Post by Scumhunter on Nov 8, 2024 9:07:17 GMT -5
(Above photo credit: wlbt.com)
From wlbt.com:
JACKSON, Miss. (WLBT) - Two national civil rights groups say a man sentenced to die for the death of two Mississippi State University students three decades ago was falsely accused in another murder investigation led by the same sheriff.
On Tuesday, the American Civil Liberties Union and Innocence Project filed an amicus brief on behalf of Willie Jerome Manning.
Manning received the death penalty in 1994 for killing Tiffany Miller and Jon Steckler, two MSU students.
He is currently seeking a new hearing in the case, saying that several witnesses key to his conviction have recanted their testimony.
Attorney General Lynn Fitch has asked the court to set an execution date.
Meanwhile, the ACLU and Innocence Project claim that the sheriff leading the investigation attempted to pin two other murders on Manning, and that critical witnesses in that case also said the sheriff attempted to bribe or threaten them if they did not implicate Manning in the case.
“Mr. Manning never stood a chance to prove his innocence even before he entered a courtroom,” the groups wrote. “The prosecution used every tool, except a fair trial, to create the perfect environment for the jury to convict.”
Manning was charged in connection with the death of Alberta Johnson and Emmoline Jimmerson in 1993.
According to court records, the two were killed six weeks after Miller and Steckler. Law enforcement struggled to find the culprit and made no arrests until they were given a tip that implicated Manning.
That tip led authorities to Kevin Lucious, who was serving life in prison in Missouri. Lucious initially testified that “he saw Manning entering the women’s apartment shortly before their bodies were discovered... [and] to having heard Mr. Manning make statements about needing money and about wishing he had done more to ‘them’ - a statement prosecution portrayed as a likely reference to the two victims.”
However, the ACLU states that Lucious later recanted that testimony, saying that Sheriff Bryan and a Starkville Police officer threatened him with prosecution if he didn’t sign off on the statement.
“There were other indicia of falsehood - for example, the police conducted a door-to-door canvas of the apartment complex after discovering the murder, and the apartment where Lucious allegedly lived when he claimed to see Mr. Manning enter the victim’s apartment building was vacant,” ACLU wrote.
“Further scrutiny of the state’s case revealed it was a house of cards, flattened both by the suppressed canvassing results as well as evidence of an alternate suspect the state had never disclosed.”
In an October filing, attorneys for Manning argued that several witnesses who testified against him in the Steckler and Miller murder case also have recanted, including Earl Jordan, who said he was promised by the sheriff that he would “help him out” if he gave a statement.
Other witnesses in the Steckler and Miller case also have recanted, including Paula Hathorn. The woman, Manning’s former girlfriend, said she received $17,000 and had multiple bad check charges dropped against her in exchange for her testimony.
The ACLU and Innocence Project say race also played a factor in Manning’s conviction. The groups point to the makeup of the jury, which had only two Black jurors, despite one-third of the jurors being considered for service at the trial being African American.
They also point to statistics from the National Registry of Exonerations showing that of the 29 Mississippi defendants who have been exonerated since 1989, 24 have been Black.
“Black people make up 56 percent of all defendants exonerated in connection with murder charges. By comparison, white people, who represent 75.3 percent of the U.S. population... make up only 29 percent of defendants exonerated,” the agencies wrote. “To make the point even more starkly, Black defendants convicted of murder are approximately 80 percent more likely to be innocent than other defendants convicted of the same crime.”
www.wlbt.com/2024/11/06/never-stood-chance-aclu-innocence-project-file-brief-support-man-sentenced-killing-two-msu-students/
Justice For Willie website: justice4willie.com/
Thoughts?
