Death Penalty News

Attorneys for condemned killer Keith Tharpe are trying to halt his Sept. 26 execution with arguments that a juror on the case was racist and voted for death because Tharpe was African-American. (CNN) The Supreme Court declined on Monday to take up the case of Georgia death row inmate Keith Tharpe, who claims a juror voted to put him to death because of his race. At issue is an affidavit from an interview conducted seven years after Tharpe's sentencing. Juror Barney Gattie used a racial slur in reference to African-Americans. He also questioned whether "black people even have souls." The court had heard this case back in 2018, and revived Tharpe's case over the dissents of Justices Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch. Now the state of Georgia is free to set an execution date. Justice Sonia Sotomayor agreed with the court not to take up the case, but she wrote separately to say that she was "profoundly troubled by the underlying facts of the case....

10:31 p.m.: The U.S. Supreme Court granted a stay of execution tonight to condemned killer Keith Tharpe, three and a half hours after he was scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection. In a 6-3 decision, the court’s justices were apparently concerned about claims that one of Tharpe’s jurors was racist and sentenced Tharpe to death because he was African-American. Three justices — Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch — dissented. The high court will now decide whether to hear Tharpe’s appeal, and, if it doesn’t, the court said the stay of execution shall terminate automatically. But that will not happen tonight. Tharpe’s lawyers were overjoyed with the decision. “We’re gratified the court understands this case merits thoughtful consideration outside the press of an execution warrant,” said Brian Kammer, one of Tharpe’s attorneys. “We are extremely thankful that the court has seen fit to consider Mr. Tharpe's claim of juror racial bias in regula...

Keith Leroy Tharpe, 59, was convicted of killing by jury that included man who said in 1998 affidavit that he wondered if black people ‘even have souls’ A Georgia prisoner whose jury trial was marred by racial bias was set to be executed on Tuesday night, barring an eleventh-hour intervention by the state or the US supreme court. Keith Leroy Tharpe, 59, lost his bid for clemency on Monday before the state board of pardons and parole. He was convicted in 1991 of the shooting death of his sister-in-law, Jacquelyn Freeman, in September 1990. One of the points Tharpe’s attorneys asked the state board to consider was that a juror in the case, Barney Gattie, who has since died, said in an affidavit signed in May 1998: “After studying the Bible, I have wondered if black people even have souls.” Gattie allegedly freely used racial slurs and in the affidavit said Freeman came from a family of “nice black folks”. Tharpe, he said, “wasn’t in the ‘good’ black folks category in m...

The state Board of Pardons and Paroles has denied clemency for convicted killer Keith Tharpe. Tharpe still has several court appeals pending that could delay his execution, scheduled for 7 p.m. Tuesday night.  His lawyers are arguing one of the jurors who convicted him and sentenced him to die was a racist. They also maintain that he is not eligible for the death penalty because he is intellectually disabled. At the parole board on Monday, 20 supporters - including a daughter and a granddaughter - had argued for mercy. Tharpe is scheduled to die by lethal injection for killing his 29-year-old sister-in-law, Jaquelyn Freeman on Sept. 25, 1990, dragging her from a car and shooting her multiple times with a shotgun. On Monday about 20 people supporting Tharpe — friends, relatives, religious counselors and attorneys — crowded into the small parole board meeting room to ask for mercy. But prosecutor Stephen Bradley said the board also heard from relatives, inv...

Many family members of a woman fatally shot in 1990 support clemency for her condemned killer, lawyers for Keith "Bo" Tharpe argue in a petition seeking clemency on the eve of Tharpe's scheduled execution. The Georgia Board of Pardons and Parole is set to consider Tharpe's case Monday, the 27th anniversary of Jacqueline Freeman's killing in Jones County. Freeman was Tharpe's sister-in-law. Lawyers for Tharpe are asking that his execution - set for Tuesday - be stayed and that his sentence be commuted to life without the possibility of parole. The copy of Tharpe's clemency application released to the media Friday after being declassified doesn't list which of Freeman's family members support clemency. The portion of the document addressing their support was redacted "to protect the victims' and victims' family members' identities and privacy," according to the application. Tharpe's application describ...

“Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?” This single, sinister question, asked over a sepulchral-sounding musical score, was rhetorical; for after a dramatic pause and a malevolent cackle, the narrator smugly informed the audience: “The Shadow knows.” And so it was with this somber admonition on September 26, 1937, that the gritty, crime-fighting character dubbed “The Shadow,” whose exploits had previously been limited to pulp fiction magazines, burst into American consciousness with his own radio program. The uber-successful first episode called “The Death House Rescue” would lead to a run of 664 more installments over 18 seasons. Exactly 80 years later another story about a scheduled execution, this time one that is all too real, is playing out; but, unlike that first episode of “The Shadow,” there is little chance of a tidy and fair resolution (much less “a death house rescue”). Indeed, absent an unlikely intervention, the state of Georgia will execute death row ...

Only a unanimous jury can convict and impose a death sentence in Georgia, and the law has long recognized that misconduct by a single juror requires reversal. In 1991, a jury in Jones County, Georgia, sentenced Keith Tharpe, a Black man, to death for the murder of his sister-in-law. Seven years later, Tharpe’s defense counsel met with a white juror on Tharpe’s trial as part of their routine investigation of the case. The juror explained to the lawyers why he voted for his client’s death, and then reviewed, edited, and signed a sworn statement, which set out his views of race and Tharpe: I have observed there are two types of Black people: 1. Black folks and 2. Niggers. For example, some of them who hang around our little store act up and carry on. I tell them, “nigger, you better straighten up or get out of here fast.” I felt Tharpe who wasn’t in the “good” black folks category in my book, should get the electric chair for what he did. . . . After studying the Bible, I have wond...

Keith Tharpe was convicted and sent to death thanks in part to a racist juror. If the Supreme Court is serious about reducing the impact of racial prejudice in capital cases - and 2 recent decisions suggest it is - the justices will halt the pending execution of a Georgia man and grant him a new trial. At stake in the case of Keith Tharpe is not the question of his guilt or innocence. At stake is the proposition that no black person should be condemned to death by a white juror who proudly boasts after sentencing that he voted to impose capital punishment because the defendant was a "nigger." The facts of the case are simple. His prosecutor, a district attorney named Joseph Briley, came to the case with a reputation for using peremptory strikes during jury selection in a racially discriminatory fashion. The federal courts had caught him in prior cases trying illegally to exclude blacks from juries sitting in judgment of black defendants. In Tharpe's case, Brile...

Keith Tharpe faces the death penalty for killing his sister-in-law and kidnapping and raping his estranged wife. His lawyers have appealed the sentence because 1 of the jurors who voted for his execution may have been racially biased. Keith Tharpe was convicted in 1991 of killing his sister-in-law and kidnapping and raping his estranged wife on Setp. 25, 1990. The wife left him and moved in with her parents. He intercepted her and her sister, Jacqueline Freeman, while they were on their way to work. He killed her sister, dragged her in a ditch and raped her and drove her to Macon to force her to withdraw money from her credit union account. With only 100 days to prepare the case, Tharpe's defense team lost the trial. The jury unanimously sentenced him to death. 8 years later, claims of a racially bias juror surfaced. The man in question, Barney Gattie, admitted he used racial epithets and racially biased language when describing Tharpe. Now-deceased, Gattie's sig...