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Post by Stormyweather on Sept 21, 2011 21:19:31 GMT -6
Georgia executes Troy Davis after his last pleas fail JACKSON, Ga. — Georgia inmate Troy Davis was put to death by lethal injection late Wednesday for the 1989 murder of an off-duty police officer, after convincing thousands but not the justice system of his innocence. Davis' death came after a three-hour hold while the Supreme Court considered a late request for a stay, but in the end the court refused to stop the execution, despite calls for clemency from former President Jimmy Carter, Pope Benedict XVI and others. today.msnbc.msn.com/id/44592285/ns/today-today_news/t/georgia-executes-troy-davis-after-his-last-pleas-fail/
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Sept 21, 2011 21:28:33 GMT -6
With the delay & all i thought scotus was going to grant him a 4th stay..
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Post by Stormyweather on Sept 21, 2011 21:36:04 GMT -6
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Post by Stormyweather on Sept 21, 2011 21:45:24 GMT -6
Troy Davis maintains his innocence until the endJACKSON, Ga. -- Georgia inmate Troy Davis maintained his innocence until the very end, saying he did not kill an off-duty officer in 1989. Davis made his final statement before he was executed at 11:08 p.m. Wednesday. Davis told the family of officer Mark MacPhail that he did not kill their son, father and brother. He said he didn't have a gun. Davis claims of innocence drew worldwide support from hundreds of thousands of people. Courts, however, consistently ruled against him. www.sacbee.com/2011/09/21/3929099/troy-davis-maintains-his-innocence.html
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Sept 21, 2011 21:48:13 GMT -6
New member, Hello all!!
I have been following this one for a while. This is probably in bad form for my first post but yeehah, this maggot is gone.
I was laughing at how his supporters wanted the staff to not show up to work today so they could not execute this maggot.
One less we have to feed and provide medical for, which I cannot afford to provide for myself.
I have one question though.
They wanted a lie detector test today, 22 years after his conviction.
Ummm, have they not had 22 years where they could have done a lie detector test, how bout before he was convicted? During his trial?
I am glad the powers that be do not let all the BS affect their duties to "get er done."
They Make Me Sick
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Post by Deleted on Sept 21, 2011 21:56:22 GMT -6
May Mark MacPhail Rest in Peace.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 21, 2011 22:03:34 GMT -6
New member, Hello all!! I have been following this one for a while. This is probably in bad form for my first post but yeehah, this maggot is gone. I was laughing at how his supporters wanted the staff to not show up to work today so they could not execute this maggot. One less we have to feed and provide medical for, which I cannot afford to provide for myself. I have one question though. They wanted a lie detector test today, 22 years after his conviction. Ummm, have they not had 22 years where they could have done a lie detector test, how bout before he was convicted? During his trial? I am glad the powers that be do not let all the BS affect their duties to "get er done." They Make Me Sick They were just clutching at staws-for their smoke & mirrors show..
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Post by kma367 on Sept 21, 2011 22:11:53 GMT -6
The DA summed it up perfectly when he said that the publicity machine manufactured the appearance of doubt. That is so true.
I was hoping that in both Woods and Davis that SCOTUS would take the attorneys to task for raising the issues they attempted to raise at the 11th hour. Woods attempted to raise issues regarding juror bias that should have been raised years ago. Davis attempted to raise issues regarding the ballistic testimony that also should have been raised during the 2010 evidentiary hearing.
kma367
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forgesfire
Old Hand
The masses of humanity have always had to suffer
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Post by forgesfire on Sept 21, 2011 22:30:53 GMT -6
I disagree with this execution. Far too much doubt to merit such an extreme measure. If even there were a 1% chance that he was innocent it wasn't worth it. No DNA or equally reliable physical evidence = no execution, in my opinion. Guilt is the most important thing.
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Post by Breka on Sept 21, 2011 23:31:10 GMT -6
I am 100 % pro - but having in my motto - in dubio pro reo - that means in doubt for the the accused - I am also against that long and never ending appeal processes - all this could have dealt with - far earlier - no matter the result in this case was !
There can't be a guilty with a doubt - either full guilty - or not guilty ? There is no in between - here it went guilty - no matter what all other who raised their voice against said - and it is their right to raise their word - as far they respect the finial decision been made - they must not agree to it - but they should respect it -
No court in the US would send anybody to death on purpose !
(But I personally do not feel well with that execution as well - but I do respect the decision made by all parties concerned)
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Post by Matt on Sept 21, 2011 23:54:45 GMT -6
Guilt is the most important thing. And he was found guilty through a trial by his peers. He also had numerous opportunities to convince apellate courts that his conviction was unsound. He failed to do so. He was guilty by every legal standard we employ in our society. You're right: that's the most important thing.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 22, 2011 0:10:27 GMT -6
Troy davis had many oppurtunities to prove his innocence but never did.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 22, 2011 1:10:46 GMT -6
This is THE worst pro-DP comment EVER! You have to PROVE your innocence? I thought you had to prove he is GUILTY! Through DNA-tests and so on!
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Post by Deleted on Sept 22, 2011 1:27:41 GMT -6
This is THE worst pro-DP comment EVER! You have to PROVE your innocence? I thought you had to prove he is GUILTY! Through DNA-tests and so on! He was proven guilty by a jury-& he had his appeal process-he kept running around sprouting innocence at whoever would listen-but in the end scotus seen through his smoke & mirror act.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 22, 2011 1:38:56 GMT -6
There was not conducted any DNA-tests. Just because a jury tells someone is guilty doesn't mean that is right. He was convicted on basis of 9 witnesses 7 of whom later pulled their testimonies back. www.amnestyusa.org/our-work/cases/usa-troy-davis
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Post by Felix2 on Sept 22, 2011 2:34:14 GMT -6
Guilt is the most important thing. And he was found guilty through a trial by his peers. He also had numerous opportunities to convince apellate courts that his conviction was unsound. He failed to do so. He was guilty by every legal standard we employ in our society. You're right: that's the most important thing. In this case that seems to be the problem, the question over the level of your legal standing. Executing somebody when a significant amount of the witnesses the initial conviction relied on have recanted? Same with the way the US used jailhouse snitches, also unsafe. Too many individuals who have potential vested interests.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 22, 2011 3:04:08 GMT -6
There was not conducted any DNA-tests. Just because a jury tells someone is guilty doesn't mean that is right. He was convicted on basis of 9 witnesses 7 of whom later pulled their testimonies back. www.amnestyusa.org/our-work/cases/usa-troy-daviswhat are you smoking mate So what about the other 2 that didn't recant.
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Post by 4GodnCountry on Sept 22, 2011 7:38:51 GMT -6
So what are they going to do with all those "I am Troy Davis" tshirts now?
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Post by Californian on Sept 22, 2011 7:47:19 GMT -6
There was not conducted any DNA-tests. That's because there was no DNA evidence available to be tested. Happens all the time. So were the witnesses lying then or lying now?
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Post by Stormyweather on Sept 22, 2011 8:03:32 GMT -6
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Post by zd3925 on Sept 22, 2011 8:17:09 GMT -6
Another cop killing turd flushed.onto the next.
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Post by Stormyweather on Sept 22, 2011 8:48:24 GMT -6
There was not conducted any DNA-tests. Just because a jury tells someone is guilty doesn't mean that is right. He was convicted on basis of 9 witnesses 7 of whom later pulled their testimonies back. www.amnestyusa.org/our-work/cases/usa-troy-davisDid they call them back under oath?
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Post by Californian on Sept 22, 2011 9:12:23 GMT -6
Did they call them back under oath? See if this helps you understand. Mumia's the Word
By Ann Coulter 9/21/2011 For decades, liberals tried persuading Americans to abolish the death penalty, using their usual argument: hysterical sobbing. Only when the media began lying about innocent people being executed did support for the death penalty begin to waver, falling from 80 percent to about 60 percent in a little more than a decade. (Silver lining: That's still more Americans than believe in man-made global warming.) Fifty-nine percent of Americans now believe that an innocent man has been executed in the last five years. There is more credible evidence that space aliens have walked among us than that an innocent person has been executed in this country in the past 60 years, much less the past five years. But unless members of the public are going to personally review trial transcripts in every death penalty case, they have no way of knowing the truth. The media certainly won't tell them. It's nearly impossible to receive a death sentence these days -- unless you do something completely crazy like shoot a cop in full view of dozens of witnesses in a Burger King parking lot, only a few hours after shooting at a passing car while exiting a party. That's what Troy Davis did in August 1989. Davis is the media's current baby seal of death row. ( ) After a two-week trial with 34 witnesses for the state and six witnesses for the defense, the jury of seven blacks and five whites took less than two hours to convict Davis of Officer Mark MacPhail's murder, as well as various other crimes. Two days later, the jury sentenced Davis to death. Now, a brisk 22 years after Davis murdered Officer MacPhail, his sentence will finally be administered this week -- barring any more of the legal shenanigans that have kept taxpayers on the hook for Davis' room and board for the past two decades. (The average time on death row is 14 years. Then liberals turn around and triumphantly claim the death penalty doesn't have any noticeable deterrent effect. As the kids say: Duh.) It has been claimed -- in The New York Times and Time magazine, for example -- that there was no "physical evidence" connecting Davis to the crimes that night. Davis pulled out a gun and shot two strangers in public. What "physical evidence" were they expecting? No houses were broken into, no cars stolen, no rapes or fistfights accompanied the shootings. Where exactly would you look for DNA? And to prove what?I suppose it would be nice if the shell casings from both shootings that night matched. Oh wait -- they did. That's "physical evidence."It's true that the bulk of the evidence against Davis was eyewitness testimony. That tends to happen when you shoot someone in a busy Burger King parking lot. Eyewitness testimony, like all evidence tending to show guilt, has gotten a bad name recently, but the "eyewitness" testimony in this case did not consist simply of strangers trying to distinguish one tall black man from another. For one thing, several of the eyewitnesses knew Davis personally. The bulk of the eyewitness testimony established the following: Two tall, young black men were harassing a vagrant in the Burger King parking lot, one in a yellow shirt and the other in a white Batman shirt. The one in the white shirt used a brown revolver to pistol-whip the vagrant. When a cop yelled at them to stop, the man in the white shirt ran, then wheeled around and shot the cop, walked over to his body and shot him again, smiling. Some eyewitnesses described the shooter as wearing a white shirt, some said it was a white shirt with writing, and some identified it specifically as a white Batman shirt. Not one witness said the man in the yellow shirt pistol-whipped the vagrant or shot the cop.Several of Davis' friends testified -- without recantation -- that he was the one in a white shirt. Several eyewitnesses, both acquaintances and strangers, specifically identified Davis as the one who shot Officer MacPhail.Now the media claim that seven of the nine witnesses against Davis at trial have recanted. First of all, the state presented 34 witnesses against Davis -- not nine -- which should give you some idea of how punctilious the media are about their facts in death penalty cases. Among the witnesses who did not recant a word of their testimony against Davis were three members of the Air Force, who saw the shooting from their van in the Burger King drive-in lane. The airman who saw events clearly enough to positively identify Davis as the shooter explained on cross-examination, "You don't forget someone that stands over and shoots someone." Recanted testimony is the least believable evidence since it proves only that defense lawyers managed to pressure some witnesses to alter their testimony, conveniently after the trial has ended. Even criminal lobbyist Justice William Brennan ridiculed post-trial recantations. Three recantations were from friends of Davis, making minor or completely unbelievable modifications to their trial testimony. For example, one said he was no longer sure he saw Davis shoot the cop, even though he was five feet away at the time. His remaining testimony still implicated Davis. One alleged recantation, from the vagrant's girlfriend (since deceased), wasn't a recantation at all, but rather reiterated all relevant parts of her trial testimony, which included a direct identification of Davis as the shooter. Only two of the seven alleged "recantations" (out of 34 witnesses) actually recanted anything of value -- and those two affidavits were discounted by the court because Davis refused to allow the affiants to testify at the post-trial evidentiary hearing, even though one was seated right outside the courtroom, waiting to appear.
The court specifically warned Davis that his refusal to call his only two genuinely recanting witnesses would make their affidavits worthless. But Davis still refused to call them -- suggesting, as the court said, that their lawyer-drafted affidavits would not have held up under cross-examination.With death penalty opponents so fixated on Davis' race -- he's black -- it ought to be noted that all the above witnesses are themselves African-American. The first man Davis shot in the car that night was African-American. I notice that the people so anxious to return this sociopathic cop-killer to the street don't live in his neighborhood. There's a reason more than a dozen courts have looked at Davis' case and refused to overturn his death sentence. He is as innocent as every other executed man since at least 1950, which is to say, guilty as hell.
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Post by Matt on Sept 22, 2011 10:22:42 GMT -6
In this case that seems to be the problem, the question over the level of your legal standing. Executing somebody when a significant amount of the witnesses the initial conviction relied on have recanted? Same with the way the US used jailhouse snitches, also unsafe. Too many individuals who have potential vested interests. And as Cali said, why should we believe them now? Why did they lie about it to begin with? Police coercion? Not for 7 witnesses. What was their "vested interest" in lying? What about the two witnesses who did not change their story? People have been executed based upon less evidence than that.
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Post by Matt on Sept 22, 2011 11:18:11 GMT -6
Not really. Davis had already been proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt during his original trial. SCOTUS, in an extraordinary move, asked a lower court to essentially re-try the case. Perhaps recognizing the judicial singularity of this decision, SCOTUS deliberately set the bar higher for Davis during this evidentiary hearing, requiring him to "clearly establish" his innocence. But this was not merely a requirement; it was also an opportunity. A chance for Davis and his defense team to show the world why he was innocent. To leave no stone unturned. Yet Davis' lawyers did not subpoena any of the witnesses who had supposedly heard Sylvester Coles confess to the crime. Thus, the District Court correctly ruled that Davis' defense was merely "smoke and mirrors", and upheld the original conviction. Unfortunately last night, the State of Georgia, ably demonstrating its true lack of backbone with regards to enforcing the death penalty, decided moments before the execution to wait and see (yet again) whether SCOTUS would intervene one way or the other, thus providing the political cover we all seem to crave so much when it comes to this issue.
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Post by kma367 on Sept 22, 2011 11:29:46 GMT -6
Dane, in many European jurisdictions, a defendant is not given the benefit of a presumption of innocence in court and also bears the burden of proving innocence/refuting the state's case in the first trial.
In the US once someone is convicted of a crime, the burden of proof shifts to the convicted defendant to prove innocence. The statement that you took issue with is an accurate reflection of the US legal system and that is just how it should be.
Troy Davis failed in his efforts to overturn his conviction because the evidence on which his claims were based was not sufficient to prove his innocence. He failed to have recanting witnesses testify and relied upon their affidavits. He presented hearsay statements from Redd Coles, which were inadmissible. He also failed to call Coles as a witness to confront him with the alleged statements.
Matt, once Davis' legal team filed the request for stay with SCOTUS, the State of Georgia by law could not go through with the execution until SCOTUS rejected the request. That's part of due process and that's the way it needs to be. Additionally, as I understand it, SCOTUS acted on the requests in the same day that it received them, rather than granting a temporary stay. Again, that's part of due process and that's the way it should be.
In the end, the execution proceeded on the same date for which it was scheduled. There's nothing wrong with that. If you want to be angry, you should be angry with the legal team who waited until the day of Davis' execution to present their recycled claims to SCOTUS. It's obvious that the plan was to prevent the execution from going forward on 9/21 and buying Davis more time.
kma367
kma367
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Post by Matt on Sept 22, 2011 12:11:33 GMT -6
Matt, once Davis' legal team filed the request for stay with SCOTUS, the State of Georgia by law could not go through with the execution until SCOTUS rejected the request. That's part of due process and that's the way it needs to be. Additionally, as I understand it, SCOTUS acted on the requests in the same day that it received them, rather than granting a temporary stay. Again, that's part of due process and that's the way it should be. My understanding from listening to the CNN legal analysts yesterday was that GA was under no obligation to halt the execution despite the SCOTUS filing, but did so in order to show they were allowing Davis to formally exhaust all legal avenues.
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Post by kma367 on Sept 22, 2011 12:23:40 GMT -6
I think the CNN analyst was incorrect. As I understand it, once the state receives notice that a pleading has been filed in any federal court, due process requires the state to await a decision on whether the stay is granted or not. If the state could go through with the execution despite the filing, there would be no reason for defense attorneys to wait until the last minute to file such stays in state cases before the various federal courts.
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Post by SubSurfCPO(ret) on Sept 22, 2011 12:26:06 GMT -6
Wow, CNN was incorrect. That is unbelievable!
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Post by Stormyweather on Sept 22, 2011 12:35:25 GMT -6
Welcome to the board.
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