Death Penalty: Convicts' Unlikely Allies

In the end, Kenneth Boyd, the 1,000th convict to be executed in the United States since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976, had some unusual advocates: two jurors who sentenced him to death in North Carolina nearly two decades ago. Sue Griffin and Sylvia Coeburn, long troubled by the verdict, petitioned the governor for clemency. "I felt like I was pushed into making the decision of the 10 other jurors," Coeburn says. "I didn't feel comfortable with it, but I didn't know my rights as a juror."

Although they didn't succeed--Boyd was executed last Friday--the women represent a small but growing number of jurors in capital murder cases who've had second thoughts and are coming forward. Emboldened by a recent spate of exonerations and reports of mishandled evidence, jurors have started talking to the media, testifying before state legislators and signing affidavits. "Jurors are like everyone else--they're very much aware that mistakes are made in some cases," says Richard Dieter, head of the Death Penalty Information Center.

They're starting to get results. Last year six jurors pleaded for clemency on behalf of Darnell Williams, an Indiana death-row inmate, after a key witness in the case recanted and new DNA tests cast doubt on his guilt. (The governor commuted his sentence to life in prison.) In Louisiana, Kathleen Hawk Norman, a jury forewoman who voted in 1996 to execute Dan Bright, later filed an amicus brief on his behalf. When his conviction was overturned last year, Norman founded Jurors for Justice to advocate for those haunted by death verdicts and aid condemned inmates. She started the group in honor of Bright, whom she faced in the courtroom just before his release. Still in shackles, he took her hand and said: "You were used like I was used. Do me a favor--don't forget about the others."