Just hours are left before Troy Davis finds out if he will live or die Wednesday.
Troy Davis was convicted nearly two decades ago and sentenced to die for the 1989 slaying of Savannah police officer Mark MacPhail. Several witnesses have since recanted testimony. (AP)
In one of the most high profile death row sentences, Davis, and thousands of his high profile supporters, await a ruling by the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles, which met Monday to review his case.
Wednesday is the fourth execution date scheduled for Davis, after decades of twists and turns in an unsettling muder trial.
In 1989, an off-duty Savannah police officer Mark MacPhail was shot and killed. Nine eyewitness identified Davis as the murderer, even though no phsyical evidence tied him to the crime.
In the years since, seven of the nine eyewitnesses recanted their story and two other witnesses said another man committed the crime. Amid the doubt, three previous execution dates have been postponed by court order, one just mere hours before Davis was set to die.
Last week, a petition with 663,000 signatures was delivered to the Georgia board, calling for clemency. Fromer president Jimmy Carter and Pope Benedict XVI have come forward asking for a stay of execution. On Twitter,
Singer and songwriter Nellie McKay wrote an original song for McKay, hoping to draw attention to the case.
McKay, who currently has a New York cabaret show based on the third woman executed by the state of California, has gotten to know death row intimately through her research.
In a phone interview she said, “There’s a cacophony on his side, and I hope the board listens.”
