Former FBI Chief William S. Sessions Calls On Georgia To Stay Order

[The Straight Story]

The execution of Troy Davis, a Georgia death row inmate scheduled to die in less than a week, should be halted because of "pervasive, persistent doubts" about his guilt, said William S. Sessions, a former federal district judge in Texas and FBI director under Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, in a sharply-worded editorial on Thursday.

"Serious questions about Mr. Davis' guilt, highlighted by witness recantations, allegations of police coercion, and a lack of relevant physical evidence, continue to plague his conviction," Sessions wrote. He urged a state pardons board to commute the sentence to life in prison.

The unusual plea from Sessions, which appears in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, is the latest high-profile call for clemency for Davis, whose looming execution has become a lightning rod for national and international criticism. Among those who have called for a halt to the execution, scheduled for Sept. 21 at 7 p.m., are Pope Benedict XVI, former President Jimmy Carter and the leadership of the NAACP and Amnesty International.

Davis, 42, was convicted of murdering Mark MacPhail, an off-duty Savannah police officer shot to death while coming to the aid of a homeless man being assaulted in a parking lot in the early morning of Aug.19, 1989. The murder weapon was never recovered and no physical evidence was found linking Davis to the crime, and he has always maintained that another man at the scene was responsible for the shooting.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/15/troy-davis-execution-william-sessions_n_963366.html