Hypothetical: If someone came forward and claimed responsibility for the killing that Troy Davis...

[Poll_Blind]

...was executed for tonight, could they be convicted, sentenced and executed (eventually) as well? I'm not even sure why I'm asking that question. It sounds dumb, but...could they? What would happen?

Has such a thing ever happened? Does anyone know? It's like...reverse double jeopardy?

PB

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. Not sure about all the legal stuff, but you would have to have a prosecutor who

was willing to reopen the case, right? I could easily see some people being willing to sweep the new info under the rug to "let sleeping dogs lie."

[TheMadMonk]

6. Guaranteed. /nt

[Poll_Blind]

9. Yeah, I would sadly agree. If you've ever seen the documentary "Thin Blue Line"...

...you'll recall a prosecutor who was absolutely unrepentant, even after strong evidence (in this case a confession by the real killer) surfaced.

PB

[Lost-in-FL]

2. Has that ever happened? The guilty party finally making a confession? Nt

[teddy51]

3. To my way of thinking, it would mean that the State of Georgia committed Homicide

by killing Troy Davis and should be held accountable. I can dream!

[Poll_Blind]

5. Well, that's part of what I'm wondering too. Though I doubt they'd LET themselves be held....

...responsible, if that makes any sense. I'm talking about the State of Georgia.

PB

[hlthe2b]

4. Yes, theoretically .. since no statute of limitations on murder....

But, it would require the state to vacate the guilty judgement on the executed individual in order to try the new guy. Few prosecutors would want to do that, as it would admit culpability in killing an innocent person.


Perhaps you are asking about "double jeopardy?" That only applies to the same INDIVIDUAL being charged with the same crime....

[Poll_Blind]

7. I guess why I mentioned "reverse double jeopardy" was that I wasn't sure that...

...the state would go after a second person for the same crime after executing a first (wrongly). Though, really, there's nothing against that except the likelihood that the state would have to admit being in error and, as you say, vacate the guilty judgement against the deceased.

I suppose at that point the family could go after the state, civilly, eh?

PB

[hlthe2b]

11. Yes, certainly... Vacating the guilty verdict to charge another...

would clearly render them liable for civil damages--big time.

[TheWraith]

8. Yes. Double jeopardy only applies to trying the same person for a given crime. nt

[dkf]

10. Sounds like it is either Davis or Coles.

They both admit to being there, with Coles accusing Davis.

The problem is that if the earlier shooting was done by the same gun, Coles wasn't with Davis yet, so process of elimination leads to Davis unless Davis or his other pal did the earlier shooting and then gave the gun to Coles.

So it really rests on the ballistics.

[DrunkenBoat]

12. No gun was ever found. Just shells. Coles owned a .38, the type of gun the

shells had come from.

He said he'd given his gun to someone else.

He also said he'd seen Davis with a .38.

But Coles was the person seen arguing with the man the officer stepped in to protect. What did Davis have to do with the situation? Nothing as far as I can tell.

[dkf]

13. Davis was at both shooting scenes, Coles only at one.

The same gun would implicate Davis before Coles.

[DrunkenBoat]

14. There's no more evidence about the first shooting than the second, & no reason to tie them together

either.

No gun was found from either shooting.


At trial, McQueen provided the state with a motive for Davis, saying Davis told him he killed MacPhail because Davis didn't want to be tied to the Cloverdale shooting. "Now it is clear that Mr. Davis never should have had to confront this evidence as it was completely false," the court filing says.

The order signed by Judge Wilson today said that claims being pursued by Davis had previously been raised and rejected. As for the ballistics evidence, the order said, a federal court judge had previously found that there was never a definitive contention at trial that the bullets matched and that the munitions evidence was not relevant to Davis' guilt of the MacPhail murder.

http://www.ajc.com/news/atlanta/troy-davis-from-gurney-1185593.html

That other shooting was a red herring.

There were no fingerprints, murder weapons, tire tracks, bloody footprints or other basic clues that help detectives track down killers. Only the bullets extracted from MacPhail and empty shell casings found on the ground provided the tiniest bit of physical evidence.

Troy Anthony Davis was eventually sentenced to death for the murder, mostly on the testimony of eyewitnesses who identified him as the shooter.

Most of those witnesses have since recanted. And now his defense team, seeking to save him from execution, is challenging the conclusions drawn from the ballistics analysis done in the Davis case. They've hired one of the state's leading firearms experts, who concluded the analysis done soon after the killing was deeply flawed.

Prosecutors believed Davis was responsible for at least one of the shootings at the party and for MacPhail's murder at a Burger King across from the Yamacraw public housing project. A GBI crime analyst linked bullets from all three shootings, concluding they could have come from the same gun, either a .38 Special or .357 Magnum revolver.

In a report written for Davis' defense team in 2003 and submitted to the state parole board, retired GBI ballistics expert Kelly Fite concluded that Parian's analysis was "shoddy and questionable at best and patently wrong at worst." Fite concluded his analysis by stating, "As it appears now, the testing already conducted in this case is wholly lacking in reliability."

Fite also notes in his affidavit that Coleman was shot shortly after Cooper at approximately the same time as MacPhail. Fite writes that Parian and the prosecution "conveniently discarded" the timing of events that would make it difficult, if not impossible, for the same weapon to have been used in both crimes.

http://s15.invisionfree.com/FIP/ar/t5477.htm


So far as I've been able to find out, Davis had only one prior: possesion of a gun with a filed off serial number. No assault, no shootings, let alone murder.

But on this one night he decided to shoot two people for trivial reasons? Doesn't make sense to me.

[dkf]

15. Would you agree though that it was either Coles or Davis who shot MacPhail?

[DrunkenBoat]

17. I have no idea who shot him. I simply believe there's no case beyond a reasonable doubt that Davis

did.

The case *was* the eyewitnesses. There was nothing else.

[DrunkenBoat]

18. I have no idea who shot him. I simply believe there's no case beyond a reasonable doubt that Davis

did.

The case *was* the eyewitnesses. There was nothing else.

[fortyfeetunder]

16. It would make for interesting times

The Georgia legislative community will have lost all remaining credibility.
SCOTUS also discredited for not even considering the possibility.
Egg on the face for the MacPhail family for ignoring all the evidence.

[Zax2me]

19. Or the opposite - video proof he did it?!

Many here would owe the victims family a HUGE apology.
Not for opposing the death penalty.
But for acting this way defending a guilty man while walking over the murdered mans grave and putting his widow through another hell.

[Chan790]

20. Oh bullshit and horse-fuckery.

It is the obligation of any individual with a conscience to maximally ensure that the innocent are not executed, especially in a case such as this where the evidence the initial conviction was based upon was shaky even at the time of conviction. Do I feel for her? Absolutely...but to no greater level of guilt than I have in sympathy for anybody else I cannot conceivably have wronged in carrying out a moral duty.

A signed confession wouldn't even carry any culpability for the actions of the those who worked to insure that Davis was not unjustly executed...the fact that you'd even make that correlation tells me that you and I have no common basis for morality anyways. I view yours as twisted and disgusting, a sort of twisting kinked preposterous offensive-jest. I've never noticed you before this week and I hope we never cross paths again.

[tblue]

23. Oh Chan790....

:hug:

I can't believe anyone is pleased with what happened today.

Thank you for sharing this info. I didn't know about the other shooting.

[readmoreoften]

21. Considering that someone else already confessed...

I think not. The person who did the shooting was the police informant who originally fingered Davis. To try him would be to admit they're wrong and the only reason Davis is dead is because they refused to admit they were wrong in the first place...

This isn't about justice. It's about CYA and making somebody pay. And that's all it's ever been.

[cascadiance]

22. Then certain Georgia government officials should be prosecuted for murder...

They who DID have a chance to avoid IMPROPERLY executing someone when there was already information that would rule out that Davis was guilty beyond a reasonable doubt SADISTICALLY kept the system from avoiding murdering him. It would be time to prosecute them instead. Perhaps then if you couldn't make the person that was the real killer of the crime that Davis was already made "guilty" for, they could charge this guy with being a part of the murder of Troy Davis, especially if that person is the one who didn't recant his testimony and who was rumored to have bragged to have been the killer himself.