Progressive Politics for a New Century

Asking that Mississippi get out of the company of Iran , Iraq , and China in carrying out state-sponsored killing, the Green Party of Mississippi is calling on Governor Ronnie Musgrove to use his life-or-death power to commute the sentence of Jessie Darrell Williams, set to be executed by lethal injection on December 11.

While two other men imprisoned for roles in the same crime are now free, based on their testimony Williams was convicted of capital murder in the 1983 rape and knifing of Karon Ann Pierce in Jackson County . Thomas Fortner, Williams’ trial and direct appeal attorney, said that the truth of who committed the crime may never be known.  Yet a man’s life is scheduled to be taken Wednesday. The injustice of such vengeance is clear to any fair-minded person. Where executions are legal, Fortner said, “the majority doesn’t mind killing an innocent person every once in a while. Something’s inherently wrong with that.”

The Green Party asks Governor Musgrove to immediately grant clemency to Jessie Darrell Williams and to allow no other person to be killed by the State of Mississippi during his administration.