Friends -- from Hunterbear: It's certainly a very good feeling indeed to be able to report that Governor Mike Easley of North Carolina has just commuted the death sentence of Charles Mason Alston, Jr of Warren County to life imprisonment.
Obviously, thanks to everyone who sent e-mails to the Governor -- and who thought good thoughts. Thanks especially to Ed Whitfield of Greensboro who brought it to our attention. Here's the story: ESTES THOMPSON Associated Press Writer RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- A condemned man who steadfastly denied beating his girlfriend to death in 1990 escaped execution Thursday as Gov. Mike Easley commuted his death sentence to life in prison. Charlie Mason Alston Jr., 42, was to die by injection at 2 a.m. Friday at Central Prison. Alston was sentenced to death in 1992 for the beating and suffocation death of his former girlfriend, Pamela Renee Perry, who was hit in the face with a hammer. No one saw the killing and no blood or fingerprint evidence connected the attack to Alston, who had been convicted about six weeks earlier of assaulting Perry. Alston, a brick mason, contended his innocence would be proved by DNA tests on evidence that has disappeared. Prosecutors said the evidence, scrapings from beneath Perry's fingernails, would confirm the guilty verdict. At the time, DNA evidence wasn't commonly used in murder trials. Just last year, the Legislature approved a law allowing every inmate charged with first-degree murder to request a DNA test. Defense attorneys asked Easley to grant clemency because the law should apply to Alston. State courts already have rejected similar arguments. The state said in documents filed in the U.S. Supreme Court that the evidence was "anything but weak ... that verdict has withstood the tests of time and close scrutiny by both state and federal courts simply because the evidence is so strong." Easley did not specify why he commuted the sentence. "After long and careful consideration of all the facts and circumstances of this case in its entirety, I conclude that the appropriate sentence for the defendant is life in prison without parole," he said. The Supreme Court rejected Alston's two remaining appeals Thursday afternoon. As his execution approached, Alston met with his parents, brother and son and talked to his lawyers, while supporters scheduled protest rallies around the state and at the governor's mansion. "This case involves a man sentenced to death despite the fact that not a single shred of physical evidence tied him to the murder," said Steven Hawkins, executive director of the Washington-based National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. _______________________________________________ Leninist-International mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international
