POST: "Hours before execution, a state court grants Willie Manning a stay: A capital case about race and scientific evidence, about jailhouse snitches and faulty federal testimony, comes to a screeching halt," by Andrew Cohen, published in the Atlantic on May 7, 2013.
GIST: "By a vote of 8-1, the Supreme Court of Mississippi this afternoon halted the scheduled execution of Willie Manning just hours before the convicted murderer was to be put to death by lethal injection at the Parchman prison in Sunflower. In their brief order, which you can read for yourself here, the justices did not give any reason for blocking the execution, and it is unclear at this time exactly how the case will proceed from here.........Today's order, by contrast, is a mark of great dishonor to the lone dissenting justice, Michael K. Randolph, who in just a few paragraphs helped illustrate the dubious rationale behind so many of these flawed capital cases. To Justice Randolph, the grave error in this case was not the false testimony against Manning or the lack of DNA testing, it was the fact that his lawyers this week failed to submit affidavits with the letters from federal officials. Then, in a passage as unhinged as any I have ever read in a judicial opinion, Justice Randolph gave full voice to his real frustrations about the result here. Of the Justice Department's timely intervention in this story, Justice Randolph wrote: The letter also states that the Department of Justice is "assist[ing] [the Innocence Project and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers] in their evaluations." "The Innocence Project supports a moratorium on capital punishment." The "NACDL has been an outspoken critic of the death penalty system. Of critical concern is the language contained in the first FBI report stating that, "[g]iven the abbreviated time frame for review, the FBI requests the Innocence Project (IP) to advise as to whether or not they agree with the FBI's conclusions as soon as possible." Although the connectivity and expediency by which this review was accomplished is mind boggling, I should not be surprised, given that the families of the victims of the clandestine "Fast and Furious" gun running operation can't get the Department of Justice to identify the decision makers (whose actions resulted in the death of a border agent and many others) after years of inquiry, and that this is the same Department of Justice that grants and enforces Miranda warnings to foreign enemy combatants." [emphasis in original].........We haven't heard the last of Willie Manning, in order words -- or Justice Randolph, either, for that matter."
The entire post can be found at:
http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/05/hours-before-execution-a-state-court-grants-willie-manning-a-stay/275631/
PUBLISHER'S NOTE:
I have added a search box for content in this blog which now encompasses several thousand posts. The search box is located near the bottom of the screen just above the list of links. I am confident that this powerful search tool provided by "Blogger" will help our readers and myself get more out of the site.
The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at:
http://www.thestar.com/topic/
Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at:
http://smithforensic.blogspot.
Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com
Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.
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