An execution amid claims of injustice

September 22, 2011 11:20 pm | Updated September 23, 2011 03:34 am IST - JACKSON (Georgia):

Troy Davis

Troy Davis

In the final hours before Troy Davis was put to death, hundreds of anguished supporters outside the prison clung to the hope for a stay of this most controversial of executions.

Their longing was met with frustration by the family of Mark MacPhail, the off-duty policeman Davis was convicted of killing, who were convinced through two decades of court hearings that his killer was finally facing justice.

Those who had campaigned for Davis for years had hoped that his conviction — marred by lack of physical evidence and recanted testimony — was a rare sympathetic case that would convey the injustice of capital punishment.

As the hours wound down, one last-ditch legal manoeuvre after another seemed to rekindle hope for a stay of execution, and his scheduled time of lethal injection came and went amid rumours the U.S. Supreme Court had granted clemency.

But the tide of ecstasy soon turned to grim silence and weeping, as word of the court's rejection — the final rejection — reached the weary protesters.

Soon a gurney-bound Davis proclaimed his innocence one last time before being injected with a lethal cocktail, and by 11:08 pm the 42-year-old was dead.

“It's a moment when your heart breaks, when the justice of a nation has deeply disappointed millions of people in the world,” said Benjamin Jealous, head of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

Davis had declined a last meal request — perhaps he too held out hope until the end — and so was served cheeseburgers, oven-browned potatoes, baked beans, coleslaw, cookies and a grape drink. His cause had been taken up by a high-profile campaign backed by the former U.S. president Jimmy Carter and Desmond Tutu.

Protesters carried signs reading “Don't let the blood be on your hands,” and “This is death row, we say hell no.”

As night fell the supporters outside the prison raised slogans and wept as they careened from frenzied joy at the premature news of a reprieve to weary hugging and weeping when it finally became clear Davis was going to die. Alongside the protesters' pain was the much older but raw grief of MacPhail's family, robbed of a father, husband, son and friend when he was gunned down in a Burger King parking lot in 1989.

His mother Anneliese MacPhail told CNN she was “absolutely devastated” by the delays, saying Davis's guilt was clear from the evidence she had seen in two decades of court appearances during all the legal wrangling.

Mercy

Davis was strapped to a gurney when MacPhail's family and friends were led in to watch the execution. He immediately looked up at them, and in his final moments insisted one last time that he was innocent. “For those about to take my life, may God have mercy on your souls. May God bless your souls,” he was quoted as saying. Witnesses said the MacPhails stared back at him the whole time.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.