The Georgia Board of Pardons and Parole has denied clemency for death-row inmate Troy Davis.
Davis was convicted of the 1989 killing of Savannah, Georgia, police officer Mark MacPhail.
Davis is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection at 7 p.m. Wednesday at a state prison in Jackson, Georgia.
"Monday September 19, 2011, the State Board of Pardons and Paroles met to consider a clemency request from attorneys representing condemned inmate Troy Anthony Davis. After considering the request, the Board has voted to deny clemency," the board said in a statement Tuesday morning.
The five-member parole board votes in a secret ballot.
Davis has gained international support for his long-standing claim that he did not kill MacPhail. International figures including Pope Benedict XVI, Desmond Tutu, and former President Jimmy Carter, entertainers such as Susan Sarandon, Harry Belafonte, and the Indigo Girls, and others have joined with Amnesty International, the NAACP and other groups in supporting Davis' efforts to be exonerated.
He has been scheduled to die three times before, most recently in October 2008, when the U.S. Supreme Court granted a stay two hours before he was to be executed.
Since Davis' conviction in 1991, seven of the nine witnesses against him have recanted or contradicted their testimony. There also have been questions about the physical evidence - and, according to some, the lack thereof - linking Davis to the killing.
Amnesty International reacted angrily to the clemency denial on Tuesday.
"It is unconscionable that the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles has denied relief to Troy Davis. Allowing a man to be sent to death under an enormous cloud of doubt about his guilt is an outrageous affront to justice," Amnesty International said in a statement Tuesday.
"Should Troy Davis be executed, Georgia may well have executed an innocent man and in so doing discredited the justice system," the statement said.
But the victim's mother, Anne MacPhail, said she's satisfied that Davis will be executed.
"Well, justice is done, that's the way we look at it. That's what we wanted," the mother told CNN. "I am very convinced that he is guilty."
She said she would not attend Davis' execution but family members would be there.
Anne MacPhail said she has not forgiven the convicted of killing her son.
"Not yet, maybe sometime," she said.
The NAACP and Georgians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty had joined Amnesty International in organizing support for Davis, setting up about 300 rallies, vigils and events worldwide in the past week or so. In addition, they said that more than 1 million people have signed a petition in support of Davis' bid to be exonerated.
In a 2008 statement, then-Chatham County District Attorney Spencer Lawton described how Davis was at a pool party in Savannah when he shot another man, Michael Cooper, wounding him in the face. Davis was then driven to a nearby convenience store, where he pistol-whipped a homeless man, Larry Young, who'd just bought a beer.
Soon thereafter, prosecutors said, MacPhail - who was working in uniform, off-duty, at a nearby bus station and restaurant - arrived. It was then, the jury determined, that Davis shot the officer three times, including once in the face as he stood over him.
Davis' lawyers, in a federal court filing, insisted that there is "no physical evidence linking" Davis to MacPhail's murder. They point, too, to "the unremarkable conclusion" of a ballistics expert who testified that he could not find definitively that the bullets that wounded Cooper and killed MacPhail were the same.
Georgia's attorney general, in an online statement, claimed that the expert said the bullets came from the same gun type and noted that casings at the pool party shooting matched - thus came from the same firearm as - those found at MacPhail's murder scene.
Two decades ago, a jury convicted Davis on two counts of aggravated assault and one each of possessing a firearm during a crime, obstructing a law enforcement officer and murder. The latter charge led, soon thereafter, to his death sentence.
While reviewing Davis' claims of innocence last year, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Georgia found that Davis "vastly overstates the value of his evidence of innocence."
"Some of the evidence is not credible and would be disregarded by a reasonable juror," Judge William T. Moore wrote in a 172-page opinion. "Other evidence that Mr. Davis brought forward is too general to provide anything more than smoke and mirrors."
The parole board denied had denied Davis clemency once before. The board has never changed its mind on any case in the past 33 years.
Read more CNN coverage on the Troy Davis case
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This reminds me of that Johnny Cash song... the one about the guy complaining about the many murders he's committed, though he's being hung for one that he's falsely accused of.
Once again the KKK is rearing it's ugly head disguised as a legal lynching.There seems to be a lot of doubt surrounding this case so the prudent thing to do is to commute the death sentence to life in prison.I wonder if there would be such a big deal had the victim been black?Racism will be the downfall of America.
Actually, people like you crying racism over anything not going your way is the downfall of America. BTW-It's already fallen.
night night next story please>>>oh ya can the real killer please come forward
As it is the supremacy factor in this country will be white and black will be always considered black and evil and those who bare resemblance shall face his or her opressors fraile and defensiveless as slaves shackled to a slave ship floor board surrounded by feces and urine knowing death is freedom and to live amongst thee which thou are nothing worthy of life ' give me my death and my presence will trouble you no more ' for i can only die one time and if this is my freedom from captivity ' give it to me to me now and forever i shall be of this opression no more .
OMG, really???
coockoo
How is this related to murder?
You do know this is the year 2011?
It is simple, If there is no dought, then you do what you must do. If there is dought you need to sift through it and find out what need be done from there. If they kill him and it is later found that he didn't do it, Well then they have just made the case for the anti death believers. Not just that But if they came back to me and informed me that the person that I was on the jury for was innocent and I voted for the death penalty. Plus I was the forman, I signed that paper. Well,they need to be sure. The only thing at stake is the life of a person. There is alwayse time to kill, but once you kill you can never fix it later.
Sweetie...It's spelled doubt....no one is going to take you seriously if you can't spell it....
This confirms everything we here in media re: Georgia.
That's the dirty south for you.
Please, give Senor Troy Davis his death juices tomorrow at 1900 hours. Give him three wiennies for another last supper and then immediately Croak him.
don't you want to at least wait for his three weenies to digest before executing him? he might vomit and that's nasty to clean up.
Everyone knows that there are more Blacks in the prison system when America Blacks are only 15 % of the population. And Perhaps police and jury and prosecutors were pressured emotionally and politically for a conviction. The man is a criminal and so it goes that he probably murdered the police officer. You can't put a man to death on an assumption.There now is doubt and proof that he may not have murdered Mark McPhail. This doubt is backed by thousands of Americans and International supporters. Yet a hand full of individuals have exclusive right to ignore them.
if there were reasonable doubts and we have people assuming he's innocent, why the hell was he locked up for 22 years? i'm not for the death penalty but i am for justice served to the victim and their families. there is no celebration on taking another life but how can you give the victim their justice if crimes committed are inconsequential???
Well, for one thing, if Sylvester Coles killed Mark MacPhail, executing Troy Davis isn't exactly a consequence that sends shivers down the spines of would-be murderers...
Why give him a last meal?
Because that's what we do when we believe in dignity.
human animals are just that and I am against this sort of retaliatory behavior. justice is not man's and karma does very well for itself. I am sorry my out of control tax dollars are used for this – not for long though because I am outtie!
I was dating an American who wanted me to move back to the states when our studies were finished. Never! I would never, ever live in a country as violent, hypocritical and murderous as America. You jail 1 in 31 of your citizens and the state murders innocent people. You fight against health care for your own citizens. You support exploitation of citizens for pure profit and greed. Disgusting.
and what hell hole country are you living in now?
You say the US is violent and hypocritical? You are a fool. Maybe you should study the history of Europe from 1939-1945.
you're an idiot Sam.
Who was it that fed you all of this propaganda?
research Darfur while you're at it. Also, read up about the Kymer Rouge and the Cambodians.
bwahahaha – what country are you from that someone who shoots a man, then pistol whips a second is considered an innocent person? I'd sure hate to live where you.
Wait so you guys are saying he is getting executed because he is black? I thought it was because he shot a guy, pistol whipped another guy and the murdered a cop. Thanks for the clarification.
It's not a new tactic: when you are losing an argument, change the subject.
killing a police officer is a capital crime and death penalty is the sentence. i think on top of that his family shold pay compensation to the victims family. they raised a monster and now are ripping the profit.
For the sake of argument I will concede he should be spared for killing the cop. But since the shooting of the other guy in the face and pistol whipping the homeless man proves he has a propensity for violence the execution should proceed.
You don't know anything about capital punishment then. The other two offenses aren't punishable by the death penalty. The real issue all comes down to the death of the cop. Has anyone heard of "reasonable doubt"?!?!? This case is sicken.
krista,
they got the right guy. We all understand capital punishment. Its not like he was sitting in church with his momma when this happened. He was pistol whipping and shotting people. He is off the street. -The End