Last night, February 22, 2011, the State of Texas executed Timothy Adams, despite the pleas of his family, nearly 100 faith leaders representing diverse traditions, and three of the jurors who originally sentenced him to death. As his attorneys note, “The execution of Mr. Adams has inflicted needless pain on the Adams family, without any benefit to the State of Texas. No family should be made to suffer such an ordeal as we collectively have imposed upon them tonight.”
Tim Adams was the 2nd person executed in Texas this year and the 466th since 1982.
Read the full statement from his attorneys with the Texas Defender Service, pasted below.
Read more from the Houston Chronicle.
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February 22, 2011 | Texas Defender Service
The State of Texas executed Timothy Wayne Adams tonight at 6:21 p.m.
Mr. Adams’s case presented a unique and powerful opportunity for the Board of Pardons and Paroles and Governor Perry to show mercy.
It is difficult to conceive of a more appropriate case for clemency than that of Mr. Adams. Mr. Adams served honorably in the United States military and held steady employment. He took responsibility for his actions by pleading guilty at trial. He had no criminal history before his crime, and none after. In his eight years on death row, Mr. Adams had, without exaggeration, been a model prisoner. He had not a single disciplinary write-up, for any reason.
Mr. Adams sought clemency because the members of his family—who also were victimized by Mr. Adams when, in a suicidal state, he caused them to lose a grandchild, nephew, and brother—did not want to suffer another loss. His family sought nothing more than a commutation of his sentence to life without parole; he would have spent the rest of his life in prison.
The execution of Mr. Adams has inflicted needless pain on the Adams family, without any benefit to the State of Texas. No family should be made to suffer such an ordeal as we collectively have imposed upon them tonight.
Mr. Adams’s criminal act was aberrational. His life was worth saving. The fact that the Board of Pardons and Paroles and Governor Perry were unwilling or unable to see that is a travesty, for it reflects that our society has abandoned its belief in the possibility of redemption and the virtue of mercy.
The family of Timothy Wayne Adams watched their son die tonight, nine years and two days after losing their grandson. No one will wake up tomorrow better off because of tonight’s execution.
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