I type with a heavy heart this morning because I've never felt so helpless. Unless there is divine intervention, Troy Davis will die tonight despite the fact he may be innocent.
Troy Davis' petition to the U.S. Supreme Court was denied for the second and last time on March 28. Today, the Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles may have sealed his fate by denying him clemency in his capital punishment case. Davis is scheduled to die Wednesday at 7 p.m. by lethal injection.
His most recent bid for clemency could be the final chance for Davis to avoid execution. Defense attorney Jason Ewart has said that the pardons board was likely Davis' last option, according to the Associated Press. But, Amnesty International, the NAACP and the National Action Network are drawing attention to one last effort to keep him alive. The groups say the man who prosecuted Davis could ask a judge to block the execution.
It doesn't look like that's going to happen because the DA who prosecuted Davis says the doubt, recantations are manufactured, and the present DA says it's out of his hands.
What can we do? From jackandjill politics.com via FacebookSister Jackie Griffith with Savannah for Clemency for Troy Davis, announced Tuesday evening her group would deliver 240,000 signatures on a petition to Chatham County District Attorney Larry Chisolm at 9 a.m. calling on him to ask Superior Court Judge Penny Haas Freesemann to vacate the death warrant for Davis.
A press release issued at 7 p.m. Tuesday by Chisolm’s office said the Superior Court, not the district attorney, has the only jurisdiction in the execution and that “this matter is beyond our control.”
Call Judge Penny Freesemann at 912 652 7252 to save Troy Davis. She has the power to pull the death warrant. The DA can ask her to rescind the warrant or she could rescind it directly.The Field Negro and I both note the absence of any mention of Troy Davis in the so-called mainstream media today. Out of sight, out of mind?
[...]
CALL THE FOLLOWING NUMBERS FOR TROY DAVIS’ STAY OF EXECUTION:
*DISTRICT ATTORNEY OF CHATHAM CTY.;(912)652-7308
*GEORGIA PAROLE BOARD; (404)656-5651
*GA STATE SENATOR & SOUTHERN CTR. FOR HUMAN RIGHTS (Ask them & all execution staff to take off tomorrow or not participate in Troy’s unjust execution);(770)692-4750/ Fax (770)692-4754
*GOVERNOR; (404)651-1151
So what's the big deal indeed? It's just another day in the United States of America. Where vengeance is mine, not liberty and justice for ALL.Still, this too will pass, and they know it. As I write this post the name Troy Davis is not even trending on Yahoo. Sarah Palin, Brooke Burke, Jeff Conaway, Cam Newton, the Boston Red Sox; all of them are getting more play in the American psyche than some black man in Georgia charged and convicted of killing a police officer many years ago. Hey, if the state of Georgia didn’t kill him, some other black man would. Or, maybe high blood pressure, diabetes, or any one of those other diseases that Negroes tend to get. He lived to the ripe old age of 41, which is more than we can say for other men who look like him in A-mery-ca. So what’s the big deal?
Please God, hear the words of Langston Hughes and Let America Be America Again
Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.
(America never was America to me.)
Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed--
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.
(It never was America to me.)
O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.
(There's never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")
Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?
I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery's scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek--
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.
I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one's own greed!
I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean--
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today--O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.
Yet I'm the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That's made America the land it has become.
O, I'm the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home--
For I'm the one who left dark Ireland's shore,
And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa's strand I came
To build a "homeland of the free."
The free?
Who said the free? Not me?
Surely not me? The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we've dreamed
And all the songs we've sung
And all the hopes we've held
And all the flags we've hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay--
Except the dream that's almost dead today.
O, let America be America again--
The land that never has been yet--
And yet must be--the land where every man is free.
The land that's mine--the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, ME--
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.
Sure, call me any ugly name you choose--
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people's lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!
The Field Negro says it best-Those of you (black and white) who advocated and fought on this man’s behalf should be proud of yourselves. I know that it’s hard to see a person who might be innocent of the crime for which he was charged put to death, but your conscience should allow you to sleep tonight, which is more than I can say for Terry Bernard, Robert Keller,Albert R. Murray,James E. Donald, L. Gale Buckner, Steve Hayes, and the rest of you in A-merry-ca.
RedEye tip toeing away from the computer to go pray.
3 comments:
EVERYONE on death row says they are innocent! The old saying about never seeing an atheist in a fox hole applies here!
If all members of the parole/pardons board were white would you make it a racial thing? Although, you somewhat have already!
Two of the members are black and got to hear all the evidence! The vote was unanimous which tells me they made the decision that the evidence allowed! 5-0 vote says it all!!!!
off the topic but worth a look.
http://newsone.com/nation/thegrio3/where-are-all-the-good-single-black-men/
Black media outlet: Only 3 good black men for every 100 black women.
Interactive One is a major black radio, print, and online news company. They recently ran an article online about how hard it is for a black woman to meet a black man that meets very basic minimal qualifications.
Finding a “Good” black man for a black woman to date is “extremely slim.” Only 3 out of 100 black men meet the most basic requirements.
They define “good” as:
High School Diploma, employed with a modest income, has never been to jail or prison, no illegitimate kids, and not aggressively pursuing white women. (The percentage of successful black men who aggressively pursue white women and shun black women has become very scandalous and a major source of tension in the black media.)
Two members are black. Three members are white. Not that it matters. And it's a brazen lie everyone on death row says they are innocent. All the 5-0 vote means is they all will have the blood of Troy Davis on their hands and on their conscience.
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