Troy Davis and wrongful execution
Is the Supreme Court right to order the rehearing of a Georgia death penalty case, or is one fair trial enough?
If Troy Davis is innocent in the 1989 murder of off-duty Savannah cop Mark MacPhail, said The New York Times in an editorial, letting Georgia execute him would be “barbaric.” So “we are relieved” that the Supreme Court ordered a lower court to hear new evidence in the case—such as that seven key witnesses have since recanted their testimony. To argue against a rehearing, as Justice Antonin Scalia does in an “extraordinarily cold dissent,” is shocking.
That’s “a bit harsh” on Scalia, said Conor Clarke in The Atlantic. It may sound “terrible” to argue, as Scalia does, that the Supreme Court “has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a habeas court that he is ‘actually’ innocent.” But legally, it’s hardly a “crazy view.”
What’s crazy is delaying the execution of this “convicted cop killer,” said the Savannah Morning News in an editorial. If the Supreme Court was moved by Davis’ “new evidence,” namely the “so-called recantations” of witnesses after 20 years of pressure from “the killer’s family” and Al Sharpton, it could have settled the case itself, instead of kicking it back onto the “judicial merry-go-round.”
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Officer Mark MacPhail’s family deserves justice, said Cynthia Tucker in the Atlanta Journal Constitution. But justice is best served by letting Davis try to prove he didn’t pull the trigger. He probably won’t succeed—the legal hurdle, that the new evidence “clearly establishes” his innocence, is too high—but to preserve the criminal justice system’s integrity, it’s important Davis be given the chance.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
-
What should you be stockpiling for 'World War Three'?
In the Spotlight Britons advised to prepare after the EU tells its citizens to have an emergency kit just in case
By Elizabeth Carr-Ellis, The Week UK Published
-
Carnivore diet: why people are eating only meat
The Explainer 'Meatfluencers' are taking social media by storm but experts warn meat-only diets have health consequences
By Elizabeth Carr-Ellis, The Week UK Published
-
Scientists want to fight malaria by poisoning mosquitoes with human blood
Under the radar Drugging the bugs
By Devika Rao, The Week US Published