury that convicted him was likely even more pro-prosecution than research show the average US capital jury to be.

[V]acation of the death penalty is required when even one juror is improperly excluded. Here there were six…
US District Court judge, 2002

A federal judge ruled in 2002 that as a result of the improper exclusion of jurors Reginald Clemons should receive a new sentencing hearing or have his death sentence reduced to life imprisonment. However, a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit overturned this decision on the grounds that the claim had not been properly preserved for federal judicial review. One of the judges dissented against upholding the death sentence, however, pointing to the improper exclusion of a seventh juror. At the same time, both the District Court judge and the three judges on the Court of Appeals agreed that Reginald Clemons had been prosecuted by a prosecutor whose conduct at trial was “unprofessional”, “abusive and boorish”, but decided that this improper conduct had not prejudiced the defendant. The federal courts have also dismissed claims that Clemons‟ legal representation at trial was inadequate under the deferential lens federal appeal courts adopt under US law.

Clemons was already scheduled for execution in June 2009, but the execution was stayed by the Missouri Supreme Court which appointed a “special master” judge to examine the case after his lawyers raised doubts about the reliability of his conviction and questions about the proportionality of his death sentence.

PLEASE TAKE ACTION:

Call on Governor Nixon to stop the execution of Reggie Clemons

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Dowload the Fact Sheet

What's wrong with the Reggie Clemons case?

No Physical Evidence
No physical evidence ties Clemons to the crime or the events leading up to it. The prosecution conceded that he neither killed the victims nor planned the crime.

Two Witnesses: 1 Former Suspect, 1 Co-Defendant
Two eyewitnesses were critical to the conviction. Thomas Cummins initially confessed to police that he murdered the victims, his cousins. After identifying Clemons and three other suspects, charges against him were dropped. On the day Clemons was sentenced to death, Cummins filed a police brutality lawsuit, resulting in a $150,000 settlement. Daniel Winfrey pled guilty to a lesser offense in exchange for testimony against Clemons and the other two.

Police Coercion Alleged
Clemons alleges that he confessed under the pressure of police brutality to raping one of the victims. He never confessed to the murders. He subsequently retracted his confession. Two other suspects independently alleged mistreatment by the police. Witnesses attest to Clemons’ face being swollen after his interrogation.

Prosecution Misconduct
Four federal judges have agreed that the prosecutor’s conduct was "abusive and boorish.” In his closing statement, he compared Clemons to two convicted serial killers, even though Clemons had no criminal record. He was 19 years old when the crime occurred. This behavior was part of a pattern that earned the prosecutor repeated criticism by state and federal courts.

Inadequate Legal Representation
Clemons’ lawyer was later suspended from practicing law following numerous complaints. His co-counsel had a fulltime job in another state when she represented Clemons. Another lawyer hired by Clemons’ mother to assist in the case said that as the trial loomed, it was clear the two trial lawyers had not done the necessary preparation.

Question Of Race
Race, particularly race of victim, biases the U.S. death penalty. Here, the murder victims were white, the three convicted defendants were black, and the two crucial witnesses were white. Blacks were disproportionately dismissed during jury selection, resulting in an unrepresentative jury given St. Louis’ sizeable black population.

A ‘Stacked’ Jury
In 2002, a U.S. District Court judge ruled that Clemons’ death sentence should not stand because six prospective jurors had been improperly excluded at jury selection. A higher court overturned this ruling on technical grounds – saying that Clemons’ lawyer had not properly preserved the claim for federal judicial review.

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Should Americans Witness all Executions?

Undoubtedly, Eddie Adams’ image of a South Vietnamese officer executing a captured Viet Cong guerrilla in 1968 (pictured left) stands out as one of the most disturbing photographs to emerge from the Vietnam War.

This photograph, published on the front page of the New York Times, proved to be so powerful that it provided the fuel needed to fire up the Vietnam protest movement, despite the fact that the man being executed had killed 12 people that same morning.
It didn't matter, America was still shocked and horrified by this photograph of an execution.

Obviously, when confronted with the in-your-face reality of execution, Americans found something dehumanizing or inhumane about killing human beings deliberately.

Why then, considering capital punishment does not deter crime and is far more expensive, not to mention the discriminatory component and the arbitrariness of its application, do we overwhelmingly support the death penalty?

Unfortunately, the same photograph, if shown today, would probably not have the same impact as it did 40-years ago. The excessive materialism that pervades our culture today makes it much too easy to distract ourselves from what we don't want to see.

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25-Day Stay of Execution Granted for Troy Davis

Update on Troy Davis:

A federal appeals court gave a last-minute reprieve to Troy Davis by issuing a 25-day stay of execution. Troy Davis was set to be executed on Monday, October 27. Davis supporters, including former President Jimmy Carter and other prominent advocates have raised doubts about his guilt and are calling for a new trial due to seven of the nine witnesses have recanting their testimony, in addition to lack of physical evidence. The case was decided primarily on eye-witness testimony.

The panel ordered both sides to draft briefs to address whether Davis can be executed if he can prove his innocence.

“Upon our thorough review of the record, we conclude that Davis has met the burden for a stay of execution,” the court said in a ruling issued by Judges Joel Dubina, Rosemary Barket and Stanley Marcus.

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Iraq - Fourth Highest Executioner in the World.

Iraq is now the fourth highest executioner in the world, Amnesty International has said.

Only three countries, China, Iran and Pakistan carry out the death penalty more frequently, the London-based human rights organisation said in a new report.

Since it was reinstated in 2004, the use of the death penalty had increased "rapidly", with more than 270 people sentenced to death and at least 100 people reportedly executed, it said.

"This represents a profoundly retrograde step. One that should not be overlooked simply because far larger numbers of lives have been lost due to ongoing violence," the report said.

The death penalty had been suspended after the US-led coalition entered in 2003. Although there were no executions reported in 2004, there were three men executed in 2005. Last year that figure rose dramatically, with at least 65 people, including two women, reportedly executed by hanging, the report revealed.

Former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and three of his associates were among those who were handed the death sentence at the end of 2006.

At the time Amnesty International said the executions were carried out after a trial which "failed to meet international fair trial standards, and an appeal process which was fundamentally flawed".

The group says in the report it is concerned that, in addition to these high profile cases, the death penalty is being increasingly imposed following "unfair trials before other Iraqi criminal courts, including the Central Criminal Court of Iraq".

The report said two protections often given to those convicted of serious crimes were being denied in Iraq, with those sentenced to death by the Supreme Iraqi Criminal Court could neither be pardoned nor have their sentence commuted.

The report said capital punishment had done nothing to deter the violence roiling the country. "It was entirely predictable that the restoration of the death penalty would perpetuate and exacerbate the abuse of human rights and come to be seen, as in the case of Saddam Hussein's execution, as an instrument of vengeance far removed from any notions of justice."

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Can the Death Penalty Ever Be Justified as Public Policy?

In evaluating whether Maryland's criminal death penalty should be replaced with life without parole, one must be guided by the answers to two basic questions:

· Is the death penalty a just punishment for murder?

· Is the death penalty an effective deterrent to murder?

Most of us would point to the execution of John Thanos, here in our state, as an example of a "just" application of the death penalty. Thanos murdered three teenagers, at random, by shooting them point-blank. He expressed no remorse, even declaring in court that he wished he could bring his innocent victims back to life to kill them again. In the end, he demanded to be executed and was. Most Marylanders felt, basically, that "hanging was too good" for John Thanos.

Did this one relatively humane execution balance out a violent murder -- much less three violent murders? Can any execution really be said to "even the ledger" for the taking of another's unique life?

Contrast that with the case of Kirk Bloodsworth, also in Maryland, who was convicted and sentenced to death for rape and murder in 1985. Eight years later, DNA evidence proved his innocence and he was released. In Illinois, 12 people have been executed since 1977. But over that same time, 18 death-row inmates have been released after evidence proved they were innocent.

These examples prompt a deeper question. Notwithstanding the executions of the rightly convicted, can the death penalty ever be justified as public policy when it inherently necessitates the occasional taking of wrongly convicted, innocent life? In Maryland, since 1978, we have executed five people and set one convicted man free when his innocence was discovered. Are any of us willing to sacrifice a member of our own family -- wrongly convicted, sentenced and executed -- in order to secure the execution of five rightly convicted murders? And even if we were, could that public policy be called "just"? I do not believe it can.

But what about the deterrent value of the death penalty? Does the use of the death penalty -- while rarely, if ever, "just" -- save more innocent lives than it takes? The evidence indicates that it does not.

In 2005, the murder rate was 46 percent higher in states that had the death penalty than in states without it -- although they had been about the same in 1990. And while the murder rate has gone down across the board since 1990, it declined by 56 percent in states without the death penalty but only 38 percent in states that have it. It would appear that the death penalty is not a deterrent, but possibly an accelerant, to murder.

And what of the tremendous cost of pursuing capital punishment? In 2002, Judge Dale Cathell of the Maryland Court of Appeals wrote that, according to his research, processing and imprisoning a death penalty defendant "costs $400,000 over and above . . . a prisoner serving a life sentence." Given that 56 people have been sentenced to death in Maryland since 1978, our state has spent about $22.4 million more than the cost of life imprisonment. That's nearly $4.5 million "extra" for each of the five executions carried out. And so long as every American is presumed innocent until proven guilty, the cost of due process will not go down.

If, however, we were to replace the death penalty with life without parole, that $22.4 million could pay for 500 additional police officers or provide drug treatment for 10,000 of our addicted neighbors. Unlike the death penalty, these are investments that save lives and prevent violent crime. If we knew we could spare a member of our family from becoming a victim of violent crime by making this policy change, would we do it?

And if the death penalty as applied is inherently unjust and lacks a deterrent value, we are left to ask whether the value to society of partial retribution outweighs the cost of maintaining capital punishment. While I am mindful of and sensitive to the closure (and in some cases the comfort) that the death penalty brings to the unfathomable pain of families that have lost loved ones to violent crime, I believe that it does not.

Human dignity is the concept that leads brave individuals to sacrifice their lives for the lives of strangers. Human dignity is the universal truth that is the basis of ethics. Human dignity is the fundamental belief on which the laws of this state and this republic are founded. And absent a deterrent value, the damage done to the concept of human dignity by our conscious communal use of the death penalty is greater than the benefit of even a justly drawn retribution.

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Executing Saddam Hussein

I am probably in the minority, but I find the execution of Saddam Hussein troublesome, knowing full well the savage, murderous environment he created for so many people. There is no doubt he will go down in history as one of the most brutal dictators that ever lived. Yet, watching him take his final steps to meet his executioners disturbs me on some level. I don't see how the premeditated execution of a man, any man, heinous as he may be, is incommensurable with what he is being executed for.

The irony is many of the people who fight for capital punishment are the same ones claiming they trust God implicitly... yet they cannot trust God enough to decide how and when the fate, of what they believe He created, should be.

Who gives any man the right to play God?

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Death Penalty World Maps

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