MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) – Two former Alabama governors from opposite sides of the political aisle wrote in an op-ed that they are now concerned about the state’s death penalty system and would commute the sentences of convicted inmates to overturn judicial or divided relationship. sworn
Former Gov. Don Siegelman, a Democrat, and former Gov. Robert Bentley, a Republican, who oversaw the executions while in office, wrote Tuesday’s op-ed for The Washington Post. The governors said they both have come “to see the flaws in our nation’s justice system and to see the state’s death penalty laws in particular as legally and morally problematic.”
“We missed the chance to face the death penalty and lived to regret it, but it is not too late for today’s elected officials to do what is morally right,” the governor wrote.
Bentley and Siegelman allowed eight runs apiece while in office, according to a list Maintained by the Alabama Department of Corrections.
The governors said they are particularly concerned that large numbers of the state’s death row population have been sentenced to death by divided juries or on the recommendation of a jury.
Alabama in 2017 became the latest state to end the practice of allowing judges to overturn a jury verdict in a capital case and send a person to death row when a jury recommended the life imprisonment, a practice that critics say brought election-year pressure into sentencing decisions. . But the change was not retroactive and did not affect prisoners already sentenced to death by judicial annulment.
“As governors, we had the power to commute the sentences of everyone on Alabama’s death row to life in prison. We no longer have this constitutional power, but we believe that careful consideration is needed to commute the sentences of the 146 prisoners who were convicted by non-unanimous juries or judicial overturning, and that an independent review unit should be established to examine all convictions for capital murder. ” the two governors wrote.
Only four of the 27 states that allow the death penalty do not require a unanimous jury to sentence an inmate to death. Alabama allows the death penalty with a 10-2 decision in favor of execution. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed legislation last month ending that state’s unanimous jury requirement and allowing death sentences when at least eight jurors are in favor. Missouri and Indiana let a judge decide when there is a split jury.
The governors cited statistics from the Death Penalty Information Center that a person on death row has been exonerated for every 8.3 executions. By applying that exoneration rate to the 167 people on Alabama’s death row, Siegelman said it could suggest that as many as 20 inmates may have been wrongfully convicted.
“We should all agree that if the state is going to be in the business of killing people, we need to make sure we have the right person,” Siegelman told The Associated Press in a telephone interview Tuesday night.
Siegelman said after reviewing cases that he is now personally haunted by one of the eight executions that took place during his time as governor.
Freddie Wright was put to death in Alabama’s electric chair in 2000 after being convicted of killing a couple during a robbery. Siegelman refused to stay the execution, saying at the time that “the death penalty is appropriate in this case.” Twenty-three years later, Siegelman said he now believes Wright “was wrongly accused, tried and convicted for a murder he probably didn’t commit.”
Siegelman said he has “never been comfortable with the death penalty,” but that his views have evolved over the years, at least in part prompted by his own criminal conviction.
Siegelman, the last Democratic governor of a state now dominated by Republicans, was convicted on federal bribery and obstruction of justice charges, largely related to his appointment of a campaign donor to a state board. Siegelman, who has maintained his innocence, said he came to see the system as flawed.
