On February 7, attor­neys for Tim Adams (pic­tured) filed a peti­tion for clemen­cy urg­ing the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles to rec­om­mend spar­ing Adams’ life and to ask Governor Rick Perry to com­mute his death sen­tence to life in prison with­out parole. Adams, an army vet­er­an with no crim­i­nal his­to­ry, killed his son while plan­ning his own sui­cide in 2002. He plead­ed guilty and has tak­en respon­si­bil­i­ty for his actions. Family mem­bers and three jurors from Adams’ tri­al have also voiced strong sup­port for his clemen­cy. Columbus Adams, Adams’ father and grand­fa­ther of the vic­tim, said, ​“Our fam­i­ly lost one child. We don’t deserve to lose anoth­er. After my grandson’s death, we lived through pain worse than any­one could imag­ine. Nothing good will come from exe­cut­ing my son Tim and caus­ing us more anguish.” Additionally, Rebecca Hayes, Ngoc Duong, and Kathryn Starling, who served as jurors in Adams’ tri­al, have said they were not pre­sent­ed with infor­ma­tion about the defen­dan­t’s char­ac­ter and reli­gious back­ground that would have influ­enced their sen­tenc­ing deci­sion. In an affi­davit, Hayes said, ​“Those delib­er­a­tions were the most emo­tion­al expe­ri­ence of my life, and I have car­ried the guilt around for years know­ing that I sen­tenced Adams, a man who had done wrong but who was oth­er­wise a good, reli­gious, and hard-work­ing per­son to death.”

Juror Doung added, ​“Since the tri­al, I have learned new infor­ma­tion that would have made me fight for Adams’s life…It would have been nice to hear from Adams’s fam­i­ly mem­bers and friends, because it would have shown many of the jurors that he was not a mon­ster, that he was a good human being, who had done some­thing hor­ri­bly wrong but com­plete­ly out of character…I do not believe that Timothy Adams deserves to die for his crime.” Adams cur­rent­ly has an exe­cu­tion date of February 22, 2011.

(Press Release from Tim Adams’ Attorneys, Texas Defender Service, February 7, 2011). Read the full text of Adams’ clemen­cy peti­tion. See Clemency.

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