"Pa. death-row inmate’s hearing to continue Monday," is the AP report, via the West Chester Daily News.
A hearing for a death-row inmate who could become the first person in Pennsylvania executed since 1999 has been continued until Monday after nine hours of testimony in Philadelphia.
Forty-six-year-old Terrance "Terry" Williams now claims he was sexually abused for years by the middle-aged man he admits beating to death in 1984 at the age of 18. He's asked a Philadelphia judge to halt the scheduled Oct. 3 lethal injection based on new evidence about the victim and the key accuser.
One of the issues at Thursday's hearing was whether prosecutors and homicide detectives withheld from Williams' lawyers a statement that the killing was motivated by rage over sexual abuse. The jury was told it was over a robbery.
"Hearing continued on Terrance 'Terry" Williams case, man set to be executed Oct. 3," is the Harrisburg Patriot-News report by Donald Gilliland.
A last-ditch hearing to stay the execution of Terrance "Terry" Williams was continued late Thursday afternoon after nearly nine hours of testimony. The judge will reconvene in Philadelphia on Monday morning.
And:
The hearing Thursday was to determine if a stay should be granted, given allegedly new evidence from the primary prosecution witness, who helped Williams kill Norwood and who now -- after 28 years -- is saying he told police and a prosecutor that sex was at the heart of the killings, but that they weren't interested and told him to stick with a robbery scenario.
Williams has exhausted nearly all avenues of appeal -- both state and federal -- to stop the execution. A push in recent months to highlight his history of sexual abuse has garnered support from a wide variety of judges, former prosecutors, child victim advocates and Norwood's widow.
An appeal to the governor for clemency -- the first of its kind in 50 years -- failed last week, with a 3-2 vote from the board that considers whether such appeals should go to the governor. Three on the panel -- including Attorney General Linda Kelley -- voted that Williams should not be executed, but rather serve life without parole, but the vote must be unanimous.
Williams' defense team has asked for a reconsideration of that decision.
"Phila. prosecutor calls death-penalty plea by Terrance Williams bogus," is Joseph A. Slobodzian's Philadelphia Inquirer report.
The prosecutor who put Terrance Williams on death row denounced Williams' admitted accomplice Thursday, rejecting as a lie the contention that Williams killed Amos Norwood in a sexual rage and that authorities ignored evidence of his motive.
"It's a complete lie," Andrea Foulkes said when asked about new statements by Marc Draper. Draper now says Foulkes and detectives ignored his information about a sexual motive behind the 1984 killing of Norwood, 56, in West Oak Lane.
Draper's account of Williams' alleged abuse by Norwood is the evidence being used by Williams' lawyers to try to block his scheduled Oct. 3 execution.
"Accomplice reverses his 1986 testimony to save Terrance Williams' life," by Mensah M. Dean in the Philadelphia Daily News.
MARC DRAPER, who has spent that past 28 years in prison for helping to beat a man to death, told a Philadelphia judge Thursday that he lied under duress from authorities when he testified against his accomplice and is now ready to tell the truth to save his friend's life."Being a man of faith, a man of God, I wouldn't want to see anybody die in that manner," a weeping Draper said of his childhood friend, Terrance Williams, 46, who is to be executed Oct. 3 for the 1984 murder of Amos Norwood, 56.
Draper, 46, the son of a retired city cop, is serving a life without parole sentence for his role in the murder. He was one of two witnesses to testify during the stay-of-execution hearing in Common Pleas Court. Andrea Foulkes, who prosecuted Williams, also testified.
And:
Foulkes, now a federal prosecutor, vehemently denied having told Draper to lie. She also disputed his claim that he had been promised a shortened prison sentence in exchange for his testimony.
Additional coverage includes:
"Pardons board could be last hope for Terrance Williams, as his Oct. 3 execution date nears," by Charles Thompson for the Patriot-News.
"Prosecutor takes stand in Williams' final death penalty appeal," by Emma Jacobs for WHYY-FM NewsWorks.
"Governor Corbett Ready To Proceed With Convicted Killer’s Execution," by Larry Kane of KYW-TV.
Earlier coverage of Terry Williams' case begins at the link.
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