Recently GACDL's President Mike Cranford spoke before the League of Women Voters about their stand opposing the Death Penalty in Georgia.

Introduction:

When I first thought about speaking to you about the death penalty I thought perhaps that I should give a brief history lesson about the death penalty in Georgia.

In researching the history I found that the Supreme Court of Georgia’s first session was held in Talbotton GA on January 26, 1846, which is exactly 100 years to the day before I was born.

The first three Judges were Joseph Lumpkin of Athens, Eugenia Nesbitt of right here in Macon, and Hiram Walker of Greenville.

Since that first day, the Supreme Court upheld the death penalty in every case all the way up until the early 1970’s when there was pause in the death penalty process.

Furman vs. State and Jackson vs. State, two unrelated death penalty cases, the United State Supreme Court on June 22, 1972 finally said the Georgia death penalty law was unconstitutional. Unfortunately they fell short of saying the death penalty was unconstitutional as a violation of the 8th amendment against cruel and unusual punishment.

The legislators decided the death penalty law just needed to be modified, and so during the legislative session of 1973 it was modified and Governor Carter, without ceremony, signed the new death penalty bill into law.

The first execution after the new law was in-acted was that of one John Elden Smith, who along with his wife committed murders here in Macon.  His wife was the actual master mind of the case and they killed her first husband and his new wife. They were tried together but the lawyer for Mrs. Smith challenged the jury pool, and Mr. Smith’s did not challenge the jury pool. Her conviction was later overturned and she received a life sentence. They had both received a death penalty in the first trial.

On December 25, 1983 John Elden Smith became the first person to be executed under the new Georgia Law. What is so ironic about this case and what shows the glaring injustices in the system is that Mrs. Smith actual became eligible for parole before her husband was executed even though she had originally receive the death penalty also.

Over 300 people have been sentenced to death in Georgia since that time, therein lies the inherent inequity in the death penalty law.

There have been many articles written over the last few years about the death penalty injustices in the justice system and more people are finally realizing this.

Your national organization in June of 2006 took an official position supporting the abolition of the death penalty. Over 50 organizations in Georgia have called for a moratorium on execution here in Georgia.

The United States and Japan are the only developed countries who still order the death penalty in certain circumstances, and since the re-instatement of the death penalty in the United States there have been over 1000 executions mostly by electrocutions.

There have been numerous challenges to death by electrocution and to hold off these challenges many states have adopted lethal injection as their form of death. Electrocution by its very nature is a cruel and unusual form of torture and death. Nebraska still has execution by electrocution however 8 states have no death penalty and all the remaining states have lethal injection as their form of capitol punishment.

But now lethal injections are being challenged also. The protocol involves the administration of three different drugs: the first drug is supposed to make the inmate unconscious, the second drug paralyzes the muscles, and the third drug stops the heart. Studies have shown however that contrary to this protocol many inmates were conscious at the time of their death.

Based upon these studies, once again, we have a pause in the machinery of death.

And we have to ask ourselves: "is this a civilized way to respond to the most heinous among us? Are we killing people who don’t deserve to die?"

With the advent of new technology, specifically DNA evidence, more revealing truths have come to light just within the last few years. Mistaken eyewitness identification contributed to over 75% of the more than 185 wrongful convictions in the United States overturned by post convictions DNA. Many of these were death penalty cases.

Here in Georgia Calvin Johnson, Douglass Echos, Samuel Echos, Clarence Harrison, and Robert Clark have all been freed from Georgia prisons due to DNA evidence technology that was not available when they were wrongly convicted.

All of these people were convicted in the 80’s and have just recently been released after spending 15 to 25 years in jail.

Here in Georgia James Crammer was sentenced to death in 1973, and after an investigation by the Atlanta Constitution another person was found and confessed to the crime and the charges against Mr. Crammer were dropped.

Earl Charles was sentenced to death in 1975, and after of years of trying his lawyers were finally able to prove that Mr. Charles was not even in Chatham County GA on the day of the robbery and murder and he was freed.

Jerry Banks was convicted of a murder in Henry County in 1975 and he was eventually freed.

Henry Drake was convicted by Madison County jury based primarily on the testimony of a Co-defendant, and he was later determined to be innocent.

In 1980 Gary Nelson was convicted of murder and rape and was sentenced to death, and in 1991 a new team of lawyers found new evidence that contradicted the evidence used to convict Mr. Nelson and he was freed.

So there is abundant proof that many people have been wrongly convicted and placed on death row in the state of Georgia and in the United States.

The death penalty is not a deterrent to crime; it serves no purpose but to satisfy the need for revenge.

Life without parole is the civilized way to control the most heinous criminals and is a reasonable alternative to the death penalty.

There is no doubt in my mind that we as a state and as a nation have committed murder in the name of justice.

There is no doubt in my mind that innocent people have been executed, and if anyone will look at the history of the death penalty there should be reasonable doubt in every mind about the validity of death penalty law.

I thank you and your organization for taking a stand against legalized murder by the government.

As I speak here today legislators in favor of the death penalty are lining up in congress to make it easier for the State to kill people in Georgia.

The corner stone of our judicial system is based upon a defendant being tried before a jury of 12 of his peers, and a unanimous verdict must be rendered before the death penalty can be imposed.

Many legislators want to change the law so it doesn’t take a unanimous decision to render death. The new proposal would allow a majority of jurors to decide whether or not to impose the death penalty.

Some legislators want to change the jury system that has been in place in Georgia since the State was first created just to make it easier for the State to kill people.

The fight against the death penalty continues unless people like you continue to speak out against it and new laws will be passed making it easier for the State to put people to death.

I would like to ask each of you to continue to make yourselves aware of these pending changes in the law and to contact your congress man and congress woman and tell them the State of Georgia should no longer sanction the death penalty.

J. Michael Cranford, President