20 May 1987 – Edward Earl Johnson

Protesting innocence seems to be the order of the day. Like Roger Coleman, Edward Earl Johnson claimed he was not guilty of the murder that turned a horrible offence into a capital crime.

Johnson had been found guilty of robbery and rape after he allegedly targeted a 69-year-old woman. But what clinched a stint in the Mississippi gas chamber was the fact that a cop had been killed as Johnson was said to be escaping.

No evidence

But the defence rested its case on the fact that there was only one witness to the murder, and that witness was dead. Other than that, there appeared to be no corroborating evidence to link Johnson to the crime scene. A would-be alibi is even said to have come forward, but she is said to have been put off by ‘a white man’, which triggered the suggestion that Johnson was the victim of endemic racism.

In an appeal following sentencing, Johnson’s attorney states, ‘No juror can say with absolute certainty that he, in fact, killed [the victim]. …there were discrepancies from both sides, of course. And with those discrepancies, now another thing, the court allows you and permits you to bring back a verdict of guilty, if you feel that the State has proven a case beyond a reasonable doubt. But you notice, they never said all doubt.’

Failure

And that last sentence encapsulates why Johnson’s defence failed so singularly and the reason why people deemed Johnson’s trial unfair – it is up to the defence to prove just one reasonable doubt, whereas the onus is on the State to prove beyond all reasonable doubt.

The critics and Johnson himself believed that the jury was misled and misinformed and the speech above highlights a pure example of the weakness of Johnson’s original legal team. At a time when racism was still overwhelmingly a part of Southern life, not only was he misrepresented, but there was also talk of veiled threats and sinister goings-on. Even the key witness was said to have changed her story a number of times. However, this is all unconfirmed and remains conjecture.

Yet, one thing is true – there may have been another suspect on the scene: Charles Coleman. All the evidence is said to have underpinned Coleman as the key perpetrator of the crimes. Nevertheless, Johnson carried the can and was sentenced to live out his remaining days on death row.

Last days on film

Once again the media was instrumental in swaying opinion. A BBC documentary entitled ’14 Days in May’, covered the last two weeks of Johnson’s life and it was overwhelmingly against his penalty. The programme provided statistics that showed four black Americans to every white American get the death penalty. And if you were rich you were more likely to be let off than if you were poor. It is generally agreed that the documentary was biased, nevertheless it did sow seeds of reasonable doubt in some people’s minds.

But it was too little, too late. Johnson was pronounced dead at 12.06am after he was gassed, aged roughly 26.

According to the ‘New York Times’, poignantly, just two days after Johnson was executed, apparently his would-be alibi came forward again to say she had been with him at the time of the rape and murder.

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