Entries tagged with “Willie Manning

Policy Issues

Innocence

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Dec 07, 2023

Mississippi Supreme Court Delays Decision on Willie Manning Execution Date, Allows Time for Appeal

On November 30, 2023, the Mississippi Supreme Court ordered that the state’s request to set an exe­cu­tion date for death row pris­on­er Willie Manning be held until the court rules on a recent peti­tion seek­ing to bring new evi­dence of Mr. Manning’s inno­cence. Mr. Manning’s attor­neys had filed a peti­tion at the court on September 29, ask­ing for an oppor­tu­ni­ty to present recan­ta­tions from jail­house infor­mants who tes­ti­fied against Mr. Manning, as well as new expert analy­sis debunk­ing the…

Policy Issues

Innocence

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Jul 15, 2022

Mississippi Supreme Court Denies Additional DNA Testing to Death-Row Prisoner

The Mississippi Supreme Court has denied addi­tion­al DNA test­ing to death-row pris­on­er Willie Manning (pic­tured). Manning, who was sen­tenced to death in Oktibbeha County in 1994 and in 1996 for two sep­a­rate crimes, has main­tained his inno­cence of both crimes. He was exon­er­at­ed of the 1996 con­vic­tion in 2015 after police and pros­e­cu­tors unlaw­ful­ly with­held excul­pa­to­ry evi­dence from the…

Policy Issues

Arbitrariness

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Innocence

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Jul 18, 2013

FBI To Examine 27 Death Penalty Cases For Potentially Inaccurate Testimony

A Federal Bureau of Investigation review of more than 21,000 cas­es has revealed 27 death penal­ty cas­es in which the FBI’s foren­sic experts may have exag­ger­at­ed the sci­en­tif­ic con­clu­sions that could be drawn from their tes­ti­mo­ny, mis­tak­en­ly link­ing defen­dants to crimes they may not have com­mit­ted. It is pos­si­ble that some of these cas­es involve inmates who have already been exe­cut­ed. Under par­tic­u­lar scruti­ny is tes­ti­mo­ny regard­ing hair evi­dence. Although FBI laboratory…

Policy Issues

Innocence

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New Voices

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Jun 11, 2013

OP-ED: DNA: A Test for Justice”

In a recent op-ed in the Baltimore Sun, for­mer FBI Director William Sessions (pic­tured) under­scored the impor­tance of reli­able FBI foren­sic analy­sis in con­vict­ing the guilty and exon­er­at­ing the inno­cent. Sessions pro­vid­ed the exam­ple of Willie Jerome Manning, who received a last-minute stay of exe­cu­tion in Mississippi in order to allow time to con­duct test­ing on DNA evi­dence that could exon­er­ate him. Manning was con­vict­ed in 1994 based on FBI