This is about Troy Davis. I stand behind everything I have said or wrote or spoke into the microphone:
1. If it was a rich person, s/he wouldn't be on death row.
2. One of the recanted testimonies was eyewitness from across the street from a hotel balcony -- 160 feet IN THE DARK. A prosecutor that introducing such evidence as "credible" isn't concerned with justice. Police who coerce testimony aren't respectful of the law. Even if only part of the testimony claimed as being coerced was in fact coerced that still taints the trial and should disallow capital punishment.
3. According to many corporatist pundits, tort reform is pressing, but Law & Order sorts don't have a problem with capital punishment. IOW, 12 citizens can't be trusted to determine how much corporations should pay when they hurt people (there has to be $$ caps) but it's ok to trust 12 citizens to decide if someone will live or die. (Since the lives at risk will be poor or minority, so it doesn't matter.) In fact, the system encourages juries to decide for death -- someone who is against the Death Penalty won't be allowed onto the jury.
4. I haven't been trying to figure out what "really" happened; 20 years ago the investigators didn't seem concerned about what "really" happened, if they didn't apparently investigate all suspects or interview all possible witnesses.
5. I'm not going to argue "innocence" with anyone when guilt or innocence doesn't matter in this situation: the trail was tainted with coerced testimony. The system was and is corrupt. I'm not going to change the mind of someone who's already made up her/his mind, what I want the other person to do is justify state killing in this instance.
6. He's been in prison 20 years, and he insists he's not guilty. 20 years is longer than many poor people serve for killing another poor person even if he did.
7. The State of Georgia has a vested interest in maintaining his guilt. It's sad they're more concerned about not admitting they might have made a mistake than being concerned about not executing a man who could possibly be innocent.
8. Eliminate the Death Penalty. Whether or not it is theoretically justified, the historical record shows it's application is almost exclusively used against minorities and poor. If you believe that laws and justice should be the same for everyone, rich or poor and independent of race, the Death Penalty is untenable.