"Somebody needs to kill my attorney."

[Diva]

Prisoner's last words.

There's a mix of sad, funny, and remorseful statements. I think my favorite has to be the guy who was pissed he didn't get his SpaghettiOs. And I pray the guys who said they didn't do it were lying, though its likely that a few were wrongly accused.

[Felt Pelt]

Here's the Texas DOJ site collecting last words for everyone executed since 1982:

http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/stat/executedoffenders.htm

The New Yorker article on Cameron Todd Willingham details how the arson that convicted him was debunked by an expert, whose work was verified and sent to the governor's office, which ignored it. The article ended with his last words, which were:

Originally Posted by Cameron Todd Willingham

The only statement I want to make is that I am an innocent man convicted of a crime I did not commit. I have been persecuted for twelve years for something I did not do. From God’s dust I came and to dust I will return, so the Earth shall become my throne.

I thought this was extremely poetic and it startled me just how alone and resigned it sounded. However, the DOJ and a Dallas News article go a bit further. He then said, "I gotta go, road dog. I love you Gabby," and then giving a middle finger to his ex-wife who was in attendance, "I hope you rot in hell, bitch."

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcont...m.3f5f9ad.html

[Phil]

There's a similar site collecting last meals of death row inmates. Some guys skip the meal and request it be donated to the homeless, while some guys eat like there's, well, no tomorrow. It's an odd collection.

[RathBandu]

That New Yorker story about Willingham is infurating, and all the more tragic because you know there are dozens more out there about guys like him.

[Diva]

I've seen the last meal's site. Hadn't heard about Willingham. So messed up.

[Khaunshar]

Well, thats one of the more curious mutatings of many legal systems in the world: Once a case goes beyond a certain stage, its virtually unstoppable at times as a lot of egos, legal and political careers etc. start getting connected to it.

When I read about cases like this Willingham thing, it strikes me as exactly that kind of thing: Some people with a lot to lose realized one day they had backed and persecuted a case that at the last minute turned into a hoax. However, they dont actually care for the guy, and they see ways to still get a conviction and sentence, so in the interest of their careers and to save face, they ll just let it go on.
Its not about justice at that point.

Its amazing how persistent some states/counties insist on not admitting to a mistake in some cases. Willingham is just one, but there are quite a few (not all death row mind you) where its glaringly obvious a major mistake has been made, or where very conclusive evidence is showing up later on basically proving easily it didnt go that way... but for some reason its "too late" then, and technicalities or whatever else is needed is employed to keep the sentence n place.

Some of these last words, though, kinda give you the impression the guy doesnt care one bit for what he has done.

[Raspberry Leper]

Ha ha. Someone quoted Flatliners.

[IggytheBorg]

As an attorney, I just thought I'd throw out there that just because an expert said this guy didn't commit arson doesn't necessarily make it so. I interned at a Prosecutor's Office in Jersey City (an urban area rife with violent crime) and there was a death penalty case going on at the time involving a guy setting his wife on fire. he produced "experts", too, as did the State. The thing about experts is, they get paid by the party proffering their testimony. How likely do you think it is they'd actually say something contrary to their client's interests? The prosecutors only half jokingky referred to them - ours and theirs - as "whores", because they'd say anything if you paid them enough. Experts tend to be that way on the civil side as well. One hopes that if they really are talking out their asses, a jury will see through it and find the more plausible explanations more credible & decide accordingly. But I'm sure there have been cases where a flashy expert long on drama & personality but short on facts can sway them to an incorrect conclusion.

[Chris Miller]

Originally Posted by Phil

There's a similar site collecting last meals of death row inmates. Some guys skip the meal and request it be donated to the homeless, while some guys eat like there's, well, no tomorrow. It's an odd collection.

I was reading that site the other day (man, I really do not know why), and I remember the case where the guy tried to donate his meal to a homeless person. Oddly enough, the prison would not comply (said they just couldn't, bureaucratically I suppose), but the information of the inmates wishes got to the media, who talked about it, and that night the local homeless shelters got a ton of donations.

[Zhukov]

It's not just one expert who has cast doubt on the Willingham case, but that's not really the point. The 'experts' presented by the state in the prosecution of the case relied on objectively bad science. This is a pretty common occurrence in Dallas, with the DA office of Bill Hill locking up scores of innocent men, most of them black, many of them for life in prison. Some of them have since been released since we got a new (black) DA, but it's impossible to say how many crooked convictions went through. This is obviously by no means limited to Dallas - it's a cultural thing in the state. When the evidence against Willingham's conviction began to mount, and it was becoming clear that the supposedly independent investigative panel that handles these sorts of questions was going to take the state to task for killing an innocent man, Fucknuts Perry dismissed three members of the forensic panel two days before they were supposed to issue a report. It's a goddamned crime, but the nation seems to expect this sort of thing from our fine and fucked Lone Star State, and so it hasn't gotten much press.

[Snerill]

Originally Posted by Khaunshar

Its amazing how persistent some states/counties insist on not admitting to a mistake in some cases.

The West Memphis Three come to mind.

[Richard Dickson]

If even one innocent person is executed by mistake, it's too many.

[IggytheBorg]

They drilled it into our heads in law school crim classes that the maxim "It is better a thousand guilty men go free than one innocent man be wrongly convicted" meant that the first duty of prosecutors was to do justice, not get convictions. I wanted to be a prosecutor when I went to law school, so I paid attention to those parts. Unfortunately, I never got to do any prosecutorial work beyond interning & at the municipal level (traffic tickets & misdemeanors). But I always tried to live up to it. It's probably a little easier to do in Jersey, since the County Prosecutors (what we call our DA's) are appointed by the governor, & not elected. They don't have to grandstand for the public w/ a stellar conviction rate to get elected. It boggles my mind that in some states Judges & prosecutors are still elected. These are two positions that, for obvious reasons, cited by Zhukov above quite succinctly, should be apolitical.