Troy Davis
(Photo: Savannah Morning Post)

With the stroke of a pen, on March 28 the U.S. Supreme Court rejected every appeal of Troy Anthony Davis, clearing the last significant legal obstacle in the way of his execution by the state of Georgia. The justices in their togas gave no explanation for their summary judgment.

Davis, a 42-year-old black man, was framed by police and prosecutors for the murder of a Savannah, Georgia police officer in 1989, based on the coerced and false testimony of supposed eyewitnesses, the majority of whom have since renounced their testimony. Since his conviction in 1991, this innocent man has been on Georgia’s Death Row.

No physical evidence was ever presented. The courts have refused to consider the testimony of the seven out of nine original prosecution witnesses who have told the real story of the workings of the capitalist “justice” system. Darrell Collins was only 16 when more than a dozen police officers converged on his home: “I told them that ... I didn’t see Troy do nothing. They got real mad when I said this and started getting in my face.... After a couple of hours of the detectives yelling at me and threatening me, I finally broke down and told them what they wanted to hear. … The police had me so messed up that I felt that’s all I could do or else I would go to jail.” (See “Troy Davis Must Not Die!” The Internationalist No. 28 [March-April 2009] for a fuller account.)

The impending execution of Troy Davis despite appeals on his behalf by leading bourgeois figures, from former U.S. president Carter to the Catholic pope, is testimony to the centrality of the death penalty in upholding police power in the racist American capitalism from the days of slavery to now.

ILA dock workers and many others in Savannah, Georgia know know that Troy Davis is innocent. It is urgently necessary to mobilize workers power to stop this legal lynching and smash the racist death penalty! ■