Troy Davis Execution: Former FBI Chief William S. Sessions Calls On Georgia To Stay Order 15SEP11

WE have 6 days to stop the execution of Troy Davis. More and more people with influence, like William Sessions and Bob Barr r GA realize this execution will be murder by the state of Georgia and are calling on the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles to commute his sentence. We can only hope and pray the people serving on the board will hear all our pleas and will take the right action and stop this execution. This from HuffPost.....
The execution of Troy Davis, a Georgia death row inmate scheduled to die in less than a week, should be halted because of "pervasive, persistent doubts" about his guilt, said William S. Sessions, a former federal district judge in Texas and FBI director under Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, in a sharply-worded editorial on Thursday.
"Serious questions about Mr. Davis' guilt, highlighted by witness recantations, allegations of police coercion, and a lack of relevant physical evidence, continue to plague his conviction," Sessions wrote. He urged a state pardons board to commute the sentence to life in prison.
The unusual plea from Sessions, which appears in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, is the latest high-profile call for clemency for Davis, whose looming execution has become a lightning rod for national and international criticism. Among those who have called for a halt to the execution, scheduled for Sept. 21 at 7 p.m., are Pope Benedict XVI, former President Jimmy Carter and the leadership of the NAACP and Amnesty International.
Davis, 42, was convicted of murdering Mark MacPhail, an off-duty Savannah police officer shot to death while coming to the aid of a homeless man being assaulted in a parking lot in the early morning of Aug.19, 1989. The murder weapon was never recovered and no physical evidence was found linking Davis to the crime, and he has always maintained that another man at the scene was responsible for the shooting.
Since the original trial in 1991, seven of nine prosecution witnesses that linked Davis to the shooting have either recanted or materially altered the stories they told the jury, but Davis' attempts to secure a retrial have been persistently rebuffed by state and federal courts.
In an extraordinary hearing in June 2010 ordered by the U.S. Supreme Court, Davis' attorneys were finally allowed to present evidence of his innocence to a federal judge. In statement after statement, witnesses from the original trial avowed that they had been coerced by police to implicate Davis in the shooting or had lied in order to secure lenience for their own troubles with the law.
"I am not proud for lying at Troy's trial, but the police had me so messed up that I felt that's all I could do or else I would go to jail," one key eyewitness told Davis' attorneys in an affidavit.

Legal experts familiar with the case said the recantations and allegations of police coercion badly undermined the state's case against Davis.
"The record is shredded," said Russell Covey, a law professor at Georgia State University. "What was presented to that jury is no longer valid evidence."
But the judge overseeing the hearing, William T. Moore Jr., decided that in order to overturn the original jury verdict, Davis needed not only to cast doubt on the evidence against him, but to provide "clear and compelling" proof of his innocence. In an August 2010 ruling dismissing Davis' appeal, he declared that while the state's case "may not be ironclad," Davis failed to make a showing of "actual innocence" and thus should not be granted a new trial. The evidentiary hearing was the first such legal proceeding in more than 50 years.
"A federal court simply cannot interpose itself and set aside a jury verdict in this case absent a truly persuasive showing of innocence," Moore wrote. "To act contrarily would wreak complete havoc on the criminal justice system."
The decision was welcomed by state prosecutors and family members of MacPhail, the murdered police officer. But some legal experts said the judge had set the bar for a retrial far too high and had overlooked the weakness of the state's original case against Davis.
At the original trial, for instance, several eyewitnesses that prosecutors used to identify Davis as the shooter had actually seen pictures identifying him as a suspect before being asked to select the shooter from an array of photos, according to Moore's 172-page decision. Another key eyewitness originally told police that he had not seen the shooter's face; at the trial, two years later, he told the jury he was confident Davis was the killer.
This August, the New Jersey Supreme Court issued a landmark decision setting new strict rules on eyewitness identifications. Under the rules, judges must inform jurors of factors that may be responsible for the misidentification of a suspect. Such misidentifications have been linked to numerous false convictions.
"The identifications are really incredibly tainted," said Anne Emanuel, a death penalty expert and law professor at Georgia State University.
Emanuel also noted the prosecutors' reliance on two hearsay confessions at the original trial, including one allegedly given by Davis to a cellmate shortly after his arrest. Both confessions were later recanted by the witnesses in affidavits.
"At the original trial, you've got very dubious eyewitness identifications and a lot of hearsay," Emanuel said. "It's appalling for a death case."
But after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear a new appeal in March, Davis’ state and federal appeals are essentially exhausted. His last chance for clemency is now in the hands of the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles.
The board granted a stay of execution to Davis in 2007, showing a willingness to hear evidence of his innocence. But in 2008, the board voted to deny a second request for clemency without comment.
The board, now comprised of several new members, has granted clemency only three time since 1991, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
Bob Barr, a former federal prosecutor and four-term Republican congressman from Georgia, urged the board to grant clemency for Davis in an editorial published in the Savannah Morning News on Wednesday.
In 2007, the five-member board pledged that “it will not allow an execution to proceed in this state unless and until its members are convinced there is no doubt as to the guilt of the accused,” Barr noted in the editorial.
“I am a longtime supporter of the death penalty. I make no judgment as to whether Davis is guilty or innocent. And surely the citizens of Savannah and the state of Georgia want justice served on behalf of Officer MacPhail,” Barr wrote. “But imposing an irreversible sentence of death on the skimpiest of evidence will not serve the interest of justice.”

VIDEO: September execution date for Troy Davis? from AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 26AUG11

I have always been against the death penalty. Yes, some people commit heinous, brutal crimes taking the life of another person. But I have always believed that when it comes to the death penalty the convicted person should be sentenced to life without parole, and when they die God will decide if they are to be punished. I am not without sin and so can never judge a person and sentence them to death. IT would seem the state of Georgia is going to execute a possibly innocent man. Troy Davis' trial and conviction and death sentence seem to be based on poor evidence, coerced witnesses and a biased trial, and the state of Georgia Pardons and Parole Board needs to stop the execution of Troy Davis and grant him a new jury trial if there is enough credible evidence to justify it, and if not then set him free and find the real killer of Officer Mark MacPhail. Even the widow of Officer MacPhail doubts Troy Davis' guilt. Watch these videos from Amnesty International, and share with family, friends, everyone....Go to http://www.justicefortroy.org for more information and please e mail Pres Obama and ask him to pardon Troy Davis before Georgia executes him here http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact

	"This person could die for something they didn't do." - Human rights attorney
	As early as September, we're bracing ourselves for the worst - another execution date for Troy Davis. In March of this year, the U.S. Supreme Court, despite having ordered a special hearing, flat-out refused to hear Davis' appeal! That decision has led us to this very moment when we wait for Georgia authorities to set an execution date. Make no mistake about it - we're in the calm before the storm. Over the years, the case of Troy Davis has inspired so many of us to take action. It is a painfully clear example of the many flaws of the death penalty. Serious doubts about guilt have persisted, yet many people have still not heard about this incredible case more fit for a legal thriller than reality: A flawed investigation, alleged witness coercion, police "tunnel vision", flimsy evidence, and a clumsy legal system that cannot seem to do the right thing. Before an execution date is announced, please help us educate more people about the doubts that plague the Troy Davis case. The more people who learn about this injustice, the more who will join us in fighting it. 1) Watch and share this video with everyone you know 2) Sign up to help educate others about Troy Davis: Remember: An execution date may be inevitable, but execution is not. The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles will soon hold Troy Davis' life in their hands - quite literally. The have said that they will not allow an execution to proceed unless there is “no doubt” about guilt. We will hold them to this statement. There is just too much doubt in this case, and too many questions that have not been answered. Things may move quickly in September, and we'll keep you posted as events unfold. Stand ready to act! In Hope and Solidarity, Laura Moye Director, Death Penalty Abolition Campaign Amnesty International USA  Share this action:
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