Discussion on Maryland’s Death Penalty One Year After Troy Davis’ Controversial Execution

Sponsored by NAACP Baltimore City Branch and Maryland Citizens Against State Executions

Discussion on Maryland’s Death Penalty One Year After Troy Davis’ Controversial Execution 

Exonerated Death Row Inmate Kirk Bloodsworth
to Take Part in Community Forum

What:

The Death Penalty in Maryland: Remembering Troy Davis – A Discussion

When:

Tuesday, September, 25, 2012, 6:30 – 8 p.m.

Where:

Union Baptist Church
1218 Druid Hill Avenue
Baltimore, MD 21217

A year after Troy Davis was executed by the state of Georgia, a community discussion will be held about Maryland’s own death penalty policy.

Davis was convicted of murdering a police officer in 1989. Despite serious doubts about his guilt, he was executed on September 21, 2011. Davis’ case raised questions over the validity of witness testimony and the possibility of executing an innocent man.  In Maryland this possibility still exists and capital punishment is expected to be an issue addressed in the 2013 legislative session.

“The Death Penalty in Maryland: Remembering Troy Davis” is sponsored by Maryland Citizens Against State Executions and the NAACP Baltimore City Branch.  Panelists include Kirk Bloodsworth, a former death row inmate who was exonerated through DNA testing. Bloodsworth spent nearly nine years in prison after being convicted of murder in Baltimore County in 1985. He was exonerated and pardoned in 1993.

The event is open to the public. Maryland is one of a handful of states that the NAACP is working in to end capital punishment. 

The Maryland Commission on Capital Punishment identified several problems with the state's death penalty system in 2008 and called for ending capital punishment. Among its findings, the commission concluded that racial disparities exist in Maryland's capital punishment system. It also cited the high cost of applying the death penalty and the toll it takes on the family members of murder victims.

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