By Nathan Everhart, BLS ACLU Street Law Coalition Coordinator
What a difference a decade makes.
The widely talked about, delayed and protested execution of Georgia prisoner Troy Davis occurred on September 21st, 2011, despite serious and legitimate doubts about his guilt, and widespread support for clemency. Davis was on death row for almost two decades, and his scheduled execution was delayed multiple times. Davis’ final appeal to the Supreme Court on the day before his execution received nothing more than this response:
“Application for stay of execution of sentence of death presented to Justice Thomas and by him referred to the Court denied.”
Manuel Valle sat on death row for 33 years before being executed September 28, 2011. And despite there being less doubt about his guilt and much less public support for a stay of execution, Justice Breyer felt prompted to write a strongly worded dissent to the Supreme Court’s denial of Valle’s petition. In his multiple-page dissent citing studies on inmate suicide rates and the “barbaric” conditions of prisons, Breyer questions the deterrent value or moral satisfaction that a community may gain from executing a man already on death row for three decades (A WSJ Law Blog article on Valle’s execution, with a link to the full opinion, can be found here).
So why the disparity? Troy Davis’ execution was highly publicized and rigorously protested. Yet when everyone was listening, the Supreme Court said nothing as to why his petition was not granted. Do legitimate questions and deep concerns over guilt or innocence get secondary treatment when they arise after conviction? What about over a half million petitioners and many world leaders supporting a stay of execution for Davis? Do concerns over prison conditions demand more of the Court’s attention than guilt in petitions to stay executions? Perhaps if Troy Davis had been imprisoned one more decade, or had one more 11th hour delay in execution, some member of the Supreme Court might have stood up to explain the decision and said, well, anything.