R.I.P. Troy Davis

Roman Colosseum lit to protest an execution

On September 21, 2011, Georgia executed Troy Davis for the murder of off-duty police officer Mark MacPhail, who was working as a security guard when he was killed on August 19, 1989.  Seven out of the nine key witnesses who implicated Davis recanted their testimony.  No physical evidence tied Davis to the crime.

My dear friend, Denny LeBoeuf, director of the Capital Punishment Project at the American Civil Liberties Union issued the following statement:

The execution of an innocent man crystallizes in the most sickening way the vast systemic injustices that plague our death penalty system. No innocent person should ever be put to death, and it is unconscionable and unconstitutional to carry out an execution where, as in the case of Troy Davis, significant doubts exist.
The jury in Troy's case was deceived, witnesses were pressured, and virtually no one who looks at the case today would claim that he could be convicted, let alone sentenced to death, for the murder. Troy's case makes clear that the death penalty system in the United States is broken beyond repair. It is arbitrary, discriminatory and comes at an enormous cost to taxpayers, and it must be ended.

This is the 35th execution in the United States in 2011, the fourth in Georgia.