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Death row Scot faces delay to discover fate
A Scot on death row in America will have to wait another two weeks before learning if his conviction remains overturned.
Kenny Richey, 41, originally from Edinburgh, has been facing the death penalty since 1987 when he was convicted of the murder of a toddler in an arson attack. He has always maintained his innocence.
Earlier this year a state appeal court in Cincinnati overturned his conviction on the grounds that his original trial had been seriously flawed.
State prosecutors in Ohio, where he was tried, appealed that decision to the Supreme Court, simultaneously lodging an intention to retry Richey if their appeal failed. The Supreme Court was expected to make an announcement yesterday, but the decision was delayed without explanation.
Ken Parsigian, Richey’s Boston-based lawyer, said: “They did not get a ruling. It is unclear why but such delays usually occur when someone is asking for time to issue a dissent.”
This compelling evidence was submitted to support a bid for a hearing to allow Kenny’s defence team to show that the case was a tragic miscarriage of justice.
The state prosecution did not dispute the accuracy of the new evidence.
Prosecution Dan Gershutz said, “Even though this new evidence may establish Mr Richey’s innocence, the Ohio and United States constitution nonetheless allow him to be executed because the prosecution did not know that the scientific testimony offered at the trial was false and unreliable.”
- Quoted at The Official Kenney Richey Campaign site
A prosecutor was trying to block a death row inmate from having his conviction reopened on the basis of new evidence, and Judge Stith, of the Missouri Supreme Court, was getting exasperated. “Are you suggesting,” she asked the prosecutor, that “even if we find Mr. Amrine is actually innocent, he should be executed?”
Frank A. Jung, an assistant state attorney general, replied, “That’s correct, your honor.”
That exchange was, legal experts say, unusual only for its frankness.
After a trial and appeal, many prosecutors say, new evidence of claimed innocence should generally not be considered by the courts.
Newspaper report on a different case
Amnesty International, which has campaigned tirelessly for Richey’s release, claiming that he is the “most compelling case of innocence on death row”, said that it expected him to be retried even if the Supreme Court threw out the prosecutor’s appeal. A spokeswoman said: “It is highly unlikely they [Ohio] will drop the case and release him.”
The Supreme Court is now in recess until October 31.
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