NC Coalition for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
Committed to ending the death penalty and creating a new vision of justice
Each November, America honors those who served in the armed forces. We speak of courage and sacrifice, of the price of freedom and the duty of remembrance. But in North […]
Reposted with permission from NC Policy Watch I recently got some sad news. My former client, James Blackmon, died earlier this month from complications from COVID. He was 68. Mr. Blackmon was […]
A bipartisan group of North Carolina legislators introduced a bill this week to prohibit the death penalty for people with severe mental illness. Here’s a recent case that illustrates why this law is so needed: Wake County prosecutors knew that Kendrick Gregory had severe mental illness when they decided to try him capitally. In the eight months before the crime, he’d been hospitalized at least 20 times for mental illness. He checked himself into emergency rooms over and over, reporting symptoms of psychosis. On some occasions, he said he heard voices telling him to hurt himself. In the five years that they sought to try him for the death penalty, his mental illness became only more apparent. It is both immoral and unconstitutional to execute people who cannot understand or regulate their actions. Yet, in North Carolina, it remains accepted practice to try people with severe mental illness for their lives.
