Maryland: Some Attitude Here!

Gov. Martin O'Malley (D) announced Thursday that he is considering whether or not Maryland's lethal injection protocol should examined in a study by a new commission on capital punishment that was formed by the General Assembly. The commission will focus on "racial, jurisdictional and economic disparities" in the administration of capital punishment. Meanwhile, there are five prisoners on "death row," and Maryland Republicans are increasingly vocal in their criticisms. They believe the Governor is simply not enforcing the law because he doesn't like it. House Republican Leader Anthony O'Donnell says, "If this governor wants to grant heinous murderers a pardon, he has the right to do that. But he does not have the right to suspend the law and that's what he's doing by failing to issue these protocols." See story here.

North Carolina: Compensation, if Pardoned

This article recounts the story of Kirk Bloodsworth,who served nine years in prison on "death row" for the rape and murder of a 9-year-old girl. In 1993, a DNA test did not match his sperm to the semen on her undergarments and he was released. The state of Maryland has compensated Bloodsworth $300,000 for wrongful imprisonment. But the article also discusses the case of another more recently exonerated North Carolina death row inmate, Glen Edward Chapman, who "can either sue the city of Hickory or receive a Pardon of Innocence from the governor, a prerequisite for receiving compensation."

Maryland: Posthumous Pardon Revisited

HomeTownAnnapolis.com is looking back on an famous murder that took place 90 years ago. John Snowden was convicted of the murder of Lottie May Brandon and sentenced to hang on Feb. 28, 1919. His various appeals for a new trial were denied although many were not convinced that his trial was fair. Governor Emerson C. Harrington was lobbied to grant a commutation, a request that also drew the support of 11 of the jurors. But Harrington refused and, on the morning of the hanging, an anonymous letter emerged which said, "He was not the guilty man. I am the Man." On May 31, 2001, governor Parris Glendening presented the community that continued work to prove Snowden's innocence his posthumous pardon. For complete story, go here.