I am an avid reader.
I love love love to read. Often, I will come across books that make me think and weigh things in my mind and soul, and then they will cause me to write about those things, in an effort to get others to think and to look at what I hope is a new perspective.
Last night, I read such a book. It was?The Green Mile?by Stephen King and it was my first Stephen King work that I have ever read. The book is a beautiful and sad story about Paul Edgecombe who was the superintendent at Cold Mountain State Prison, on E block- where the death row inmates were. The last execution that he presided over was that of John Coffey- like the drink, but spelled differently. The book is set in the year 1932, during a time when black folks were considered no better than mongrel dogs and Jim Crow as in full swing.
The thing about John Coffey, though, is that he was different. For one, he was a gentle giant who would not hurt anyone. For two, he had an extraordinary gift in his hands- he was a healer, what the faith healers wish they were. For three, and most importantly, though?
He was an innocent man, convicted to die, because no one could bother with him the way he deserved.
What’s your point, Jordan?
My point in writing about that is that it got me to thinking. I have never had a good feeling about death row as it is, never felt that it was the best and most just option. This novel further validated my beliefs and then I began to do some research.
After a brief Google search, one of the first things that popped up was a list of people who were exonerated after execution. Exonerated means they were actually innocent and, for many, there was extreme doubt that they were even guilty to start with- they were not found guilty beyond a shadow of a doubt, they were not entirely sure that these people were even guilty- but they still executed them.
Some that I found that were exonerated are:
- Larry Griffin. He was executed in 1995 for the 1980 murder of Quentin Moss. Moss was a drug dealer, and Griffin was sentenced to death on the word of a career criminal named Robert Fitzgerald. Turns out that Fitzgerald did the deed himself and says that police pressured him into saying it was Griffin.
- David Wayne Spence. He was convicted for the 1982 murder of three teenagers on the word of three convicts that were eager for early release. He was killed by lethal injection even though there was so much physical evidence at the scene of the crime- and none of it was even his.
- Leo Jones.?He was convicted of killing a police officer in 1981. He originally confessed to the charges but retracted later saying that he was coerced. Evidence of torture and even twelve other witnesses identifying another man were not enough to stop his execution by electrocution in 1998.
- Thomas Griffin & Meeks Griffin.?They were convicted in 1913 of killing an elderly Confederate veteran. This was done based solely on the testimony of one man, who was a known criminal. Tom Joyner, a distant relation and a radio host, won pardons for them in 2009.
These people died and they were innocent.
I found other things about convicts that were presumed innocent after their execution, and I also found a list of those who were pardoned or exonerated before they died on death row.
DNA evidence played a part in some to help release them, thankfully.
But there are those who are guilty.
Yes, there are. However, more people are dying that are innocents and there are people on death row, even still today, who are innocent. Is this truly worth the risk of one innocent life being extinguished because there are some that are guilty on there? Is this bloodthirsty hunger for vengeance truly a sign of an enlightened society, of an advanced society? Or is it just us wishing to please our inner hunger for the blood of those that we think did wrong, even if we have “collateral damage”?
Is this truly justice?
