Tuesday, September 29, 2015

Bulletin: Richard Glossip: Oklahoma; Willie Manning site looks at the Glossip case and sets out every innocent death row inmate's nightmare: "It is shocking that Glossip might die on Wednesday simply because his attorneys’ investigations require longer than the allocated time to uncover evidence that could quite possibly, as in Willie’s cases, prove exculpatory."

"Richard Glossip is scheduled to be executed in Oklahoma on Wednesday (September 16, 2015). One of his current attorneys, Don Knight, has described his trial in marketing terms: “Basically, you’ve got prosecution trying to sell their product [Glossip’s responsibility for a murder] to the jury.” Knight argues that without an effective counter-narrative from the defense, the jury ‘bought’ the prosecution’s product. As Barry Scheck writes in the Huffington Post, “We … don’t know for sure whether Richard Glossip is innocent or guilty. That is precisely the problem. If we keep executing defendants in cases like this, where the evidence of guilt is tenuous and untrustworthy, we will keep killing innocent people.” In both Willie Manning’s cases evidence of guilt was also tenuous and untrustworthy. In his 1992 case it was probably last-minute revelations from the FBI (about false hair and ballistics testimony) that brought about the court’s stay of his execution. In his unrelated 1993 case it was a court’s acceptance that the prosecution had withheld evidence that resulted in the charges against him being dropped. If the exculpatory evidence had not been revealed in time, in either of his cases, Willie would by now be dead, executed in error. It is shocking that Glossip might die on Wednesday simply because his attorneys’ investigations require longer than the allocated time to uncover evidence that could quite possibly, as in Willie’s cases, prove exculpatory."
http://justice4willie.com/2015/09/14/willie-manning-death-row-mississippi-like-richard-glossip-evidence-tenuous-and-untrustworthy/