Alexander Williams: A Case for Moratorium
(Left to right: Williams' with his sister as children; Williams' being forceably medicated on death row)
Alexander Williams' life was spared by the state's Board of Pardons and Paroles. We commend their decision and call for the state to take the next step by placing a moratorium on executions and comissioning a study of the death penalty's application. We have a system in which a man came close to being executed who should have never been on death row.
In November, 2002, Williams' reportedly committed suicide after he had been moved out of death row and into prison. A very tragic end to an already tragic story.
Williams' case illustrates some of the worst problems with the death penalty's application:
Inadequate indigent defense
Williams' lawyer is known in the state's legal community to be incompetent. 5 out of 8 surviving jurors from his original trial have signed affidavits saying they would not have given Williams' a death sentence had they known about his history of mental illness and child abuse, both major mitigating factors that were not raised by his lawyer. And because these issues were not raised in the initial trial, this presented serious difficulties in the appeals because the appeals process is not a place for new (previously unpresented) evidence. Williams' lawyer assigned to take on his re-trial never met with him. Thus, he was able to spend 16 years on death row without legal progress.
Arbitrary
+Is the death penalty awarded to the "worst of the worst" or to those with the worst laywer?+Certainly, Williams' commited an agravated murder, yet the many mitigating factors were not presented and thus could not be weighed.
+Many agree, both those who support and oppose the death penalty, that executing someone who is severely mentally ill, and/or who was a juvenile at the time of the crime, and who was not adequately represented is not morally right.
Mental Illness
Before Williams committed murder, he showed signs of mental illness. He has been diagnosed with schizophrenia. There are many examples of his delusions. He believes Sigourney Weaver is God and that she talks to him. He has been known to crawl around on the prison floor to talk with imaginary frogs, and he believes insects replaced his eye with a shell.
Williams' was severely abused as a child, which no doubt contributed to his poor mental health. He was repeatedly physically abused by family members. In one example, his mother hammered a screwdriver into his toes. He was also sexually abused by his father.
Juvenile Offenders
Iran, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the USA are the only remaining countries which allow people under 18 years of age at the time of their crime to be sentenced to death. Yemen and China have stopped this practice recently and Pakistan is expected to soon.
International human rights law prohibits this practice in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Because juveniles are developmentally less mature, they are not allowed to buy cigarettes or alcohol and cannot enter into legal contracts by themselves. The international community is moving toward concensus that juveniles should not be treated as adults in the judicial system, as they are not in other areas of society.
Justice for the Victims Family
The victim, Aleta Carol Bunch, was brutalized and murdered. Our belief that Williams' should not have been executed does not mean that we do not believe in consequences or justice for her family. We believe that her memory is being honored and justice accomplished through a life sentence. Executing such a damaged man would have only created more tragedy.
International Outcry
The European Union and Council of Europe, the UN Commissioner for Human Rights, and others across the world, nation, and state including Rosalynn Carter appealed to the state of Georgia to stop this execution. To see some of these letters and press statements, go to the ABA website.News Clips
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