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Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor Speaks against the Innocence
Protection Act: "If your concern is to protect the
innocent from being executed, then you need not worry; it is not occurring
and is highly unlikely to occur."
11 South Union, 3rd Floor, Montgomery Alabama, 36104
334-242-7300
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Congress is considering legislation, titled the
Innocence Protection Act, that would establish a national commission to
set minimum standards for defense attorneys appointed to represent poor
people accused of capital crimes. States that didn't comply with the
standards would risk losing federal funds for their prison systems. But
the bill also would create a $50 million grant program for the states to
improve their methods of appointing attorneys in death cases. Supporters,
including more than 200 members of the U.S. House of Representatives and
several senators, say the bill is necessary to prevent mistakes that could
lead to the execution of an innocent person. Opponents of the bill,
including U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., and Pryor, say it would curtail
state control of its criminal justice system; give anti-death penalty
activists a greater role than sit ting judges in appointing lawyers; and
grind the system to a halt because the standards for competency would be
unattainably high."If your concern is to protect the innocent from
being executed, then you need not worry; it is not occurring and is highly
unlikely to occur," Pryor told the committee. Drinkard, who was
sentenced to die by a Morgan County jury in 1995 for the robbery and
murder of a Decatur man, won a re-trial after the Alabama Supreme Court
found certain evidence was improperly considered. He was acquitted last
month. He and his newer lawyers believe Drinkard was convicted the first
time because a more sophisticated analysis of a tape recording wasn't
done, an alibi witness was not put on the stand and complicated medical
evidence was submitted in writing instead of being explained by a doctor.
"There are good ways to do it and much better ways to do it, and in
capital cases, you need the much better ways," said John Mays, a
Decatur lawyer who represented Drinkard in his second trial. He called
Alabama's system for appointing defense counsel the "snatch them out
of the hall" method. Alabama requires that a lead defense attorney in
a capital case have at least five years experience, which doesn't
necessarily mean they've taken a criminal case to trial or handled a
capital case, Mays said. Since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976,
96 people have been set free from Death Rows around the country. The issue
of inadequate defense counsel has gained momentum since the Democrats
regained control of the Senate, a shift that put one of the bill's
sponsors, Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., back in charge of the judiciary
committee. "It is a problem that calls into question the legitimacy
of criminal convictions and undermines public confidence in the integrity
of the criminal justice system as a whole," Leahy said.
Va. 'Regretful' on Sterilizations
FEBRUARY 15, 2001
By BILL BASKERVILL Associated Press Writer
LYNCHBURG, Va. (AP) — In the 1940s, the state labeled Raymond W.
Hudlow a``mental defective'' and surgically sterilized him. Years
later, his nation honored him as a war hero, awarding him the Bronze
Star for valor, the Purple Heart and the Prisoner of War
Medal for service in World War II. Now
the Virginia General Assembly has refused to apologize to Hudlow and the
more than 7,400 other Virginians sterilized under the
state's eugenics program between 1924 and 1979.
``They treated us just like hogs, like we had no
feelings,'' said Hudlow, now 75. Instead,
the state Senate voted Wednesday to express ``profound regret'' for
the General Assembly's action 77 years ago that led to
forced sterilizations. The House of Delegates
already passed the resolution, and Gov. Jim Gilmore
said he believes an expression of regret is sufficient. ``It
seems that there's a trend in this country to rewrite history, and now
we're going to go back and stir the pot on history and take
some of those most unfortunate chapters in our
history and relive them for no real purpose,'' Sen.
Warren E. Barry said from the Senate floor. But
Hudlow says the trauma inflicted on him when he was a teen-ager in the
wards of the Virginia Colony for Epileptics and
Feebleminded has never left him. He has more
flashbacks about that time than the terror of combat and imprisonment
by the Germans, he said. ``I remember this just as
it was yesterday,'' Hudlow said. ``It has always been
in my mind. It has never left me.'' Although
eugenics eventually was discredited as political and social prejudice
rather than scientific fact, neither Virginia nor any of the 29 other
states that conducted eugenical sterilizations has ever compensated or
apologized to the more than 60,000 victims. The
Virginia law was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1927. That ruling,
which still stands, led a federal judge in 1984 to throw
out a class-action lawsuit filed by eugenics victims
of the state. Virginia's Southern aristocracy,
acting under a eugenics law that served as a model
for the rest of the nation — and for Adolph Hitler — tried to purify
the white race from 1924 to 1979. Targeted was virtually
any human shortcoming believed to be a hereditary
disease that could be stamped out by surgical
sterilization, such as mental illness, mental retardation, epilepsy,
criminal behavior, alcoholism and immorality. Hudlow's
malady: repeatedly running away from home to avoid beatings by his father.
When his father told the ``welfare lady'' that ``he
couldn't control me,'' Hudlow said, his reproductive
fate was sealed. He was 16 years old. ``I was picked
up by the sheriff at home. He handcuffed me and took me'' to the
Colony near Lynchburg, where most of Virginia's sterilizations were
performed. A county judge in 1942 granted the Colony's
request to sterilize Hudlow, identified in the court
order as an ``inmate'' of the Colony. ``They just
came and got me before I woke up one morning. They wheeled me and
throwed me up on the operating table,'' he said. No
one explained what they were doing, Hudlow said. ``The only way I found
out, an employee on Ward 7 told me I wouldn't be able to
father any children.'' Sixteen
months after the operation, Hudlow was released from the Colony and
was drafted into the Army. He served as the radioman for
his platoon leader, was wounded and spent seven
months in German prison camps. Hudlow decided to
make the military a career and served 21 years in the Army and
Air Force. Phil Theisen, president of the Lynchburg
Depressive Disorders Association, has urged state
lawmakers to make a strong, clear apology to the eugenics victims.
``This is a skeleton in the closet for Virginia that will
continue to be there until it's addressed
forthright,'' Theisen said. ``An apology would be a
historic first, and that makes it all the more important.'' While
some lawmakers supported a strong apology by the state, others, including
Virginia House member Mitchell Van Yahres, said it would only draw fire.``
It carries a connotation of guilt that I don't want to be associated
with,'' Van Yahres said.
Before they strap me in 'Yellow Mama,' you boys come back. I've got
some more things to tell you." Those
were the words of convicted killer Glenn Holladay - already on death
row - as he talked with Etowah County Sheriff James Hayes and Lt. Joe
Nabors of the Alabama Bureau of Investigation several years ago. Holladay,
now 51, is scheduled to die in Alabama's electric chair at 12:01 a.m.
Friday - 14 years to the day his murder trial began for the shooting
deaths of his ex-wife, Rebecca Ledbetter Holladay; her boyfriend, David
Robinson; and a 16-year-old neighbor, Larry Thomas Jr., on Aug. 25, 1986,
in the Tidmore Bend community. Hayes
has made an official request to again speak with Holladay before he is
executed. "My
concern is that he has some information that can clear up additional
crimes and put some things to rest," Hayes said. "He needs to
tell us what he did." A
September execution date was set in 1990 but delayed because of the
appeals process. Attorneys
for Holladay have asked the state to grant a stay of execution, claiming
he is mentally retarded. If
the sentence is carried out this time, Holladay will be the first person
convicted in Etowah County to die in Alabama's electric chair. District
Attorney Jim Hedgspeth said he, too, plans to attend the execution.
Holladay's case was Hedgspethís
first capital murder trial to prosecute. "I
know I don't have to go, but I feel like it's my responsibility in seeing
the case through," he said. "These families are people I spent
time with. I shared with them in their loss. "I
hope the execution brings closure to the families and brings conclusion to
what 12 people and a judge said was the measure of justice which should be
meted out." Hedgspeth
said Holladay's mental capability is an issue that has been raised on
appeal. "He
couldn't read or write, but he's not mentally retarded," Hedgspeth
said. When traveling
often between Miami and Chicago, Holladay never got far off the
interstate. "If
Glenn got too far off the interstate, he couldn't read the road signs and
he'd get lost," Hedgspeth said. When
he planned burglaries and he'd see a sign in a yard, he would copy the
letters, then take them to someone to read for him. In
a search of his car after he was arrested, a small piece of paper with a
triangle drawn on it and a number on each line of the triangle was
found, Hedgspeth said. "Everyone
was trying to figure out what it meant," he said. "We got a map
out and it was the number of the interstates between Chicago, St. Louis
and Nashville." At
times, Holladay even held down jobs, Hedgspeth said. "No
one who suffered from mental retardation could plan out and do the things
he did," Hedgspeth said. When
Holladay was questioned about
a rape someone said he did several years earlier, he admitted it and
described the place the woman lived, what she was wearing and provided
many details. Hedgspeth
said Holladay came from a good family. "He was a typical boy, but he
just started getting in trouble," he said. "He
has brought just as much heartache to his own family as he has the
victims' families," Hedgspeth said. "It's just a different kind
of hurt." Hedgspeth
used a quote Holladay's father made to a reporter in his closing
statements at trial. "Somewhere
along the way, Glenn went bad," Hedgspeth said. "This didn't
have to happen. It just shows what happens when somebody goes bad."
High court delays Holladay execution Lawyer says client
retarded, should be spared
Birmingham News
Stan Bailey
6/22/01
Assistant Attorney General Beth Jackson Hughes contended in court
documents that Holladay's latest appeals were filed
too late and are without merit because he "functions
in the borderline range of intelligence and is not mentally
retarded." After Holladay was
examined at Taylor Hardin Secure Medical Facility in Tuscaloosa
in 1986, Dr. Joe Dixon, a psychologist and certified forensic examiner,
testified he was "not a rocket scientist but that he had common
sense, street smarts, could understand things and could
figure out how to fix things." Dixon said
Holladay could "adapt to the rules of society and to get along should
he choose to," so he disagrees that Holladay is mentally retarded.
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