Entries tagged with “Johnny Lee Gates”
Issues
Time on Death Row
,Sep 22, 2021
Nevada Supreme Court Finds Samuel Howard Innocent of the Death Penalty 40 Years After He Was Sent to Death Row
The Nevada Supreme Court has found that a prisoner who has been on the state’s death row for more than forty years is “actually innocent” of the death penalty and must be resentenced. In a ruling issued on September 16, 2021, the court reversed the death sentence imposed on Samuel Howard in 1983 for a 1980 robbery and murder in Las Vegas, holding that the sole remaining aggravating circumstance in his case that had made him eligible for the death penalty was invalid. Writing for a unanimous…
Issues
Aug 03, 2021
Equal Justice Initiative Releases Report on Racial Discrimination in Jury Selection
Racial bias in jury selection is compromising the “credibility, reliability, and integrity of the legal system,” and its effects are especially pronounced in death penalty cases, a new report from the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) has found. EJI’s report, Race and the Jury: Illegal Discrimination in Jury Selection, released online July 27, 2021, places the continuing illegal exclusion of jurors of color in its historical context as “a continuing legacy of our history of racial injustice,”…
Issues
May 22, 2020
Former Georgia Death-Row Prisoner Reaches Deal Securing His Release After Serving 43 Years for a Murder He Says He Did Not Commit
Johnny Lee Gates (pictured) is free, 43 years after being sentenced to death in Georgia for a murder he has steadfastly maintained he did not commit. On May 15, 2020, Gates entered a so-called “Alford plea” on charges of manslaughter and armed robbery, meaning that he did not admit guilt, but conceded that prosecutors had enough evidence to convict him. He was sentenced to 20 years on each charge, but was credited with time served and immediately released. “I’ve fought for 43 years for this…
Issues
Mar 16, 2020
Georgia Supreme Court Votes 9 – 0 for New Trial for Former Death-Row Prisoner Johnny Gates
More than forty years after he was convicted and sentenced to death by an all-white Columbus, Georgia jury for the rape and murder of a 19-year-old white woman, Johnny Lee Gates (pictured) will be getting a new trial. On March 13, 2020, the Georgia Supreme Court unanimously held that DNA contained on physical evidence that police and prosecutors had withheld for decades raised “significant doubt” as to Gates’ guilt. The court’s 9 – 0 decision rejected an appeal by state prosecutors of a January…
Issues
Jan 18, 2019
Citing Evidence of Innocence, Race Discrimination, Georgia Court Grants New Trial to Former Death-Row Prisoner
A Georgia judge has granted a new trial to Johnny Lee Gates (pictured recently, right, and at the time of trial, left) based on new evidence that excludes him as the source of DNA on implements used by the killer during the 1976 rape and murder for which Gates was sentenced to death. DNA testing disclosed that Gates’s DNA was not found on a necktie and the bathrobe belt the prosecution said were used by the killer to bind Kathrina Wright, the 19-year-old wife of a soldier stationed at Fort…
Issues
Mar 23, 2018
Jury Notes Show Georgia Prosecutors Empaneled White Juries to Try Black Death-Penalty Defendants
New court filings argue that Columbus, Georgia prosecutors had a pattern and practice of systematically striking black prospective jurors because of their race, discriminatorily empanelling all- or nearly-all-white juries to try black defendants on trial for their lives in capital murder cases. In a supplemental motion seeking a new trial for Johnny Gates (pictured) — a black man sentenced to death by an all-white jury in 1977 for the rape and murder of a white woman — lawyers from the Southern…
Issues
Mar 23, 2018
Jury Notes Show Georgia Prosecutors Empaneled White Juries to Try Black Death-Penalty Defendants
New court filings argue that Columbus, Georgia prosecutors had a pattern and practice of systematically striking black prospective jurors because of their race, discriminatorily empanelling all- or nearly-all-white juries to try black defendants on trial for their lives in capital murder cases. In a supplemental motion seeking a new trial for Johnny Gates (pictured) — a black man sentenced to death by an all-white jury in 1977 for the rape and murder of a white woman — lawyers from the Southern…