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Ga. Won't Stay Execution Despite Witness Reversals
Carter, clergy, NAACP have asked for life sentence for Troy Davis
By Matt Cantor
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Posted Sep 23, 08 9:18 AM CDT
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(Newser)
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A man sentenced to die tonight in Georgia is looking to the US Supreme Court after the state’s parole board and top court rejected clemency yesterday, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports. Troy Anthony Davis was convicted in 1991 for murdering a police officer, but seven prosecution witnesses have since recanted testimony, leading to calls for his sentence to be commuted to life in prison.
Death-penalty opponents called for prison workers to take a sick day today in support of Davis, whose case has drawn the attention of Jimmy Carter and Pope Benedict XVI, among others. The NAACP called the penalty “a modern-day lynching,” while a pastor said the execution of an innocent man would “leave the blood of Troy Davis on all of our hands.”