36° CLOUDY, Court will not consider request
U.S. Supreme Court refuses to consider DNA testing for Arthur
Last Modified: Tuesday, November 27, 2007 at 12:13 a.m.
Montgomery - The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to consider DNA testing for condemned Alabama inmate Tommy Douglas Arthur who, along with his daughter, is fighting his Dec. 6 date for death by lethal injection.
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- Top court holds off Arthur's execution
- Daughter optimistic over possible stay
- Arthur decision may come today
- Court sets new execution date
- Lethal injection resumes in state
- Group urges DNA test
- Execution date sought for Arthur
- Arthur granted 45-day stay
- In Alabama, Rare Delay of Inmate’s Execution
- Governor's decision trying to be used to stop execution
- Time running out for Arthur
- Arthur's stay of execution denied
- Arthur appeal denied
- Group fights Arthur execution
- Daughter tries to stop execution
- Execution date set for Tommy Arthur
- Arthur still fights system after 25 years
- Arthur's legal team has at least one more move
- Arthur remembered as suave but troubled
The court without comment said it would not consider Arthur's request to stay his execution so DNA material from a 1982 crime scene in Muscle Shoals can be tested. His attorney refiled motions Monday to stay the execution, said Sherrie Stone, Arthur's daughter.
Stone said her father is innocent of the contract killing of Troy Wicker. Arthur was convicted three times for Wicker's death.
Wicker's widow, who pleaded guilty to murder, said she paid Arthur $10,000 to kill her husband. She said she and Arthur were having an affair.
At the time of her arrest, Judy Wicker said she had been beaten and raped by a black man during a burglary and that the man had shot her husband. Arthur's attorney said material from the crime scene should be tested with modern technology that wasn't available in 1982.
"You would think if there is DNA evidence there (it would be tested), especially if it could prove someone's innocence, or guilt for that matter," Stone said. "We're disappointed."
Stone said the Supreme Court relied on a technicality in Alabama law that requires post-conviction challenges to be filed within a certain amount of time. But since Alabama doesn't provide attorneys for inmates in criminal cases, Stone said her father couldn't have filed a request for DNA testing within the allotted time.
Stone said Gov. Bob Riley has the authority to stay Arthur's scheduled execution and then request DNA testing that wasn't available technically at the time that semen, hair samples, blood, and bullet cases were collected at the scene.
Riley stayed Arthur's September execution for 45 days while the state changed its method of lethal injection but he has no plans to stay this one, spokeswoman Tara Hutchison said.
Clay Crenshaw, chief of the attorney general's capital litigation section, said Arthur still has a motion pending before the U.S. Supreme Court to stay his execution based on a charge that lethal injection is cruel and unusual punishment.
He said the Supreme Court's decision on current motions that will be discussed in a Friday conference meeting should be known Monday.
Stone said Riley's office asked a national group, the Innocence Project, for information about DNA testing.
"I think he's thinking about it or he wouldn't have asked for the guidelines from the Innocence Project," Stone said. "DNA testing of these items can prove that Thomas Arthur is innocent and was never at the crime scene."
Crenshaw said Monday's Supreme Court ruling "ends the federal court request for DNA testing."
Dana Beyerle can be reached at (334) 264-6605.
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Comments
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November 27, 2007 5:13:06 am
RE: http://www.timesdaily.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20.../NEWS/711270327/1011. Finally lets get on with it. Merry Christmas to the Wicker Family I hope they can finally rest after December 6, 2007. This man has been alive way too long. Finally he will receive the sentence that he was given by a jury of his peers.
November 27, 2007 6:32:36 am
I got a feeling that after all this controvesy that Gov. Riley WILL grant a stay. He sort of did it the last time, except under another "guise".
November 27, 2007 7:21:46 am
i just pray that God will bring justice, closure, and peace for the Wicker family, it is time..i pray that mr arthur has asked forgiveness..
November 27, 2007 11:02:37 am
Nicely said.
November 27, 2007 12:35:21 pm
It is time Arthur was executed. How many times does a person have to be convicted before a sentence is carried out? And why should we have to keep supporting this waste of flesh? They should hang him while being electrocuted along with lethal injection in front of a firing squad. The do it all again just to make sure.
November 27, 2007 12:39:35 pm
I do have a serious question, sort of pertaining to the last stay. Why all the concern with executions being humane and painless? It seems to me that the more pain there is and the more inhumane execution might be, could serve to be more of a deterrent to capital crimes. I say bring back guillotines, hangings, firing squads, etc. The victims did not have the luxury to choose how they were to die, why should the scum murderers?
I know, I know... the ACLU. The ACLU can take their "civil liberties" for the killers and stick them straight up their understanding butts.
November 27, 2007 9:25:47 pm
I don't believe Arthur ever asked for forgiveness for his first murder, and I'm not holding my breath until he asks for it now. If you read the TD interview with him about two months ago, you know he has not used his time in prison to improve his vocabulary or his outlook.
November 28, 2007 2:21:34 pm
I am Thomas Arthurs Daughter. Pretty obvious all of you live in Alabama and think this way. You may even be related to someone who my father offended or did not take any **** from. There are alot of you out there. How will you feel when this crime scene evidence is DNA tested and we find out he is innocent? How can you even think he has had a fair trial when the evidence has never even been shown to a jury that convicted him? When there is physical evidence that could be scientifically DNA test and prove innocence? try going to the web site and looking at some facts instead of being brain washed by Alabama and it judicial system www.ThomasArthurFightForLife.com
What if this was you or your mother or father, daughter or son? Most of you may not remember when the state came after me when this crime was committed and locked me up and paid a witness to lie against me. they tried to put me in tutwiler for 15 years for a crime I was innocent of. I have first hand eperience of the corrupt judicial system in Alabama. My father is not asking to be set free, he is only asking for access to the physical evidence to be DNA tested, then quoting his own statement, "when the DNA testing proves I was never at the crime scene and never could of committed this murder, then I just want a FAIR trial"sherrie stone
November 28, 2007 2:41:21 pm
Welcome, Sherrie.You know, it never ceases to amaze me when we are discussing a news article and a family member posts here. I guess it shouldn't considering "google", but it still does.
I hope you find the answers you seek and that justice is served. I don't really know enough about your dad's case to comment further.
My sympathies to you, for what it's worth, for having to go through this.
November 28, 2007 2:47:32 pm
"I am Thomas Arthurs Daughter. Pretty obvious all of you live in Alabama and think this way. You may even be related to someone who my father offended or did not take any **** from. There are alot of you out there. How will you feel when this crime scene evidence is DNA tested and we find out he is innocent? How can you even think he has had a fair trial when the evidence has never even been shown to a jury that convicted him? When there is physical evidence that could be scientifically DNA test and prove innocence? try going to the web site and looking at some facts instead of being brain washed by Alabama and it judicial system www.ThomasArthurFightForLife.com
What if this was you or your mother or father, daughter or son? Most of you may not remember when the state came after me when this crime was committed and locked me up and paid a witness to lie against me. they tried to put me in tutwiler for 15 years for a crime I was innocent of. I have first hand eperience of the corrupt judicial system in Alabama. My father is not asking to be set free, he is only asking for access to the physical evidence to be DNA tested, then quoting his own statement, "when the DNA testing proves I was never at the crime scene and never could of committed this murder, then I just want a FAIR trial"sherrie stone "----------------------
I don't understand why they don't just test the DNA to prove further his guilt, and leave no stone unturned. That way everyone is happy with the outcome.I know I would want at least that much for one of my family members. And, not to be offensive to you Sherri, I wouldn't blindly believe that my relative is totally innocent either, until evidence proved either way.
He's been convicted several times over, but I do agree that his DNA should be tested. Other than that, I've read a lot about this, and my opinion is that he is guilty of it. Whether from Alabama, or Tenbuktu, it does not matter. People are going to have their opinion on this kind of thing, whether right or wrong.Your attitude, while understandable, is not helping your father, not really. If anything it's making it worse, by you condemning others for having an opinion unlike that of your own. It has to be tough to be in your shoes, no doubt, but sometimes the best thing to do is leave well enough
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