30th Jul 2010
I just called and asked the Governor’s telephone answerer
to give Governor Riley this message:
“One of the greatest decisions you can make as you prepare
to leave office is to declare a moratorium on the death penalty.
Executions are murder. So many persons who commit murder
were under the influence of drugs or alcohol - or are persons
with other disabling weaknesses when the murder took place.
Our reputation for executions is another reason we are viewed
in the country as a state where we don’t know what we’re doing”.
John Wright
No Comments
29th Jul 2010
Governor Riley,
My numerous emails and letters to stay all executions and institute a moratorium during which Alabama’s capital punishment system could be thoroughly studied and proposals implemented have yet to be acknowledged with a reply from you or staff from your office.
I continue pleading for compassion from you.
Please STOP the execution of Michael Jeffrey Land on August 12, 2010!
Show mercy and grant a stay of execution for Michael Jeffrey Land who is scheduled to be killed by the state of Alabama on August 12, 2010.
YOU CAN do this!
Please!
Sincerely,
Teresa Margarita Diaz Miranda
No Comments
27th Jul 2010
Wrong to execute
In defiance of the 2002 “Atkins” U.S. Supreme Court ruling, the state of Alabama recently set an execution date (Sept.9, 2010) for a condemned mentally retarded man by the name of Holly Wood. The man is documented as having an IQ less than 70 but this state’s “justice” system saw no problem with condemning him to death anyway.
Is there no depth too low for Alabama to sink? I understand that this man was convicted of murder.
But executing this man is like excecuting an 8-year-old that killed. Eight-year-olds can figure out they will be in trouble after they have done something. However, they cannot recognize the outcome before hand. To anyone who agrees that killing this person is a good idea, I ask: Should we execute unruly 8-year-olds? That is exactly what we are doing with Holly Wood!
I don’t know which is worse, Troy King deciding he needed to kill this man before he thankfully leaves office or Governor Riley for allowing it.
Bruce O’Gorman
Decatur, 35603
No Comments
20th Jul 2010
I get these notes and I read them as often as I can, and appreciate your sending them.
This note is another example of how the so called system is broken. If I understand this right, the accused did not get a fair trial of peers as presented by the defense. I am white and I know for a fact that a person who is a minority will never get a fair trial by any jury of all or almost all whites! An all white or almost all white jury may be citizens but they are “very” often biased citizens.
I see this nonsense all the time in many areas of life. I can be around a few white people and if a black man comes in to the health club I go to, he is looked at differently. He is treated politely but there is still a difference at how he is perceived. In the end, the minority does not get a fair shake. One thing is certain! The smaller the town or county, the worse the treatment of minorities! That man would not have had that trial decision or appeal decision if it had been in Jefferson County. The jury would never have been so biased in race. Another example to stop the insanity of death penalty cases.
Keep up the moratorium pressure, never let up! I have convinced many people to open their eyes and see the value in stopping the death addiction. If ever the state does not need this image, it is now!
In conclusion, I still say young people who do not finish high school are “doomed” to failure. Education is the key. Jesus said we will always have the poor. True, however we do not have to have uneducated poor. Please remind people in your work to never stop telling young people to finish school. If after high school they are confused, they can go to the military. The tech schools. My neighbor is a black man and he is an Air Conditioning heating service man. He has a very nice home, truck, all because he went to Tech school.
Oh well I must go. Keep up the great work!
No Comments
6th Jul 2010
Dear Governor Riley,
In your last letter back to me responding to my request to stay an execution, you stated that it was your job to carry out the will of the people and that the will of the people of Alabama is to have the death penalty.
You may or may not be aware that there was a survey in The Birmingham News last week and the majority of voters overwhelmingly agreed that Alabama needs a moratorium on the death penalty and a study done to ensure that it is being administered fairly.
I personally believe that there is nothing Christlike about the death penalty, regardless of what the world says, but until we know that what we are doing is being done fairly, we need the moratorium and we need it now.
Two more people have been scheduled to die in Alabama and you have the power and the authority to do this one last thing for the Republican party and the State of Alabama, before the Democratic candidates for Attorney General take the credit for doing the right thing.
Please have mercy on these two men and any others who may also have to die before the study is completed!
Sincerely,
Sharon S. Denham
Gardendale, AL
No Comments
30th Jun 2010
The Board of Project Hope to Abolish the Death Penalty is pleased to announce that our organization now has a German Representative. Christoph Silex will seek to garner support from German officials for our cause. There are more than 50 German companies in our state, which gives Germany some clout in Alabama.
The Board of Project Hope to Abolish the Death Penalty is delighted to announce that Callie Greer, mother of a murder victim, and tireless supporter of phadp, has joined the Advisory Board. We are touched and honored by her generosity.
No Comments
14th Jun 2010
Friends,
For those of you who have not met Callie Greer, it is my great honor and privilige to introduce you to her. What she wrote speaks for itself, but I want you to know that we can always, always count on her help. In addition, we have another link, which I am now telling her for the first time. Two days before the tragic murder of her son, I witnessed the electrocution of my dear friend, Brian Baldwin at Holman prison. It speaks against deterrent, doesn’t it? Thank you, Callie, from all of us!
I am and always will be against killing another human being regardless of how it is done. I know someone reading this maybe saying you say this, but what if it happened to you? Well, I am someone that has sat on both sides of the table. My brother was on death row for some 20+ years and his sentence was changed to life w/o. And this Fathers Day will mark the 11th year of my oldest son being killed. And in both cases I was and am against the death penalty.
My son came home from college and got back into his old crowd and never made it back to college. And my brother, 19 years old at the time, was an accomplice in a robbery gone really bad. But in both cases I asked for mercy, for my brother and for the young man that shot my son. For me it is the right thing to do because I believe what I preach. To obtain mercy you have to give it, to receive forgiveness and peace you have to give it. No, it is almost always never easy to do. But then the right thing almost always is never easy. But one thing I know for sure, I am free to love and give all of those things to others that we can’t buy. And that, my friend, is more awesome than an eye for an eye. It’s what I call true peace.
After we agree to take someone else’s life and it is done, do you think you will have peace? Of you that have witnessed the killing of another human being, 99% will say, no, it is a haunting event that we never ever quite get over and it did not bring closure. Humans are the only creations that GOD breathed His spirit into. That’s how precious we (HUMANS) are to HIM. None of us is perfect and all of us have had murderous thoughts at one time or another. Most of us do not carry them out. But what if our child, grandchild, mother, father, sister, brother or husband/wife did kill, would you seek mercy? Once we set these things into motion it’s like planting seeds. What we plant we will harvest. Plant roses, reap roses. Plant hate, reap hate. Plant love, forgiveness and peace, reap love, forgiveness and peace.
There are other forms of punishments we can apply. Let us seek to be more like what we say we want to see in others and maybe, just maybe,,,,,,,,,,,, Well that’s my spill on this for TODAY. Be Blessed.
Callie Greer
Mother of a Murder Victim
No Comments
11th Jun 2010
My thoughts are with all of the board tonight. I continue my hope and fight along with you as I know you will, to bring nonviolent fight and peace in the struggle against Alabama’s criminal (definitely by them) justice practices. Just the presence of others’ humanity in action and intent brings much hope in my world as I view so many enduring spirits in the face of unimaginable injustice and struggles to survive from civil strife and poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa to bloodshed and disappearances in Columbia. This is why I fight. I cannot wait for the day Project Hope to Abolish the Death Penalty will help overcome. You lead an important passing in history.
My love and peace,
your Hannah
No Comments
8th Jun 2010
Dear Mr Riley
Yet again I find that you are preparing to MURDER another inmate John Forrest parker this Thursday. I ask that you intervene and stop this MURDER from taking place because the trial judge overrode the jury’s recommendations that he be sentenced to life in prison without parole also the judge’s decision to override the jury’s sentencing recommendation was not consistent with an Alabama Supreme Court ruling that set guidelines for when a judge can do that. Please Please Please stop this MURDER from taking place. You hold a very very high position in the state of Alabama and can stay stop or give the go ahead for an execution to take place. I am from cornwall in the UK and cannot understand personnally how as a state you can MURDER Prisoners. It does not solve crime It Does not have any affect on reducing murders in your great country. Life without parol including or life in isolation is far much more of a punishment than DEATH. Mr Riley please think very hard before this Thursday you and only you can save John Parkers life. Thank you for your time in reading my email its very much appreciated.
Best Wishes to you
Andrew Laskey
UK
I am 110% against the DEATH PENALTY
No Comments
7th Jun 2010
Dear Governor Riley,
I am writing to protest the murder of John Forrest Parker at Holman Prison this Thursday. I realize John Parker is a convicted murderer, but when the state of Alabama kills him by lethal injection, we are also murderers. We should execute justice, and you would have to agree there are just alternatives to more killing. This man has been locked away, and could continue to be locked away, and be no threat to the citizens of this state. Murder is not necessary, and it is not a deterrent. I don’t believe one man on Alabama’s death row gave one thought as to the death penalty at the time their crimes were committed. If it was a deterrent, our murder rate would go down, as compared to states who don’t have the death penalty. But it steadily increases despite the executions.
Governor Riley, I beg you to consider what we are doing as a people, what we are teaching our children about the value of a human life, no matter who extinquishes it. Please exercise your reponsibility as our elected Governor to consider each case for clemency.
Sincerely,
Kathy R. O’Gorman
No Comments
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