Supreme Court Judgment Affirming Decision

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AS 4 45 2049 S44 40 | f 7 pis] +1 Pe! A= 4, 

Supreme @ourt Of The Lvited States | 

| OCTOBER TERM — 197] | 
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| NO. 69-5003 : 

WILLIAM HENRY FURMAN | 

Petitioner, 

VS. 

Sn | 
STATE OF GEORGIA, | 

Respondent 
| 

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE SUPR REME COURT |} 

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OF GEORGIA | 
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IN THE 

  
  

  
              

  
  

  

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Supreme Court Of The United Dtates 

OCTOBER TERM — 1971 

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| NO. 69-5003 

WILLIAM HENRY FURMAN 

  
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Petitioner, 

VS. 

H 
STATE OF GEORGIA, 

| 
Respondent             

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT 

OF GEORGIA 

TABLE OF AUTHORITIES 

34 Lawyers Edition, page 519, 136 U.S,, 436,447 ... 3   
| 95 Lawyers Edition, page 345,99 U.S., p- 130 sie. 4 

i 356 U.S. page 86, 7 Lawyers Edition 2,p.630 ...... 5 

i 93 Lawyers Edition, p. 1337,337 U5. p. 20-353... 

325 Federal 2d page CT EER AT
U TR LE Ea 7 

| 329 U.S. page 459-481, 91 Lawyers Fd.p.422 ..... 9 

Bill of Rights of 1688 and Act of Parliment .......- 10 

          
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STATEMENT OF FACTS 

William Henry Furman was tried and convicted 

on the 20th day of September, 1968, for the murder of 

William Joseph Micke, Jr., and sentenced to death by 

electrocution as a result of the verdict of the Jury. 

Mrs. Lanell Micke after being sworn testified 

that between the hours of 2:00 and 2:30 A.M., on 

August 11, 1967, she and her husband thought they 

heard one of their five children, Jimmy, walking in the ! 

kitchen. The son Jimmy, was a chronic sleep walker. (Tr. | 

of E. page 17, lines 19 through 33). She and her husband 

lay in bed about five minutes and heard the noise again 

coming from the kitchen and her husband removed 

himself from the bed to investigate. (Tr. of E. page 18 

lines 25 through 40). She heard her husband call out to 

Jimmy to get back in bed, heard his footsteps quicken 

and all of a sudden heard a loud sound and he screamed. 

(Tr. of E. page 17 lines 1 through 14). She became 

frightened got all her children in one room and started 

screaming for Mr. Dozier, the next door neighbor. (Tr. of 

E. page 17, lines 16 through 20). Mr. Dozier and a person 

named Johnnie came over shortly after the screaming of 

Mrs. Micke and called the Police. (Tr. of E. page 19 lines 

25 through 29). She testified that there was a back porch 

to the house where she and her husband lived and that 

you could gain entry into the kitchen from this back 

porch. The porch was enclosed by a screen and the screen 

door has a lock which she did not remember whether the 
screen door was locked that night. (Tr. of E. page 19 lines 

38 through 41, page 20 lines 1 through 13). Mrs. Micke 
did not go to the kitchen because she was scared and 
feared for the lives of her children. (Tr. of E. page 21 
lines 39 through 41, page 22 lines 1 through ©}. 

Sgt. G.W. Spivey of the Savamnah Police 
Department testified that he answered a call 10 S08 West 
63rd Street, the home of the deceased, at approximately 
2:30 A.M., on August 11, 1967. (Tr. of E. page 24 lines 
15 through 20). When he arrived he went in the back 

door and acting on information he received azd believing 
the subject was still in the house crouched in the 
doorway leading to the kitchen at which time he saw the 

  

  
  

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body which later was identified as Mr. Micke. (Tr. of E. 

page 25 lines 1 through 29). Upon his examination he did 

not find anyone else in the house other than Mrs. Micke 

and her children. (Tr. of E. page 725 lines 21 through 29). 

Dr. Harold Smith, Coroner for Chatham County, 

Georgia, testified that on the 11th day of August, 1967, 

he examined the body of William Joseph Micke, Jr., and 

that death was caused by a bullet wound which entered 

the upper chest causing severe lung hemorrhage. (Tr. of 

E. page 32, lines 23 through 28). He removed the bullet 

from the body of Mr. Micke and turned this bullet over 

to Detective B.W. Smith. (Tr. of E. page 32, lines 29 

through 34). : 

Sgt. J.E. Mincey of the Savannah Police 

Department Identification Officer, testified that on 

August 11, 1967, he went to the address of 508 West 

63rd Street and lifted from the back porch on a washing 

machine some latent fingerprints that he compared these 

prints with the known prints of William Henry Furman 

and that they were identical. (Tr. of E. page 33 lines 20 

through 35, page 34, lines 1 through 14). These prints, 

both latent and known prints were sent to the Federal 

Bureau of Investigation in Washington, D.C.. (Tr. of E. 

page 34, lines 16 through 19). 

John F. Walters, Federal Bureau of Investigation 

Identification Division, testified that he examined and 

compared the prints sent by Officer Mincey and that the 

known prints of Furman are identical with the latent 

prints. (Tr. of E. page 35 lines 21 through 29, page 36 

lines 1 through 20). 

Officer Alphonso Hall, Savannah Police 

Department, testified that he answered the call to 508 

West 63rd Street at approximately 2:30 AM., on August 

11, 1967. (Tr. of E. page 37 lines 28 through 30). Officer 

Hall left the residence to search the general area for the 

suspect. (Tr. of E. page 37, lines 35 through 37). He 

stationed himself southwest of 508 West 63rd Street and 

observed a subject coming out of the wooded area from 

the direction where Mr. Micke was killed. (Tr. of E. page 

38 lines 1 through 24). After radioing for help he 

followed this subject to 5020 Temple Street where he 

found the subject under the house. (Tr. of E. page 39, 

  

  

  

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lines 9 through 40, page 40 lines 1 through 18). After the 

subject, who Officer Hall identified as Petitioner was 

removed from under the house he was searched by 

i Officer Goode and a 22 pistol removed from his person. 

(Tr. of E. page 40 lines 25 through 33). 

Officer 1.R. Goode, Savannah Police 

Department, testified that on August 11, 1967, that he 

made a search of the Defendant and removed a 22 pistol 

which he identified as the pistol in Court. (Tr. of E. page 

40 lines 24 through 35, page 42 lines 1 through 10). 

Detective B. W. Smith, Savannah Police 

Department, testified that the petitioner made a 

statement to him whereby he admitted being in the man’s 

kitchen, the man saw him grabbed for him, he went out 

the door, slammed the door, turned around and fired one 

shot and ran. (Tr. of E. page 47 lines 36 through 41). 

Dr. Charles Sullenger, Senior Toxicologist, State 

Crime Laboratory, Chatham County, Georgia, testified 

that he was given the bullet removed from the victim’s 

body and the pistol taken from petitioner, made the 

ballistics test and found that the bullet taken from the 

victim’s body was fired from the pistol taken from 

petitioner. (Tr. of E. page 50 lines 8 through 18). 

Petitioner took the stand and in an unsworn 

statement admitted going in the house of the victim but 

stated that he fell back and. the gun discharged 

3 accidentally. (Tr. of E. page 54, lines 33 through 40, page 

1 55 lines 1 through 2). 

  

  

  

  

  

  
; . ARGUMENT AND LAW : 

1 Respondent contends that the death penalty 

should be kept in force and effect and in support of this 

position directs this Honorable Court to an old case 

decided by the United States Supremze Court in the 

matter of William Kemmler, 34 Lawyers Edition, page 

519, 136, U.S., 436, 447, wherein the Court held: 

“The provisions in reference to cruel and 

unusual punishment taken from the well-known 

Act of Parliament of 1688, entitled rehearsing 

the various grounds of grievances and among 

others, that ‘excessive bail hati: been required of 

persons committed in criminal cases, to elude 

      
  

  

 



  

  
  

  
  

  

a eit be pee EP a et EE 

the benefit of the laws made for the liberty of 

the subjects; and excessive fines have been 

imposed; and illegal and cruel punishment 

inflicted: it is declared that ‘excessive bail ought 

not to be required, nor excessive fines imposed, 

nor cruel and unusual punishment inflicted.” 

The Court after declaring this Act of Parliament 

went on further to state that the language used in the 

Constitution of the State of New York, from which this 

case came, was intended particularly to operate upon the 

legislature of the State, and while the language of the 

Constitution of the State of New York was similar to the 

declaration of rights referred to, that the Courts of the 

State of New York had the right to declare punishment 

cruel and unusual. This to include burning at the stake, 

crucifixion, breaking on the wheel or the like. 

The Court in, In Re: Kemmler, Supra, further 

stated: 
“Punishments are cruel when they involve 

torture or a lingering death; but the punishment 

of death is not cruel, within the meaning of that 

word as used in the Constitution. It implies 

there something inhuman and barbarious, 

something more than mere extinguishment of 

life.” 
The United States Supreme Court in the case of 

Wallace Wilkerson vs. People of the United States in the 

Territory of Utah, 25 Lawyers Edition, page 345, 99 

U.S., page 130, in reference to the death penalty, stated: 

“Difficulty would attend the effort to define 

with exactness the extent of the constitutional 

provision which provides that cruel and unusual 

punishment shall not be inflicted; but it is safe 

to affirm that punishments of torture such as 

those mentioned by the commentator referred 

to, and all others in the same line of unnecessary 

cruelty, are forbidden by that Amendment to 

the Constitution.” 

In the Wilkerson case the Court was concerned 

with the mode of punishment declared by the trial Court. 

The Defendant was on the 14th day of December next 

between the hours of 10:00 in the forenoon and 3:00 in 

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the afternoon to be taken to a place certain and there 

publicly shot until dead. The Court in its opinion stated: 

“Cruel and unusual punishment is forbidden by 

the Constitution, but the authorities referred to 

are quite sufficient to show that the punishment 

of shooting as a mode of executing the death 

penalty for the crime of murder in the first 

degree is not included in that category, within 

the meaning of the Eighth Amendment.” 

It can be seen that the question of cruel and 
unusual punishment dates back as far as the eighteen 

hundreds and the Supreme Court of these United States 

even then recognized that there was difference in the 

mode of executing the death penalty and even then they 

drew a distinction between the humane death and 

inhumane death such as torture or lingering death. 

In the case of Trop vs. Dulles, 356 U.S. page 86, 

2 Lawyers Edition 2, page 630, 78 Supreme Court 590, 

the Court in an opinion delivered by Chief Justice Warren 

joined in by Mr. Justice Black, Mr. Justice Douglas, Mr. 

Justice Whitaker stated the following: 

“At the outset, let us put to one side the death 

penalty as an index of the Constitutional limit 

on punishment. Whatever the argument may be 

against capital punishment, both on moral 

grounds and the terms of accomplishing the 

purpose of punishment; and they are forceful, 

the death penalty has been employed 

throughout our history, and, in a day when it is 

still widely accepted, it can not be said to violate 

the Constitutional concept of cruelty. But it is 

equally plain that the existence of all death 

penalties is not a license to the Government to 

devise any punishment short of death within the 

limit of its imagination.” 
“The exact scope of the constitution phrase 

‘cruel and unusual’ has not been detailed by this 

Court. But the basic policy reflected in these 

words is firmly established in the 

Anglo-American tradition of criminal justice. 

The phrase in our Constitution was taken 

directly from the English Declaration of Rights 

  

  
  

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4 | of 1688, and the principle it represents can be 

8 | traced back to the Magna Carta. The basic 

| concept underlying the Eighth Amendment is 

nothing less than the dignity of man. While the 

State has the power to punish, the Amendment 

stands to assure that this power be exercised 

i within the limits of civilized standards.” 

Ԥ The Trop case was decided March 31, 1958, { 

B almost one hundred years after the Wilkerson case was ; 

1 decided. The concept of the United States Supreme 

41 Court with regard to the death penalty, in the late 

eighteen hundreds and the middle nineteen hundreds has 

not varied or changed. The concept of the death penalty 

as being cruel and unusual punishment is only limited by 

the execution of that death penalty. The Courts through 

the years have consistently held that if the mode of oil 

executing the death penalty is not that of our ancestors 

        

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3 | from England, such as breaking on the wheel, torture, or 

11 a slow and lingering death then it does not come within 

11 the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution of the United 

States. If the mode of execution is a dignified means then 

this type of execution has been accepted by our Courts as 

| being within the frame work of our Constitution and 

al should continue to’be within that frame work. 

Throughout the years the Supreme Court has 

not seen fit to remove from States the power or powers 

to deal with criminals in the way they saw best provided 

that it did follow civilized standards.” 

The consent of not interferring with the States’ 

powers was exemplified in a decision handed down by 

Mr. Justice Black, June 3, 1949, in the case of Samuel 

Titto Williams vs. The People of the State of New York, 

93 Lawyers Edition page 1337, 337 U.S., page 240 

through 253. This is a case where the petitioner was 

charged with murder and in a two-week trial was found 

guilty and recommendation of life imprisonment was ¢ 

 B forth coming from the Jury. Under New York state law 

1 the Judge had the power and the right to either accept 

1 the recommendation of the Jury or to impose a sentence 

| he felt justified. In this particular case after the verdict of 

the Jury, the trial Judge heard additional evidence as to 

the past activities of the petitioner and sentenced him to 

      
    

  

  
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death. In giving his reasons for imposing the death 

sentence the Judge discussed in open Court the evidence 

upon which the Jury had convicted stating: 
“That this evidence had been considered in the 
light of information obtained through the 
Court’s probation department and through other 
sources.’ 
The case was appealed to the United States 
Supreme Court for violation of due process in 
that petitioner was not allowed to examine the 
extra-ordinary evidence or to cross-examine the 
witnesses who gave this evidence. 
Mr. Justice Black in delivering the opinion of 
this Court stated the following: 
“To deprive sentencing Judges of this kind of 
information would undermind modern 
penological procedural policies that has been 
cautiously adopted throughout the nation after 
careful consideration and experimentation. We 
must recognize that most of the information 
now relied upon by Judges to guide them in the 
intelligent imposition of sentences would be 
unavailable if information were restricted to that 
given in open court by witnesses subject to 
cross-examination.” 

Mr. Justice Black went on to say: 
“The due process clause should not be treated as 
a device for freezing the evidential procedure of 
sentencing in the mold of trial procedure. So to 
treat the due process clause would hinder if not 
preclude all courts, state and federal, from 
making progressive efforts to improve the 
administration of criminal justice.” 
It can be seen by Mr. Justice Black’s opinion in 

the Wiliams case that states must have a right and the 
power, within the confines of the Constitution of the 
United States of America, to deal with criminal justice as 
their Legislatures deem best. 

In the case of Laurence Aikin Jackson vs. Fred 
R. Dixon, 325 Federal 2d page 573, the Appellant in his 
petition and on argument in the Ninth Circuit Court of 
Appeals contended that the carrying out of the death 

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| penalty would deprive him of due process and also that it | 

: would amount to cruel and unusual punishment in 

violation of the Eighth Amendment of the United States 

Constitution. In delivering the opinion, Circuit Judge 

Duniway stated: 

«Traditionally the death penalty has been 

deemed an appropriate punishment for murder.” | 

Circuit Judge Deniway went on to say: ; 

“Here there is no suggestion as there was in ! 

certain of the cases above cited, that the method | a 

of administering of penalty is cruel and unusual. 
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The contention is only that the penalty itself is : 

of that character. This contention, in light of the 

foregoing authorities we must reject.” 
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“Jackson’s arguments, which attack the penalty | 

as incompatible with modern concepts of justice, would | 

more properly be addressed to the California Legislature. 

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It is not for us to write our personal views on the matter, | 

whatever they may be, into the Constitution. We hold 4 

that if the State is free to find Jackson guilty of murder pi { 

| in the first degree, as Leland makes clear that it was in i 

Hi this case, it does not violate the Eighth Amendment, 

- made applicable to it by the Fourteenth Amendment, by 

| imposing the death penalty upon him.” 

I think Judge Duniway has made clear the 

position which we believe should be taken by this 

H Honorable Court, that position being that regardless of 

our personal feelings toward the death penalty and 

regardless of whether we feel that a person deserves or 

does not deserve ultimate punishment that we must 

H confine ourselves to the question of whether or not the 

death penalty is, or is not, prohibited by the Eighth 

Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of 

America. We think it goes without saying that any type 

of torture or lingering death that is calculated to put a 

person in misery before he dies, is the type of death 

penalty outlawed and prohibited by the Eighth 

; Amendment of the Constitution. Any type of death 

4 penalty, such as death by electrocution, by being shot, or 

by being put to death by gas, is the type of execution 

that is known to civilized men and is a type of execution 

that is constitutionally protected by the Eighth 

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Amendment and has been constitutionally protected by 

the United States Supreme Court in former years. 

We find it difficult in 1971 to say that death by 

electrocution is wrong now but was right in the year 

1958 and was right in 1879. The offense of murder, as 

the offense of rape, was wrong in 1879, it was wrong in 

1958, and is wrong in 1971. The punishment for those 

crimes has been the same for almost one hundred years 

and we can not see now where the punishment should be 

deemed cruel and unusual. 

Petitioner contends that the death penalty 1s 

cruel and unusual punishment and therefore should be 

eliminated because it violates the Eighth Amendment of 

the Constitution of the United States of America. 

Respondent respectfully directs the Court’s 

attention to a case decided by this Honorable Court on 

the 13th day of January, 1947, which was a cas of State 

of Louisiana ex rel. Willie Francis, Petitioner, vs. E. Al 

Resweber, Sheriff of the Parish of St. Martin, Louisiana, 

et al., 329 U.S. 459 through 481, 91 Lawyers Edition 

page 422, wherein petitioner Francis was convicted of the 

offense of murder and sentenced to die in the electric 

chair on the 3rd day of May, 1946, pursuant to a death 

warrant. On the 3rd day of May, 1946, Petitioner was 

prepared for execution and sat in the electric chair and 

the Executioner threw the switch but, presumably, 

because of some mechanical malfunction, the current did 

not come On and dealth did not result. Therefore 

petitioner was removed from the electric chair and a new 

death warrant issued by the Governor of Louisiana fixing 

the date of execution for May 9, 1946. 

After a refusal of an application to the Supreme 

Court of the State of Louisiana, petitioner brought his 

case before the United States Supreme Court alleging a 

denial of due process and also alleging cruel and unusual 

punishment. The denial of due process consisted of the 

violation of the Fifth Amendment which was double 

jeopardy and the cruel and unusual punishment consisted 

of the violation of the Eighth Amendment, cruel and 

unusual punishment, all as applied to the State of 

Louisiana through the Fourteenth Amendment. 

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In announcing the decision, which was joined in 
by the Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Black and Mr. Justice 
Jackson, Mr. Justice Reed stated the following: 

“Our minds rebel against permitting the same 
sovereignity to punish an accused twice for the 
same offense ... But where the accused 
successfully seeks review of a conviction, there is 
no double jeopardy upon a new trial. ... Even 
where a state obtains a new trial after conviction 
because of errors, while an accused may be 
placed on trial a second time, it is not the sort of 
hardship to the accused that is forbidden by the 
Fourteenth Amendment ... 
As this is a prosecution under State law, so far as 

double jeopardy is concerned, the Palco case is decisive. 
For we see no difference from a constitutional point of 
view between a new trial for error of law at the instance 

of the State that results in a death sentence instead of 
imprisonment for life and the execution that follows 
because of failure of equipment. When an accident, with 
no suggestion of malevolence, prevents the 
consummation of a sentence, the State’s subsequent 
course in the administration of its criminal law is not 
affected on that account by any requirement of due 

process under the Fourteenth Amendment. We find no 
double jeopardy here which can be said .to amount to a 

denial of federal due process in the proposed execution.” 
“We find nothing in what took place here which 

amounts to cruel and unusual punishment in the 

Constitutional sense. The case before us does not call for 

an examination into any punishment except that of 

death...” The traditional humanity of modern 

Anglo-American law forbids the infliction of unnecessary 

pain in the execution of the death sentence. Prohibition 

against the wanton infliction of pain has come into our 

law from the Bill of Rights of 1688. The identical words 
appear in our Eighth Amendment. The Fourteenth 

Amendment would prohibit by its due process clause 

execution by a state in a cruel manner. 
“Petitioner’s suggestion is that because he once 

underwent the pyschological strain of preparation for 
electrocution, now to require him to undergo this 

  

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preparation again subjects him to a lingering or cruel and 

unusual punishment. Even the fact that petitioner has 

already been subjected to a current of electricity does not 

make his subsequent execution any more cruel in the 

constitutional sense than any other execution. The 

cruelty against which the Constitution protects a 

convicted man is cruelty inherent in the method of 

punishment, not the necessary suffering involved in any 

method employed to extinguish life humanely. The fact 

that an unforeseeable accident prevented the prompt 

consummation of the sentence cannot, it seems to us, add 

an element of cruelty to a subsequent execution. There is 

‘no purpose to inflict unnecessary pain nor any 

unnecessary pain involved in the proposed execution. The 

situation of the unfortunate victim of this accident is just 

as though he had suffered the identical amount of mental 

anguish and physical pain in any other occurrence, such 

as, for example, a fire in the cell block. We cannot agree 

that the hardship imposed upon the petitioner rises to 

that level of hardship denounced as denial of due process 

because of cruelty.” 
We can see by the Francis case (Supra) that the 

Supreme Court of the United States still upheld the 

theory that unless the type of execution to effect the 

death penalty is that of torture or lingering death then, 

even though the malfunction of the device used occurred 

to effect that type of punishment failed, it still is not 

excluded by the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution. 

Surely this Honorable Court would agree that the Francis 

case (Supra) would come close, if not the closest, to 

meeting a definition of a lingering death. Can this Court 

say that to prepare a person for death, see him upon the 

instrument that would cause his death, and let him 

experience all the fears of death including meeting the 

Supreme Being that created him, whether he stands in his 

favor or not, and death not resulting and then have this 

person returned at a later date to this instrument for the 

purpose of accomplishing the end that theretofore had 

failed, would not come within a lingering death? This was 

answered by the highest Court of our land in the year 

1946, in the negative. Can this Honorable Court, as 

presently constituted, sixteen years later, say that death 

      
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by electrocution in a penal institution, in the sovereign 
state of Georgia, now constitutes cruel and unusual 
punishment and is a type of punishment prohibited by 
the same Eighth Amendment of the United States 
Constitution that existed in 1946? 

As the Court can well see we have a young 
couple with five children in the safety of their home at 
2:30 AM., on August 11, 1967. The victim, Mr. Micke 
believing his child is sleep walking, leaves his bed, and his 
wife and goes into the kitchen to find not his child but an 
intruder. In an effort to protect his wife and five children 
he attempted to stop this intruder whereupon Petitioner 
runs out, slamming the door and fires at Mr. Micke. 
Petitioner says the penalty of death for this murder is too 
cruel and too unusual and therefore should be prohibited 
by the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution of the 
United States of America. I wonder what Mrs. Micke, 
who is now left alone to rear five children, thinks of what 
he did to her husband at 2:30 A.M., on August 11, 1967? 
I wonder if Petitioner’s battery of Attorneys would say 
that William Henry Furman committed an act of cruel 
and unusual punishment on William Joseph Micke, Jr.? I 
wonder if they would say that William Henry Furman 
committed an act of cruel and unusual punishment on 
Mrs. Micke and her five young children? I am sure they 
think this is a deliberate crime and they grieve for the 
widow and fatherless: children but now say that it is not 
right to take the life of a burglar, murder, who left the 
widow and five fatherless children. We don’t accept the 
view taken by Petitioner or his Attorneys. We think the 
crime that he has committed is senseless, hideous and one 
for which he should be given the ultimate punishment 
which is death by electrocution. 

We have a person before this Court, who broke 
into the house where a mother and father and five 
children lived. After being discovered by the head of the 
household he ran, but when he was outside on that porch 
after having slammed the door between Mr. Micke and 
himself, he wasn’t content with just running away, he 
turned around and in a wanton, wilful disregard for 
human life he fired that 22 pistol through the door and 
into Mr. Micke’s chest causing the death of Mr. Micke. 

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Can this Court now say that the crime committed was 

not a crime that deserved the death penalty? Throughout 

our legal history and throughout Biblical history man has 

invoked the death penalty, the Church has invoked the 

death penalty. The death penalty in our United States has 

been upheld as cited to this Court on numerous 

) occasions. It has been guaranteed the protection by the 

| Eighth Amendment for numerous years. Provided that it 

is not a torturious death or a lingering death. Our Bible 

1 says: “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, a life 

| for a life.” 
Our Bible says: “Render unto God the things 

that are God’s and to Ceasar the things that are Ceasar’s.” 

We take the position that the State of Georgia has seen fit 

to invoke the death penalty; that our Legislature has seen 

"fit to allow this Statute to remain on the books of the 

State of Georgia and now we are only rendering to Ceasar = 

the things that are Ceasar’s. 
Ed 

Petitioner in this case, as the petitioner in the 

case of Lucious Jackson, has made the same over-tones of 

racial discrimination. Let it be well understood by this E13 

Court that this State stands not for discrimination : 

because of race, color or creed, but it stands for justice. 

Should it be a person of color that killed Mr. Micke or 

should it have been a white man and had he received the 

death penalty as petitioner did, this writer and this State 

would be as strong in favor of that execution being 

carried out as they are in this execution being carried out. 

This writer has never experienced an intruder in this 

house in the middle of the night and hopes he never will, 

I think there is nothing more terrifying than to be 

awakened in the middle of the night and find an outsider 

in my house. 
We contend that when Petitioner broke into the 

victim’s house he was armed with a pistol; we believe that 

he carried that pistol for the express purpose that if he 

was detected he would use that pistol to accomplish his 

end, whether it meant the extinguishment of life or not. 

We think the crime that he has committed deserved the 

death penalty; deserved the State taking his life, as he 

took the life of William Joseph Micke, Jr. 
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We ask only that this Honorable Court decide 

this case on the same legal basis that past Supreme Courts 

have decided this question. 

Death by electrocution is not that type of 

torture or lingering death that is prohibited by the Eighth 

Amendment of our Constitution. It is not that type of 

death which shocks the senses of civilized men. It is that 

type of punishment that has been sanctioned by this 

Court for almost one hundred years. It is that type of 

| punishment that has been sanctioned by the English 

Parliament for hundreds of years. 

We. respectfully request that this Court affirm 

the decision of Georgia Supreme Court and uphold the 

death penalty as a proper means for punishment. 

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EASTERN JUDICIAL CIRCUIT OF 

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1 Post Office Address: 

| : 402 Courthouse Building 

| Savannah, Georgia 31401 

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