In 1991,
Troy Davis was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1989 murder of policeman Mark MacPhail in a Savannah, Georgia parking lot. Since then, seven of the nine prosecution eyewitnesses have
recanted all or part of their testimony, with some citing pressure from the police to make false statements. An exception is Sylvester "Redd" Coles, who made the initial report of Davis’s guilt, and is regarded by the defense as the chief suspect. New witnesses have sworn affidavits that Coles confessed the crime to them. An
array of figures have called for a stay of execution, including death-penalty supporters Senator Bob Barr and former FBI director William S. Sessions.
Today, the Georgia
Board of Pardons and Paroles denied clemency; barring
action from the District Attorney, Davis is
set to be executed by lethal injection tomorrow at 7pm. [
Previously]
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94
on Sep 20, 2011 -
432 comments
The National Library of Medicine has put a selection of
murder pamphlets from the late 1600s to the late 1800s online.
These pamphlets have been a rich source for historians of medicine, crime novelists, and cultural historians, who mine them for evidence to illuminate the history of class, gender, race, the law, the city, crime, religion and other topics. The murder pamphlets in the NLM's collection address cases connected to forensic medicine, especially cases in which doctors were accused of committing-or were the victims of-murder.
[more inside]
posted by gman
on Nov 7, 2010 -
7 comments
Three months from today,
Gaile [Part I]
Owens [Part 2] will be dead in Tennessee after 25 years on death row. The mother of two boys went to the rough side of Nashville to find a hitman to kill her abusive and cheating husband. Due to a series of events, the jury never heard of or believed the abuse. She pleaded guilty in exchange for a life sentence, but will die on September 28.
[more inside]
posted by daninnj
on Jun 28, 2010 -
38 comments
In a case reminiscent of
Bernard Goetz, pharmacist Jerome Ersland was held up by two gun-wielding men, shot one of them in the head, and then, when the other had left, shot the prone man several more times, killing him (
store security video). Now he's being charged with first-degree murder, and is the center of intense controversy about whether he engaged in legitimate self-defense by making absolutely sure his attacker was incapacitated or in an unjustifiable vigilante-style execution. Complicating matters is the fact that Jerome is white and the robbers black.
posted by shivohum
on May 30, 2009 -
178 comments
Dutch nurse Lucia De Berk has had her case
reopened 5 years after her conviction for multiple counts of murdering her patients.
[more inside]
posted by Jakey
on Jan 4, 2008 -
6 comments
Public gatherings restricted? Check. Shutdown of independent businesses? Check. Lockdown on traffic and transportation in the area? You bet. Lawmakers in Baltimore trying to curb the city's homicide rate (already 108 this year) have come up with some
"desperate measures" of questionable constitutional legality, including heightening police presence in order to lockdown streets in "emergency areas." It has been called, "partial martial law" by some, and one has to wonder if the city of Baltimore may not do better to take a page from
The Wire's Hamsterdam for a solution to their inextricably linked drug and homicide issues.
posted by dead_
on May 17, 2007 -
60 comments
Who Killed Ryan Harris? Eight years ago the body of eleven-year-old Ryan Harris was discovered in a
poor neighbourhood on the South Side of Chicago. What followed was a saga involving
the youngest children in U.S. history to be charged with murder; the subsequent dropping of the charges after exculpatory evidence surfaced and allegations of
coerced confessions; another (adult) suspect allegedly faking a low IQ and entering an
Alford plea; lawsuits against the prosecutors on behalf of the boys, later
settled out of court; and, earlier this year, one of the boys coming back into the news after being charged in connection with a
double shooting, with lawyers insinuating that his earlier ordeal was to blame for his criminal activity. One of the sadder stories I've heard in some time.
posted by Johnny Assay
on Oct 31, 2006 -
9 comments
In the emotive world of
child abuse, Professor Sir Roy Meadow became a celebrity in the last 25 years. He described
Munchausen's Syndrome by proxy in which parents were said to have confabulated symptoms in their children in order to obtain medical treatment. Among child and health workers, Police and Social Workers, his eponymous law held that multiple childhood deaths in individual families were indicative of abuse and infanticide.
He was of course a popular forensic expert and his testimony resulted in murder convictions and removal of at-risk children from their families. But the Court of Appeal in UK has found that Prof. Meadow's statistical assertions and scientific
reasonings were themselves confabulated and there have been a number of convictions overturned. He is now
fighting for his professional reputation before the General Medical Council in London.
[More Inside]
posted by peacay
on Jun 28, 2005 -
17 comments
"Approximately 250,000 persons viewed and passed by the bier of little Emmett Till. All were shocked, some horrified and appalled. Many prayed, scores fainted and practically all, men, women and children wept". Chicago Defender, September 1, 1955.
Federal officials this morning
erected a white tent over the grave of Emmett Till in
Alsip, Ill.,
in preparation to exhume the body to shed light on the
Chicago teenager's death 50 years ago.
Till, 14 years old at the time,
was killed in a hate crime in Money, Miss., that
sparked the Civil Rights movement. (previous Emmett Till MeFi threads
here and
here)
posted by matteo
on Jun 1, 2005 -
5 comments
Homicide in Chicago: 1870-1930 July 25, 1899
Murphy, James, 28 years old, shot dead, saloon 1210 Wabash Av., by Lorezo Sodini, proprietor. Murphy refused to pay for drinks and ran out of saloon and threw stone through window. Sodini ran out and fired at him, killing him instantly. Harrison St. Station. Held by Coroner's Jury, July 29. Acquitted Dec. 9, 1899, by jury in Judge Baker's court.
Case number: 1498
posted by tcp
on Jul 2, 2004 -
1 comment
Framed for defending herself. On August 28th, 2002 in Las Vegas, Nevada a woman named
Kirstin Lobato was sentenced to life in prison. She was the victim of an attempted rape in May 2001, and had defended herself against her rapist. prosecutors used this "confession" of self defense to convict her of a murder that happened months later and in a town where
she didn't even live. How "innocent until proven guilty" can you be if prosecutors are willing to use known perjurers and refuse to allow expert testimony?
posted by dejah420
on Nov 26, 2003 -
17 comments
Robert Durst Admits to Killing but is found innocent because the jurors didn't think the prosecution proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Durst intentionally murdered, cut his ex-friend up and then threw the body parts in a lake.
I'm sure the fact that he's got like $9 billion had absolutely nothing to do with it.
But since he's got a history of killing, I suppose they'll just wait for him to "accidentally" kill someone else and then try to dispose of the body without getting caught.
But isn't an accidental killing still prosecutable? Isn't the fact that he admitted to chopping the body up and throwing it in a lake prosecutable?
Are you wondering what ever did happen to his wife too?
posted by fenriq
on Nov 11, 2003 -
21 comments
This week, two boys in Florida were tried for the bludgeoning-murder of their father. With accusations raised of the actual killing to have been done by another, adult male with alleged sexual ties to the two boys,
the boys were found guilty only of a lesser second-degree murder charge, claiming the adult must have done the actual deed... yet the jury was unaware the adult accused and being tried for that very idea was
acquitted of all charges the previous week. The issue? Both trials were handled by the same prosecutor
who presented completely different theories to each jury... in other words, not settling on a confident belief of who actually performed the killing, the prosecution tried to get both the adult and the pair of boys convicted for it. Isn't that risky? Or, if you like a different flavor of debate, isn't that completely unethical?
posted by XQUZYPHYR
on Sep 7, 2002 -
40 comments
Convicted Hockey Dad Killer to get only 3- 5 years? i know he only threw a few punches, but he was 275 lbs and his victim was 165 lbs. I'm sorry, but killing a guy nearly half your size in front of children - in front of both of their children even - is reason enough for throwing the book at this thug. 20 years = 10 years if he stays cool in the pokie - a pittance if you're the victims kids. Hopefully the Mass judge will make an example out of this totally unneccessary tragedy.
posted by tsarfan
on Jan 11, 2002 -
48 comments
