An Alabama death row inmate scheduled to be executed this week is pleading with Gov. Kay Ivey to meet with him in person before his death, insisting that he is innocent and has never received a fair hearing in court.
Anthony Boyd had his plea recorded on Monday night from a prison phone call. During a press conference Tuesday morning, hosted by the nonprofit Execution Intervention Project, his spiritual advisor, Dr. Rev. Jeff Hood, shared his message.
“Hello, Governor Ivey, this is Anthony Boyd. I’m asking, extending, offering, giving you an invitation to please come sit down and talk to me before this execution is carried out. Come sit down with me and have a conversation with the guy that you deemed one of the worst of the worst. Know the guy that’s innocent on Alabama’s death row,” said Boyd.
Boyd was sentenced to death for the 1993 burning death of Gregory Huguley in Talladega County.
Prosecutors said Boyd and three other men abducted Huguley over an unpaid $200 drug debt, taped him to a bench, doused him in gasoline and set him on fire.
Boyd maintains his innocence, saying no physical evidence ties him to the crime and that the evidence used at trial has since been discredited.
He has spent more than 30 years on death row and currently chairs Project Hope to Abolish the Death Penalty, an inmate-led organization advocating against capital punishment.
Boyd has asked the courts to halt his execution, arguing that Alabama’s nitrogen hypoxia method violates constitutional protections against cruel and unusual punishment, especially given his asthma and vertigo. But both a federal district judge and the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals have denied his requests.
In his recorded plea, Boyd urged Ivey to demonstrate compassion and courage.
“If at any time during our conversation you feel that I’m being deceptive or evasive, please carry out the sentence,” he said. “But if not, then I ask you to stop this execution and have my case thoroughly investigated. I’ve never been given a fair shot in court. None of my issues have been heard on the merits.”
He also criticized the state’s handling of the nitrogen execution protocol, claiming inmates were promised they would have two years to sign up once a protocol was finalized, but that the state later reversed course.
“Now the state is in court arguing that I waited too long,” said Boyd. “We had an opportunity to sign up, but there was no protocol in place. The state made a deal with us. Now they’re breaking it.”
“I thank you for your time, your understanding, and for being a good Christian in this good Christian state. I hope to see you soon,” said Boyd.
Boyd’s supporters say the governor still has time to act. “Before an innocent man is executed, come sit down with me,” Boyd said. “Talk to me. Know me. Show the people of this state that you are not just carrying out sentences and hiding your hands.”
Anti-death penalty advocates plan to deliver a clemency petition to Gov. Kay Ivey at noon Wednesday in Montgomery. In addition to halting all nitrogen executions, organizers said they will also ask the governor to permit witnesses to observe the entire execution process from the moment prison staff begin securing the gas mask on the inmate to the procedure’s end.
Currently, witnesses are only allowed to view the execution after the curtain is opened, once the inmate is already strapped to the gurney and fitted with the mask.
Source: alreporter.com, Mary Claire Wooten, October 22, 2025
"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."
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