A Martyr Is Born

“I’ve never struggled with that at all,” said Texas Governor Rick Perry in a Republican primary debate, referring to whether he could sleep at night when his state has executed 234 death row inmates — more than any other state in the modern era. And the audience applauded.

Today, over 60 percent of Americans support the death penalty. It matters little that one execution alone costs the state of North Carolina $2 million (and that’s just one example; there are 30 other states with the death penalty) or that statistics show how the system is racist: 42 percent of those on death row are black.

What’s more, after everything that happened with Troy Davis, it seems like injustice isn’t even an impediment. Accused of murdering a white police officer in 1989, Davis became a motivating force for defenders of human rights and opponents of the death penalty (they do exist). It later emerged that seven of the nine witnesses in the case recanted their initial testimony.

A legitimate case — one worth protesting over — was gradually born. The gun was never identified, there was no specific motive and the witnesses were coerced by police. One witness even claimed that he was the murderer.

Finally, there rose a global cry for mercy, which was echoed by politicians, celebrities and the pope. Twenty years of appeals to all possible judicial options confirmed that, in the fourth death sentence, there was no possible escape.

As in China, Iran, Yemen or Saudi Arabia, the prisoner was executed. He did not eat a last meal, and he refused to be sedated. They say that he looked at the family of the man he supposedly killed and told them, for the umpteenth time, that he was not the murderer. And then he demanded justice. Not mercy.