Shame on us

by Thomas C. Fox on Sep. 22, 2011

"Tonight the state of Georgia legally lynched an innocent man," Troy Davis' lawyer Thomas Ruffin Jr. said. "Tonight I witnessed something tragic."

Davis, whose case drew international attention, is now dead, executed for the 1989 killing of an off-duty police officer in Savannah, Georgia, a crime he quite likely did not commit, a crime riddled with grave doubt.

Until the very end, he maintained his innocence. After being strapped to the death gurney, he lifted his head to address the family of the slain officer, once again saying he was not responsible for the officer's death and did not have a gun at the time, according to execution witnesses.

The pleas of Pope Benedict XVI and former U.S. President Jimmy Carter and a host of other well-known and lesser known human rights and justice advocates were to no avail.

Amnesty International was among the organizations that condemned the execution. It issued a statement saying, "the U.S. justice system was shaken to its core as Georgia executed a person who may well be innocent. Killing a man under this enormous cloud of doubt is horrific and amounts to a catastrophic failure of the justice system."

Shame on us. Shame on U.S. laws that allow capital punishment in such irretrievable unjustice. Let us hope that this tragedy leads to further scrutiny and reform of our legal system.

Oh Tom, you only told half

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sep. 22, 2011.

Oh Tom, you only told half the story, shame on you :)

The shell casings at the crime scene matched the casings at another crime scene where Davis shot another man in the face.
Witnesses may change their stories which they did almost 17 years LATER! Where were they during the first 17 years?
However, hard evidence, the shell casings, don't change based on sympathies.
After OJ Simpson some people will say anything.

By the way, if so many people are against the death penalty how many were at the other execution in Texas last night? He was a white supremacist who killed a black man by dragging him behind his truck?

Seems like the "system" is not the only thing flawed.

It's not even about either

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sep. 26, 2011.

It's not even about either man's guilt or innocence. Jesus took the option of the death penalty away from us by requiring the executioners (us) to be without sin. We aren't so we can't.

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