{"id":991,"date":"2011-09-22T10:45:20","date_gmt":"2011-09-22T14:45:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www3.law.harvard.edu\/journals\/hlpr\/?p=991"},"modified":"2015-10-02T15:28:08","modified_gmt":"2015-10-02T15:28:08","slug":"life-after-troy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/2011\/09\/22\/life-after-troy\/","title":{"rendered":"Life after Troy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jessica Jackson\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Last night the world sat silently holding its breath as it once again waited to hear whether Georgia would be allowed to kill Troy Anthony Davis.\u00a0 Troy\u2019s case, unlike most death row inmates, received international attention, extensive media coverage, and celebrity awareness.\u00a0 In fact, the hashtags\u00a0#TroyDavis<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0#TooMuchDoubt<\/a>\u00a0were tweeted by over fifty thousand people in the days leading up to Troy\u2019s execution.<\/p>\n

After the U.S. Supreme Court\u00a0declined to issue a stay<\/a>\u00a0on Troy\u2019s behalf, prison officials moved quickly to execute Troy within the night.\u00a0 Troy\u2019s\u00a0last statement<\/a>\u00a0proclaimed his innocence and urged the family members of the victim\u2019s family to continue to seek the truth.\u00a0 In a letter to his supporters, Troy stated \u201cthis movement began before I was born, it must continue and grow stronger until we abolish the death penalty.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/span>As we move forward and begin to digest the truth of what happened in Georgia tonight, the truth that the state killed a man without proof of his guilt, it\u2019s important to channel Troy\u2019s incredible strength and spirit.<\/p>\n

Last summer I stood outside the Georgia prison during\u00a0Melbert Ray Ford\u2019s execution<\/a>.\u00a0 There were fewer then ten of us standing in the dust singing \u201cWe Shall Overcome.\u201d \u00a0Last night that same lawn was filled with hundreds of people protesting Troy\u2019s execution.\u00a0 Troy\u2019s case has brought together people who may otherwise never have bothered to pay attention to an execution \u2013 and his murder has opened the eyes of even those who support the death penalty to the harsh reality of our failed justice system.<\/p>\n

While expecting total abolition immediately may not be possible in every state yet, several states do have bills regarding heightened requirements for\u00a0admissibility of eyewitness testimony<\/a>\u00a0or changes to state evidentiary codes.\u00a0 It is unclear what other effects last night\u2019s execution will have on the future of the death penalty, but it is clear that Troy Davis did not die in vain.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jessica Jackson\u00a0 Last night the world sat silently holding its breath as it once again waited to hear whether Georgia […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-991","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peZQka-fZ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/991","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=991"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/991\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}