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A MAN WAS executed in the US state of Missouri last night, despite pleas for clemency from the Vatican and his lawyers on the grounds that he was intellectually disabled.
Ernest Lee Johnson, 61, was put to death by lethal injection for the 1994 murders of three convenience store workers during a botched robbery in Columbia, Missouri.
He was pronounced dead at 10.11pm Irish time, according to a statement from the Missouri Department of Corrections.
Missouri Governor Mike Parson, a Republican, had rejected appeals to halt the execution on Monday , which took place in Bonne Terre, Missouri.
“The state is prepared to deliver justice and carry out the lawful sentence Mr Johnson received,” Parson said in a statement.
“The evidence showed Mr Johnson went to great lengths to plan and conceal his crime,” he said.
“Three juries have reviewed Mr Johnson’s case and recommended a sentence of death.
“Mr Johnson’s claim that he is not competent to be executed has been reviewed and rejected by a jury and the courts six different times, including a unanimous decision by the Missouri Supreme Court,” the governor said.
Johnson’s lawyers have repeatedly sought to block his execution on the grounds that he is intellectually disabled, arguing that would violate the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment.
The Vatican’s envoy to the United States sent a letter to the governor on behalf of Pope Francis last week urging him to halt the execution.
“This request is not based upon the facts and circumstances of his crimes; who could not argue that grave crimes such as his deserve grave punishments,” said the Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Christophe Pierre.
“Nor is this request based solely upon Mr Johnson’s doubtful intellectual capacity. Rather His Holiness wishes to place before you the simple fact of Mr Johnson’s humanity and the sacredness of all human life,” he said.
In a filing with the US Supreme Court, Johnson’s attorneys said he averaged scores of 67 on IQ tests, the range of intellectual disability.
They said his mother and a brother were intellectually disabled, and Johnson was born with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder.
“Mr Johnson was held back twice in second and third grade because of his intellectual shortcomings,” they said, and dropped out of school after a second attempt at ninth grade.
But yesterday the US high court denied Johnson’s attorneys’ motion for a stay of execution.
Two Democratic members of the House of Representatives from Missouri, Cori Bush and Emanuel Cleaver, also issued an appeal for clemency, saying Johnson’s execution “would be a grave act of injustice.”
“Killing those who lack the intellectual ability to conform their behavior to the law is morally and legally unconscionable,” they said in a statement.
“Like slavery and lynching did before it, the death penalty perpetuates cycles of trauma, violence and state-sanctioned murder in Black and brown communities.”
“This wasn’t justice. This was cruelty,” Bush tweeted after the execution was confirmed, and called to abolish the death penalty.
Johnson was convicted of killing three convenience store employees – Mary Bratcher, Mabel Scruggs and Fred Jones – while robbing the store to get money to buy drugs.
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Good riddance! Murder is murder.
@Tony Doran: He would be out of prison 10 years ago if convicted here.
@Tony Doran: by that logic, the carrying out by the state of the death sentence is state sponsored murder, does that mean everyone involved carrying out the senrence should be up for murder too
@Tony Doran: unfortunately, many innocent people have been executed in the US for crimes they didn’t do, so, no the use of the phrase “good riddance” is not correct.
@Tony Doran: oh the irony !
@Brendan Cooney: Source?
@Garreth mc mahon: no they are preforming their duty as per the law, not a random act of murder, there is a difference legal or illegal act, if you don’t know the difference you should be making these sort of comments
@Tony Doran: So you’re comfortable with killing people? Comfortable with killing people who are intellectually disabled too? hmmm. Nice one.
@Larry O Reilly: Larry, that “law” could be changed tomorrow if a different political party had the power. That “law” is only there because people brought up in privilage are happy to kill people who wern’t.
@Contrary Mary: you need a source to know there are an incredible amount of false convictions in the US? Really? Oh my!! Curtis Flowers, Adnan Syed, Joey Watkins? I could go on and on, there are literally LOADS… google it for yourself – Curtis Flowers, look it up, its really not hard.
@Contrary Mary: https://www.pnas.org/content/111/20/7230
4.1% but I doubt you needed to be told it happens. Everyone on earth knows it’s happened and still does.
@Larry O Reilly: Just following orders…
@Contrary Mary: source? Why? There are many well documented cases of of posthumous pardons in the US over the years, not to mention long sentence convictions overturned. At least with the latter, innocent people get to eventually walk free, not so with the former. Look it up for yourself.
@Garreth mc mahon: It’s illegal to detain someone against their will but that’s what happens everytime a person is arrested and jailed. All state sponsored. By that logic, an Garda and the courts should be completely powerless so as not to commit a crime themselves by doing their duty.
The death penalty is barbaric.
It’s been repeatedly demonstrated to be racist and innocent people have been killed.
It’s a stain on any country still perpetuating it.
@Tricia G: you’re not wrong, Tricia. Thankfully, there’s no chance of it ever coming back here.
@Tricia G: racist? How can that be??
Some parts of the US seem truly backward and barbaric. And they criticise the Taliban?
@John O’Brien: No doubt the families of his murdered victims would feel differently. 6 different trials and 3 juries disagreed, based on medical expert testimonies, that he was not intellectually deficient. He had had 30+ years to change their mind. This was a pity ploy full of all the anti-racist buzz words they could find, but they just weren’t true.
@Contrary Mary: Capital punishment is barbaric and can never be justified regardless of the circumstances. Most civilised countries in the world have removed this form of punishment. The Taliban offer victims of crime the right to choose if the accused should live or die, is that where we should go?
@Contrary Mary: Really? You really think that laws should be based on how people in the throes of anger and grief feel? Also if harsh and excessive punishments work America should be crime free by now. 4% of the world population with 40% of the worlds prisoners and one of only 3 countries not to sign up the UN convention on the rights of the child, so they can still execute minors.Do you really think that is a system that’s working?
Its makes me think that death penalty is needed in this country after the 2 recent murder cases .
2 murders of women with details that beggars belief.
@John Kenny: longer sentences would suffice. Like Sarah Everard’s murderer in the UK, Nadine Lott’s would ideally receive a whole of life sentence also.
@John Kenny: the death sentence does not prevent murder. It does mean that a person who has commit a crime that may result in the death sentence will use deadly force to resist arrest. Rather then preventing crime it increases it.
@Jen McCartney: Wasn’t Colin Pitchfork released only last month?
Some parts of the U S seem truly backward and bar baric. And they criticise the Taliban?
@John O’Brien: careful now, you’ll draw the contrariest of marys on yourself. For what it’s worth, I agree with you a hundred percent.
If he was a white hillbilly I’m not sure his intellectual ability would have been taking into account. Say he would be long dead.
@Jimmy Reid: Statistically, in the US, Black convicted murderers are more likely to be given the death penalty than white ones. Black criminals are usually given far harsher sentences for the same crimes than white criminals. This is all well documented.
@Tricia G: That’s only true because African Americans disproportionately commit more homicides/serial killings than any other group in the US. It also is unhelpful that 93% of Hispanics are classified as white when making these racial comparisons. When you extract Hispanics from white crime statistics you end up with an African American homicide rate of 12.7 times higher than the white rate. You’re also ignoring many different factors to get an oversimplified statistic.
Please stop adding 2 and 2 and getting 5 because it fits in with your narrative.
@John Marsden: Also it is untrue that black defendants are more likely to be sentenced to death. That statistic was debunked years ago… More misinformation from Trisha. When it was debunked the social study narrative switched to black victims instead of black defendants.
Why are you talking about a subject in which you are totally ignorant of the facts?
I’ve always thought the death penalty was barbaric and pointless. It has quite obviously never served as a deterrent. It’s about revenge. Enlightened societies have moved on from the concept of state revenge. It was indeed a heinous crime this man committed but his death doesn’t change anything. All it did was to diminish those who ordered it carried out and those who supported them. That’s all it ever does. The amount of people on here almost revelling in his death is somewhat disconcerting and sickening. Excluding the minority of obvious psychopaths I often wonder would those who support the death penalty here actually have the stomach to pull the lever/push the button/flip the switch themselves? I dare say the majority wouldn’t but hey don’t let that stop your fun…
Article failed to mention he had a massive brain tumour, a parafalcine meningioma.
Most of the tumour was removed in 2008, long with 20% of his brain. He was left partly paralysed, had difficulty walking and his seizures, although diminished, remained as part of the tumor was left behind. I wonder if they wheeled him to the execution chamber.
It was argued by his lawyers that executing him would constitute cruel and unusual punishment (banned by the US constitution) as the execution drugs can provoke seizures in people who have preexisting epilepsy.
Refs.:
Zivot, J. 2016. Too Sick to Be Executed: Shocking Punishment and the Brain. FORDHAM LAW REVIEW, 85, 8.
Live by the sword, Die by the sword.
67 in an IQ test..better than Trump
Incomprehensibly cruel, I hope that one day legally sanctioned killing will be history.
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