Brother Troy Davis Will Refuse His Last Meal: Join Him in Solidarity, Will You Please. (914 hits)
This morning, our worst fears came true. Despite widespread doubt, the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles upheld the decision to execute Troy Davis this Wednesday. Still, Troy has refused to have a “last meal.” He has faith his life will be spared. In the past, his tremendous faith has been rewarded. The last time Troy faced execution, in 2008, the warden brought in what was to be his last meal. But Troy refused to eat. Looking the prison staff in their eyes, he explained this meal would not be his last. He was vindicated when he received a last minute stay. Guards still remember this as a haunting moment, one rooted in Troy’s deep faith.
Still, there is every sign the state of Georgia intends to execute Troy this time--despite calls for them to stop by everyone from the former head of the FBI, William Sessions, to former US President Jimmy Carter. Troy has prepared himself, and to the extent anyone can, his family, for either outcome. As he has said many times "They can take my body but not my spirit, because I have given my spirit to God." Thus, even as we continue to call on the Board of Pardons and Parole and Savannah District Attorney Larry Chisolm to reconsider, we must be prepared for either outcome too.
Please stand with Troy and his family. Join NAACP activists around the country in an evening of solidarity, prayer and fasting on Wednesday, September 21st.
Ask friends to meet up. Ask your family to fast Wednesday evening in solidarity with Troy's family and use the dinner hour to talk. Ask your faith community, if they already have a Wednesday night fellowship planned, to make time for conversation about Troy’s scheduled execution.
However you do it, please mark the 7 o’clock hour on that evening—the time of Troy’s scheduled execution—as a moment to reflect on Troy’s experience, to offer prayers for his family and that of Officer MacPhail, and to talk about what we can each do to ensure our nation never does this again. This is a moment to rededicate ourselves to the struggle to end the death penalty and otherwise fix our nation's broken justice system.
To honor Troy’s courage, and rededicate ourselves to the cause of justice in America, NAACP activists are asked to fast Wednesday evening. Will you join us?
While moments like this test the limits of our understanding, we do know the world will remember Troy’s name, and the movement against the death penalty will grow. People who thought they supported capital punishment yesterday will realize they cannot today. Because people who thought they could stand on the sidelines will realize they no longer can.
As the scorn of the world grows and the doubts within our nation grow as well, we will increasingly realize this barbarous tradition—practiced by virtually no other western nation—is inconsistent with our self image as a fair and freedom-loving society.
No, should the execution actually occur this time, Troy’s life and the fight to save it will not have been in vain – we will move forward with more allies and an even wider consensus about the urgency of our cause.
Please join your fellow activists Wednesday for an evening of prayers, fasting, reflection, and recommitment to the struggle for justice.
..ATLANTA (AP) — With less than half a day left to live, Troy Davis faced execution Wednesday despite a furious campaign in the U.S. and Europe to win clemency for the 1989 slaying of a Georgia policeman he claims he did not commit.
Vigils outside Georgia's death chamber were set and protests were planned. Davis' attorneys said he was willing to take a polygraph test if the pardons board would consider its results. And they didn't rule out filing one last legal appeal, though they know it's a long shot.
In Europe, where the planned execution has drawn widespread criticism, legislators and activists were making a last-minute appeal to the state of Georgia to refrain from executing Davis. Amnesty International and other groups planned a protest outside the U.S. Embassy in Paris later Wednesday. Amnesty International also planned to hold a vigil outside the U.S. Embassy in London on Wednesday night.
Renate Wohlwend of the Council of Europe's Parliamentary Assembly noted doubts raised about Davis' conviction by his supporters. She said that "to carry out this irrevocable act now would be a terrible mistake which could lead to a tragic injustice."
After winning three delays since 2007, Davis lost his most realistic chance at last-minute clemency this week when the state pardons board denied his request. He was set to be executed by injection at 7 p.m. Wednesday for the 1989 killing of Mark MacPhail, an off-duty police officer who was working as a security guard in Savannah when he was shot dead rushing to help a homeless man who had been attacked.
Davis didn't want a last meal. He planned to spend his final hours meeting with friends, family and supporters. According to an advocate who met with him late Tuesday, he was upbeat, prayerful and expected last-minute wrangling by attorneys.
Attorney Stephen Marsh said he had asked state prisons officials and the pardons board if they would allow a polygraph test. A prisons spokeswoman said she was unaware of the request and the pardons board didn't immediately respond.
"He doesn't want to spend three hours away from his family on what could be the last day of his life if it won't make any difference," Marsh said.
Davis has received support from hundreds of thousands of people, including a former FBI director, former President Jimmy Carter and Pope Benedict XVI. Some of his backers resorted to urging prison workers to strike or call in sick Wednesday, and they considered a desperate appeal for White House intervention.
The U.S. Supreme Court gave him an unusual opportunity to prove his innocence last year, but his attorneys failed to convince a judge he didn't do it. State and federal courts have repeatedly upheld his conviction.
Prosecutors have no doubt they charged the right person, and MacPhail's family lobbied the pardons board Monday to reject Davis' clemency appeal. The board refused to stop the execution a day later.
"He has had ample time to prove his innocence," said MacPhail's widow, Joan MacPhail-Harris. "And he is not innocent."
Click image to see more photos of the protests
Spencer Lawton, the district attorney who secured Davis' conviction in 1991, said he was embarrassed for the judicial system that the execution has taken so long.
"What we have had is a manufactured appearance of doubt which has taken on the quality of legitimate doubt itself. And all of it is exquisitely unfair," said Lawton, who retired as Chatham County's head prosecutor in 2008. "The good news is we live in a civilized society where questions like this are decided based on fact in open and transparent courts of law, and not on street corners."
Davis supporters said they will push the pardons board to reconsider his case. They also asked Savannah prosecutors to block the execution, although Chatham County District Attorney Larry Chisolm said in a statement he was powerless to withdraw an execution order for Davis issued by a state Superior Court judge.
"We appreciate the outpouring of interest in this case; however, this matter is beyond our control," Chisolm said.
MacPhail was shot to death Aug. 19, 1989, after coming to the aid of Larry Young, a homeless man who was pistol-whipped in a Burger King parking lot. Prosecutors say Davis was with another man who was demanding that Young give him a beer when Davis pulled out a handgun and bashed Young with it. When MacPhail arrived to help, they say Davis had a smirk on his face as he shot the officer to death.
Witnesses placed Davis at the crime scene and identified him as the shooter. Shell casings were linked to an earlier shooting that Davis was convicted of. There was no other physical evidence. No blood or DNA tied Davis to the crime and the weapon was never found.
Davis' attorneys say seven of nine key witnesses who testified at his trial have disputed all or parts of their testimony.
The state initially planned to execute him in July 2007 but the pardons board granted him a stay less than 24 hours before he was to die. The U.S. Supreme Court stepped in a year later and halted the lethal injection two hours before he was to be executed. And a federal appeals court halted another planned execution a few months later.
Over the years, Davis has picked up high-profile support from a host of dignitaries and dozens of federal lawmakers. Conservative figures have also advocated on his behalf, including former U.S. Rep. Bob Barr, ex-Justice Department official Larry Thompson and one-time FBI Director William Sessions.
The U.S. Supreme Court granted Davis a hearing to prove his innocence, the first time it had done so for a death row inmate in at least 50 years. At that June 2010 hearing, two witnesses testified that they falsely incriminated Davis at his trial when they said Davis confessed to the killing. Two others told the judge the man with Davis that night later said he shot MacPhail.
Prosecutors, though, argued that Davis' lawyers were simply rehashing old testimony that had already been rejected by a jury. And they said no trial court could ever consider the hearsay from the other witnesses who blamed the other man for the crime.
U.S. District Judge William T. Moore Jr. sided with them. He said the evidence presented at the hearing wasn't nearly enough to prove Davis is innocent and validate his request for a new trial. He said while Davis' "new evidence casts some additional, minimal doubt on his conviction, it is largely smoke and mirrors."
Troy Anthony Davis (born October 9, 1968) is an American death row inmate convicted of the August 19, 1989, murder of Savannah, Georgia, police officer Mark MacPhail. MacPhail was working as a security guard at a Burger King when he intervened to defend a man being assaulted in a nearby parking lot—Davis was convicted as the assailant. During Davis’ 1991 trial, many witnesses testified they had seen Davis shoot MacPhail, and two others testified that Davis confessed to them. Although the murder weapon was not recovered, ballistic evidence presented at trial tied bullets recovered at or near the scene to those at another shooting in which Davis was also charged.
let the nurse find the viens......................
@Jen capital punishment by death always seem unfair. I pray for him and for the family of the murdered victim as well. If he is innocent he'll really live and will know no death except by flesh.
Wednesday, September 21st 2011 at 8:43PM
MIISRAEL Bride
Troy Anthony Davis (October 9, 1968 – September 21, 2011)
2 Timothy 4:7 King James Version (KJV) I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith:
