Arkansas Parole Board Recommends Clemency for Jason McGehee

The Arkansas Parole Board voted 6-1 on April 5 to recommend clemency for Jason McGehee, one of the eight death-row prisoners scheduled to be executed in an unprecedented eleven-day period later this month. McGehee’s clemency petition drew support from both the former Director of the Arkansas Department of Correction, Ray Hobbs, and the trial judge who presided in his case, Robert McCorkindale. Speaking on McGehee’s behalf, Hobbs told the Board, “He has learned his lesson, and he still has value that can be given to others if his life is spared.” McGehee’s lawyer, assistant federal defender John C. Williams, said clemency was warranted for numerous reasons and “respectfully ask[ed] the Governor to accept the parole board’s recommendation and sentence Mr. McGehee to life without the possibility of parole instead of death.” Williams emphasized that McGehee was only twenty years old when the murder occurred and had a “near-perfect” prison record. He said, “The parole board determined Mr. McGehee warrants clemency instead of death because of his exemplary behavior, his youth at the time of the crime, and also because his sentence is not proportional.” Two of McGehee’s co-defendants, whom his lawyers argued were at least as culpable as McGehee, had received lesser sentences. The Fair Punishment Project chronicled numerous mitigating factors that, because McGehee’s lawyer at trial barely investigated the case, his jury never heard. This included evidence that McGehee had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and that he had experienced severe abuse and neglect as a child that led him to use drugs and alcohol as early as sixth grade. The parole board has recommended against clemency for four of the other prisoners, despite issues in those cases that include seriously inadequate defense, histories of mental illness, and borderline intellectual disability. The board’s recommendations are advisory, not binding, and Governor Asa Hutchinson makes the final decision whether or not to grant clemency. [UPDATE: The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas stayed McGehee’s execution pending final action by Governor Asa Hutchinson on the Parole Board’s clemency recommendation. The Governor announced his intent to grant clemency on August 25, and the commutation of McGehee’s death sentence to a sentence of life in prison without parole became final in October.]

(“Parole board recommends death row inmate receive clemency from governor,” KATV, April 5, 2017; K. Kissel, “Ark. parole board suggests mercy for 1 of 8 due to die,” Associated Press, April 5, 2017.) Read the Statement by McGehee’s Lawyers here. See Clemency.