"Help Save Troy Davis" (NAACP)

[Gulalai]

So for those living in the U.S.,
I got this in my inbox a little while ago, What do you think of this situation? & What are your thoughts on NAACP?

------------------------------------------

Friend,

Innocent until proven guilty.

These four words helped establish our criminal justice system. But in a nation that prides itself on our belief in liberty and justice for all, why is Troy Davis -- with an overwhelming body of evidence pointing to his innocence -- facing execution?

Twenty years ago, Troy Davis was convicted of murdering a white police officer. Since then, seven of the nine witnesses recanted their statements, new witnesses have come forward identifying another man as the murderer, and the alleged murder weapon has still not been found.

Despite these new developments, the state of Georgia is putting Davis on track to be executed -- perhaps as early as next month.

You can help save Troy Davis' life today by standing up, adding your voice to our "name wall" and asking the Georgia Parole Board to commute his sentence:

http://action.naacp.org/Save-Troy-Davis

When the Supreme Court heard the evidence, they understood that there were many more questions to be answered. But instead of granting Troy Davis a trial where his peers could decide his fate, he was forced to face a single federal judge where the burden was on Troy to prove his innocence -- the exact opposite presumption of a jury trial.

In hopes of exonerating Troy after 10 years of imprisonment, his lawyer submitted each piece of evidence at the hearing. And each piece of evidence was rejected by the judge. Despite noting that the case against Troy was not "ironclad," he nevertheless refused to grant a new trial.

A jury trial would have made this issue moot. Reasonable doubt would have freed Troy Davis.

Now it's up to you to put a stop to Troy Davis' execution. You are his last hope, and time is running out. Tell the Georgia Parole Board not to execute a man with such an overwhelming body of evidence pointing to his innocence:

http://action.naacp.org/Save-Troy-Davis

As an American, I have faith in our justice system. But as President of the NAACP, I have seen how our justice system can fail. Sometimes even when it comes to life and death. It is up to us to right this wrong.

This is his last chance. Stand by Troy and stand up for liberty and justice for all.

Thanks,

Ben

Benjamin Todd Jealous
President and CEO
NAACP

[Digital Malang]

screw Americans.

[Bengal_Tiger]

If the NAACP version of events is true, then this is disgusting. This would basically be state-sponsored murder of an innocent man.

However I am not that familiar with the US or US legal system or this whole particular case to comment. Maybe some of our American forumers can comment.

[Gulalai]

Last-minute appeal to halt execution for Troy Davis rejected

The Georgia pardons board rejected a last-minute appeal Wednesday by attorneys for death row inmate Troy Davis to halt his execution scheduled for later in the day.

Defense attorney Brian Kammer filed the appeal in Butts County Superior Court, south of Atlanta, arguing that ballistic testing that linked Davis to the shooting was flawed.

The state Pardons and Paroles Board said in a statement it would not review its decision to allow the execution to go forward. Defense lawyer Stephen Marsh also said the pardons board denied his request for Davis to take a polygraph test

Davis is set to be executed by injection at 7 p.m. .
About 225 supporters -- some chanting "Save Troy Davis now" -- were stationed in a special cordoned-off area outside the prison in Jackson, Ga., on Wednesday afternoon. A separate cordoned-off area for supporters of the execution sat empty.


Activist Al Sharpton arrived with the group of supporters who came from Atlanta on two buses.
"There is no DNA, no gun, no physical evidence," Sharpton said. "That is unheard of in a civilized society. This is much bigger than Troy Davis; it's about people having the right to seek redress. We are here because this is an outrage and we want to show it's an outrage."

The family of Davis, 42, was "heartbroken," said Benjamin Jealous, head of the NAACP, after the Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles announced Tuesday it would not grant clemency to the man convicted in the 1989 slaying of Savannah, Ga., police officer Mark MacPhail.
"They're terrified at the thought that the state of Georgia would kill their loved one," Jealous said.

Members of MacPhail's family expressed relief at the decision, which appeared to end years of attempts by Davis supporters to stop his death. "Justice was finally served for my father," Mark MacPhail Jr. told the Associated Press. "The truth was finally heard."

MacPhail's family has said it was time to stop dragging out the case and carry out the penalty. Davis supporters noted that 10 witnesses signed affidavits saying police coerced them into implicating Davis, and eight more signed affidavits implicating another man.

Davis has been scheduled for execution four times. Now, his appeals are exhausted, said Michael Leo Owens, a professor of political science at Emory University in Atlanta who has studied capital punishment.
Davis has drawn support from around the world, from Pope Benedict XVI to former president Jimmy Carter. The NAACP, Amnesty International, ColorOfChange.Org and Change.org collected more than 900,000 signatures petitioning the pardon board to spare him.

Ernel Dawkins, a supporter, said he felt compelled to come to the prison even if the state moves ahead with Davis' execution.
"There's always something good that comes out of something bad," said Dawkins, 37, of Decatur, Ga. "His life may save 10 people's lives."
Supporters continued their campaign after Tuesday's announcement, urging people via Twitter to contact Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal or plead with the pardon board to reconsider. The board will not do that, spokesman Steve Hayes said. Supporters also pressed Chatham County District Attorney Larry Chisolm to vacate the death warrant, but Chisolm said he was powerless to do so.

Inside the prison, Davis has opted not to request a special last meal, prison officials said in a release. Instead, Davis will be offered a meal of "grilled cheeseburgers, oven-browned potatoes, baked beans, cole slaw, cookies and grape beverage," according to the statement.
Jealous said he would spend Wednesday morning with the condemned man.

MacPhail's mother, Anneliese MacPhail, told CNN: "Mark was a very, very exciting young man, full of life. … He went into the police department to protect us and that's what he was doing," she said, when he was fatally shot while going to the aid of a homeless man who was being assaulted.


Contributing: Larry Copeland, Jackson, Ga.; The Associated Press

[Espresso]

so many of the witness had takes their testimony back weaking the prosecution thus automatically making the conviction controversial & the base of the very death penalty becomes questionable it was in deed not an execution infact it's a judicial murder

[sahil112]

lol somebodys gonna get lynched

and his black, i mean wtf LOL

[khushal]

so many of the witness had takes their testimony back weaking the prosecution thus automatically making the conviction controversial & the base of the very death penalty becomes questionable it was in deed not an execution infact it's a judicial murder

In societies where the law is the religion. Once a conviction is given and later evidence is presented to overturn the conviction, that evidence is mute and the law as it is written has to be followed, it does not matter what is right or wrong but what is written as the law. The law must be followed right or wrong and in this case as expected was followed, the man was executed. The only thing the lawyers could have done to stop the execution was if they could find something in the trial that was erroneous or if the judge or the prosecution made a mistake in following the law or the Governor of the state has the power to stop it.

Same thing applies when it is the other way around. If someone is tried and not enough evidence is supplied and a not guilty is given in the trial and later more evidence is found, they can not have another trial for the same person for the same crime. That person is basically free forever.

[Espresso]

In societies where the law is the religion. Once a conviction is given and later evidence is presented to overturn the conviction, that evidence is mute and the law as it is written has to be followed, it does not matter what is right or wrong but what is written as the law. The law must be followed right or wrong and in this case as expected was followed, the man was executed. The only thing the lawyers could have done to stop the execution was if they could find something in the trial that was erroneous or if the judge or the prosecution made a mistake in following the law or the Governor of the state has the power to stop it.

Same thing applies when it is the other way around. If someone is tried and not enough evidence is supplied and a not guilty is given in the trial and later more evidence is found, they can not have another trial for the same person for the same crime. That person is basically free forever.

then the LAW needs changes

[Bengal_Tiger]

Troy Davis' last words, recorded by a reporter.

“I’d like to address the MacPhail family. Let you know, despite the situation you are in, I’m not the one who personally killed your son, your father, your brother. I am innocent.
The incident that happened that night is not my fault. I did not have a gun. All I can ask … is that you look deeper into this case so that you really can finally see the truth.
I ask my family and friends to continue to fight this fight.
For those about to take my life, God have mercy on your souls. And may God bless your souls.”

Troy Davis







A candle lit for Davis as a lady wears a shirt with "I am Troy Davis".







Troy Davis as a child.

I ask my family and friends to continue to fight this fight.

Troy Davis, 1968-2011

[IamDZJ]

how could they execute someone the innocence of whom was at question? they could have waited till he was proved %100 guilty. what was the hurry?

[Bengal_Tiger]

His sister (right), Martina Correira.



Martina with Troy and supporters.



The campaign to stop the murder of Troy Davis attracted support from all over the world, including over 1 million signatures.





French, a young woman calling for Troy Davis not to be murdered.




















At the night when he was killed in Georgia.




Tears shed at Troy's execution.

On the 24th of September 2011 3 weeks before his 43rd birthday, Roy Anthony Davis was killed by the state of Georgia in the USA.



Troy's sister, Martina Correira sheds tears, Martina is battling breast cancer.

In April of this year, Davis lost his mother. At the funeral, his sister, Martina Correia, a stalwart advocate for Davis, said “she died of a broken heart,” unable to face another execution date. Correia, a miraculous survivor of breast cancer, has recently suffered a health setback as well, but she is determined to appear at the clemency hearing

"We're going to keep moving forward..."That's what my brother would have wanted us to do, not be angry and wallow and those kinds of things...My brother's case has brought people together from all over the world"

Martina Correira, sister of Troy Davis.

[KingKhan]

It's funny how all this noise and support got ignored by the courts.

The worst and hypocritical part of this is the victims parents. Who even after 7 of 9 witnesses said they were pressured by the police, still wanted him executed.

Like Troy Davis told them before he got murdered, "my god have mercy on your souls"

[Bengal_Tiger]

Killer spared from death hours before execution




(Reuters) - The parole board in the state of Georgia spared a convicted killer from execution hours before he was due to die by lethal injection on Thursday and commuted his sentence to life in prison.
The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles made its decision less than three hours before Samuel David Crowe, 47, was to be executed, according to a spokeswoman for the state's prisons.
"After careful and exhaustive consideration of the requests, the board voted to grant clemency. The board voted to commute the sentence to life without parole," the parole board said.
Crowe's death would have marked the third execution since the U.S. Supreme Court lifted an unofficial moratorium on the death penalty last month.
Crowe was not present at the parole board hearing in Atlanta. He had already eaten his last meal and was preparing to enter the execution chamber at the prison in Jackson, Georgia, Mallie McCord of the Georgia Department of Corrections said.
In March 1988, Crowe killed store manager Joseph Pala during a robbery at the lumber company in Douglas County, west of Atlanta. Crowe, who had previously worked at the store, shot Pala three times with a pistol, beat him with a crowbar and a pot of paint.
Crowe pleaded guilty to armed robbery and murder and was sentenced to death the following year.
"David (Crowe) takes full responsibility for his crime and experiences profound remorse," according to Georgians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, an advocacy group, who welcomed the board's decision.
At Thursday's hearing, his lawyers presented a dossier of evidence attesting to his remorse and good behavior in jail, according to local media reports. The lawyers also said he was suffering from withdrawal symptoms from a cocaine addiction at the time of the crime.
The U.S. Supreme Court on April 16 rejected a challenge to the three-drug cocktail used in most U.S. executions, which opponents claimed inflicted unnecessary pain. Georgia then conducted an execution on May 5.
Georgia has executed 41 men since the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1973 and this week it had 109 prisoners on death row.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2008/...50765020080522


This was three years ago in the same state, a white man who confessed he carried out murder was given clemency.

Troy Davis, a black man, of whom there was a huge doubt whether he murdered and consistently declared his innocence, was not given clemency.

This is not just a coincidence or a one off, black and other non-white people are treated far harsher by the American legal system, than whites. Many non-blacks who have never suffered the racism that black (and other ethnic groups) face do not understand and are dismissive.

America is a deeply racist society, as are other countries, with the difference being that America illegally invades other countries, destroys them, creates refugees whilst claiming to be morally superior.

[Bengal_Tiger]

A white poster from another blog.

After hearing more about the evidence that was used to convict Troy Davis, it’s pretty clear that this was a legal lynching. Yes blacks were involved in the conviction, but this just wouldn’t have happened to a white person in America.
The ballistic evidence was inconclusive. the witness testimony was coerced. The prosecution was openly racist in it’s testimony. It really is sick and disgusting that this could happen in this day and age. It’s still possible that he did it, but the evidence just wasn’t there. We basically sat back and watched our criminal justice system execute a man without sufficient evidence. Everyone should be angry and ashamed not just black Americans.

And for other white people reading this: This isn’t coming from some knee jerk liberal or white apologist or whatever. I don’t have a problem with the death penalty if those who receive it are guilty beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Troy Davis just should not have been executed, and he would not have been executed if he weren’t black. O.J. was black and he got away with it because he was rich and famous. Troy Davis was black and poor. Even a poor white person would not have been executed on trumped up charges like this.

http://abagond.wordpress.com/2011/09...rday/#comments

The punishment of Allah descends upon those who punish the poor and weak, but not the rich and powerful.

America has been exposed to the entire world.

I ask Allah to stop this, this racism, and to help Troy Davis' sister and family.

If America does not change, it will face divine consequences.