beyond tookie

Now that Stanley Williams has shuffled off this mortal coil, perhaps we can concentrate on someone on death row who is truly deserving of help, Cory Mayes:

Cops mistakenly break down the door of a sleeping man, late at night, as part of drug raid. Turns out, the man wasn't named in the warrant, and wasn't a suspect. The man, frigthened [sic] for himself and his 18-month old daughter, fires at an intruder who jumps into his bedroom after the door's been kicked in. Turns out that the man, who is black, has killed the white son of the town's police chief. He's later convicted and sentenced to death by a white jury. The man has no criminal record, and police rather tellingly changed their story about drugs (rather, traces of drugs) in his possession at the time of the raid.

That's from a summary of the case by Radley Balko, who has done a stellar job of following this case (here's the latest). The story has been picked up by the CBS News Blog, so hopefully this story will get some national attention.

I think this is the true promise of the blogosphere. A citizen journalist, Radley Balko, has done his own investigative work and this case could get the attention it really needs.