At a
time when two of Pennsylvania’s largest institutions have been exposed
for turning a blind eye to the sexual abuse of children, the state is
preparing to execute a victim of child sex abuse for killing his
abusers.
In 1984, less than four months after his 18th birthday —
the minimum age required for capital punishment — Terrance “Terry”
Williams was sentenced to death for the murder of 56-year-old Amos
Norwood, a Philadelphia church leader. With the help of 18-year-old Marc
Draper, the son of a police officer, Williams smashed Norwood’s skull
with a tire iron, set fire to his body and dumped him in a cemetery.
Just five months earlier, Williams was convicted of third-degree murder
for killing 50-year-old Herbert Hamilton, who was found naked on his
kitchen floor with a knife in his throat.
But according to
Williams’ lawyers, both the jury and defense were deliberately kept in
the dark about the true motive behind the killings — the sexual abuse
Williams, now 46, endured at the hands of Hamilton and Norwood. At the
time, Williams now says, he was too ashamed to admit the abuse. Now he
says he was violently raped by Norwood the night before the murder.
that
sentenced Williams to death have testified that they never would have
done so had they known about Williams’ history of childhood sexual abuse
— and had they known that his victims were also his abusers.
As
Williams’ Oct. 3 execution nears, his attorneys are scrambling to save
his life. On Monday, the Pennsylvania Board of Pardons rejected a
.
Though the five-member board voted 3-to-2 in favor of clemency,
unanimous approval is required for the governor to consider halting the
execution. Williams’s lawyers have since asked the Board of Pardons to
,
citing an allegedly inaccurate statement made by assistant district
attorney Thomas Dolgenos, though it’s unclear whether board rules allow
for reconsideration.
Williams’ life currently rests in the hands
of Philadelphia Common Pleas Court judge M. Teresa Sarmina, who has the
power to grant an emergency stay of execution. Victor Abreu, one of
Williams’ attorneys, tells Salon, “The state knew the real motive for
the killing and yet presented evidence that was false.” Sarmina is
currently reviewing whether this is indeed the case.
At
the time of the trial, the prosecution alleged that the killing was
motivated by robbery, using the testimony of Draper, Williams’
co-defendant, as proof. But Draper, also now 46, has
recanted his testimony and
says that he told homicide detectives and then prosecutor Andrea
Foulkes on multiple occasions that Williams was motivated by sexual
abuse, not robbery.
In an evidentiary hearing held on Thursday,
Sarmina listened to nine hours of testimony from Draper and Foulkes, now
a federal prosecutor.
Draper, who was convicted of second-degree
murder and sentenced to life in prison without parole for his role in
Norwood’s killing, says he was promised a shot at parole in exchange for
testifying that robbery was the motive. He also contends that Foulkes
promised to write a letter to the parole board on his behalf.
Foulkes called Draper’s claim that she ignored evidence of sexual abuse and instructed him to change his testimony “
a complete lie,” though she acknowledges having written a letter for him to the parole board in 1988. The hearing is scheduled to
continue on Monday.
Ironically, it is Pennsylvania’s Republican Gov. Tom Corbett — under fire by
some critics for
how long it took to bring charges against former Penn State football
assistant coach Jerry Sandusky when Corbett was state attorney general —
who
signed Williams’ death warrant in
early August. Some critics have said that Corbett deliberately
understaffed an investigation team, so much so that it took three years
to arrest Sandusky, during which more children were likely abused.
As a result, it will be interesting to see whether Corbett chooses to
intervene on behalf of Williams, a popular high school quarterback and
also a victim of sex abuse whose abusers, like Sandusky, appear to have
been repeatedly ignored despite being suspected of wrongdoing.
Marc Bookman, executive director of the Atlantic Center for Capital
Representation in Philadelphia, tells Salon that, “If there is any state
that has a sense of what sexual abuse does to someone, it’s
Pennsylvania.” Bookman says he is “cautiously optimistic” that the state
will spare Williams. “I would hope that the governor’s experience in
the Sandusky case would make him more sensitive and more understanding
of the incredible trauma that Terry Williams underwent.”
Despite declarations of sympathy for child victims of sex abuse by
Pennsylvania’s politicians and bureaucrats, the prosecution has elected
to blame Williams for failing to raise the issue of sexual abuse at his
trial. “Instead,”
says deputy district attorney Ronald Eisenberg,
“[Williams] chose to present false testimony that he wasn’t there.”
However, Williams lawyers explain that the reason it took Williams so
long to reveal his abused history is because he was frightened and
ashamed, as are most child victims of rape.
On another occasion, Eisenberg
called Williams’
plea for clemency a “massive public relations campaign.” Eisenberg’s
remarks echo the prosecution’s belief that Williams’ alleged abuse is
unimportant in deciding whether he lives or dies. In a
statement following
the rejection of clemency, district attorney Seth Williams accused
Terry Williams “of manipulative and malevolent behavior,” calling his
claims of sexual abuse “a last ditch effort to escape punishment for his
crime.”
Shawn Nolan, another one of Williams attorneys, has
expressed outrage at the prosecution’s argument, saying in a statement,
“It is unconscionable that district attorney Seth Williams, who
considers himself an advocate and defender of victims of abuse, has
allowed prosecutors to characterize the evidence in this case as a ‘gay
prostitute rage defense.’”
As a child, Williams was no stranger to abuse by older men in positions of authority. The
clemency petition filed
by Williams’ attorneys describes his childhood as wrought with “abuse,
neglect and deprivation,” which “made him an easy mark for sexual
predators.” His mother was cruel and abusive, and his stepfather was a
violent alcoholic. The sexual abuse Williams suffered began at the age
of six, when he was raped by an older boy in his neighborhood. “He came
home in tears, bleeding from his rectum. Terry reported the assault to
his mother, who saw the blood on his backside but never even sought
medical attention for her son, let alone counseling or mental health
treatment,” states the clemency petition. Later, Williams was raped by
his middle school teacher, Timothy Johnson, and at 16, he was gang raped
by two older men in juvenile detention.
Hamilton and Amos, the men Williams ultimately killed, are described
in the petition as “middle-aged sexual predators who preyed on teenage
boys.” Hamilton, a prescription drug dealer, abused many teenage boys,
one of whom testified in the petition. According to Williams’ defense,
his attempted abuse of Williams resulted in a knife fight that ended
with Hamilton’s death.
In an unprecedented outpouring of support, 36
child advocates and sexual abuse experts, 38
law professors, 48
mental health professionals, 55
religious leaders and 36 former
prosecutors and
judges are calling on the state of Pennsylvania to spare the life of Terrance Williams.
Mamie Norwood,
the elderly widow of Amos Norwood, one of the men Williams killed, is
also among those calling for clemency, saying, “His execution would go
against my Christian faith and my belief system.”
Furthermore, over 350,000 people have signed a
petition at Change.org urging clemency. The European Union has even chimed in with an “
urgent humanitarian appeal”
to Corbett and the Board of Pardons, calling the case “particularly
distressing because he has been reported to have been sexually abused by
the person whom he murdered, a fact which appears not to have been
taken into account during his trial.”
Meanwhile, in a
letter sent
to Corbett and the Board of Pardons, over two-dozen child advocates and
sexual abuse experts argue that Williams’ actions were a direct result
of sexual abuse. “Terry’s acts of violence have, alas, an explanation of
the worst sort: Enveloped by anger and self-hatred, Terry lashed out
and killed two of the men who sexually abused him and caused him so much
pain,” they say. “Terry was left alone to develop the means to deal
with the horrors of his daily life.” The letter continues:
His crimes are an undeniable reflection of this internal
suffering and are directly connected to his history of abuse and trauma.
The violence of his crimes is a window into the true agony with which
he struggled. We are saddened by what could have become of Terry
Williams’ life had someone, anyone, intervened on his behalf.
The letter also points to the significance of understanding the
effects of child sex abuse in the wake of Pennsylvania’s recent sex
abuse scandals involving Jerry Sandusky and the Catholic Church, saying,
“In our Commonwealth, we have seen very public and analogous examples
of this phenomenon as major institutions in Pennsylvania have come under
scrutiny regarding the sexual abuse of children.”
Though Pennsylvania has the nation’s fourth highest number of death
row inmates, prisoners are rarely executed due to a high reversal rate,
making the notion that Williams is among the worst of the worst and is
deserving of death absurd in the eyes of his advocates. Only three
people have been executed since the state reinstated capital punishment
in 1978. Williams would mark the first Pennsylvania execution in 13
years as well as the state’s first non-volunteer execution since 1962.
http://www.salon.com/2012/09/22/terry_williams_a_victim_might_be_executed/
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