Weekly Report from the Board Meeting at Holman Prison 5.31.23
The governor’s office set a time frame for the execution of James Barber that will begin at midnight on July 20 and expire at 6 a.m. on July 21. The 30-hour window is designed to give the state prison system more time after two most recent executions were called off because of trouble with intravenous lines.
James Barber has filed a civil rights lawsuit challenging Alabama's lethal injection process based on its history of botches. You can find the Execution Talking Points at: https://www.phadp.org/execution-alert-james-barber/. We thank the individuals, including Cantor Mike Zoosman of L’chaim, Jews Against the Death Penalty for their daily weekday calls to the Governor’s office protesting the upcoming execution. Might you join them? PHONE 1-334-242-7100 and please sign the Death Penalty Action petition: https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/stop-the-execution-of-james-barber-in-alabama/
A week ago a hearing before the House Judiciary Committee of a bill that could change some death sentences in our state to life in prison drew not only supporters but also some compelling witnesses as to why jurors’ decisions should be respected. After the meeting, England said he believes the public hearing on the issues still served a good purpose.
“Even if the bill doesn’t pass, the conversation is extremely important,” England said. “Because in order to get rid of judicial override, it took years of that conversation happening over and over and over again before we made the realization that it’s fundamentally unjust to allow one person to override a jury’s recommendation. All these things have to happen. There are steps to it. And this is just one of those steps.”
The news of former Governors Siegelman and Bentley continues to make news. “Two former governors of Alabama from opposite sides of the political aisle published an opinion piece in The Washington Post calling for the state to put an end to executing people who were sent to death row by a split jury, and for Alabama to commute the sentences of 146 death row inmates.” As a cartoon suggests may the ghosts of past those two former governors as well as her omissions to grant clemency also haunt Governor Ivey!
As always in closing, we thank all our generous donors who either gave by going to our website and using the “donate” button or who gave directly. Thank you also to all who took the time to read our notes, commented, liked and shared them on Facebook. And if you would like to order our book Ghosts Over the Boiler you can do so at Amazon.com.
Esther
