![]() The Pardon and Parole Board’s recommendation was to reduce Jones’ sentence to life in prison with the possibility of parole, which would have been immediately eligible for. ![]() The petition, titled 'Julius Jones is innocent. “After prayerful consideration and reviewing materials presented by all sides of this case, I have determined to commute Julius Jones’ sentence to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole,” Stitt said in a statement. The black inmate has spent more than 20 years proclaiming his innocence, and a petition, which has garnered over six million signatures, claims he spends 23 hours a day in solitary confinement as he awaits his fate. The decision comes after Jones’ sister, Antoinette, and a group of spiritual leaders were unable to meet with the governor on Tuesday in an effort to overturn the execution. On October 27, 2021, Jones was granted a stay of execution which was later overturned by the state attorney general’s office however, on November 18, the same day as his execution, Stitt spared Jones’ life. In 2002, Julius Jones, 40, was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death at just 22 years old for the killing of 45-year-old businessman Paul Howell. Stitt’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Forbes.WHAT DID GOVERNOR KEVIN STITT SAY ABOUT JULIUS JONES? Stitt must decide whether to commute Jones’ sentence or let him be executed Thursday. Jones, along with other plaintiffs, have filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Oklahoma’s lethal injection protocol. Grant’s execution was the first following a six-year pause where the state said it worked to implement safeguards to make the process more humane, HuffPost reports. Last month, the state conducted a third botched execution that left John Marion Grant convulsing and vomiting as he died. Supporters of Julius Jones, who has been on death row in Oklahoma since 1999, march to the offices of the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board, Thursday, Feb. Oklahoma has come under fire for a series of botched executions for inmates on death row. Attorneys Ben Crump and Eliza Orlins also urged for Stitt to grant clemency for Jones. Rapper Common and NBA players Blake Griffin, Trae Young and Russell Westbrook have also spoken out about the charges against Jones, Newsweek reports. Howell’s family has also started a campaign to prove that Jones is guilty of Howell’s death. He filed for clemency in October 2019 after exhausting all of his options to fight the death penalty. There have been documentaries, petitions, a Justice for Julius campaign, which is backed by big-name celebrities and athletes, and more. Jones has maintained he is innocent, claiming his co-defendant shot and killed Howell and pinned the slaying on him. The series reportedly caught the eye of Kim Kardashian West, who met with Jones in 2020. Jones’ clemency hearing is set to begin at 9 a.m. Jones’ case was included in The Last Defense, a 2018 docu-series produced by Viola Davis that examined his innocence. Attorneys file clemency petition for death row inmate Julius Jones The petition, started in 2019 on by Oklahoma activist and faith leader Cece Jones-Davis, now has more than. Jones filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the United States. Jones and sentence him to death.” Key Background 0:00 / 5:40 Julius Jones Needs Our Help The Late Late Show with James Corden 28.1M subscribers 116K views 1 year ago Show more Show more Watch on YouTube Broadway, television and film star. Julius Darius Jones (born July 25, 1980) is an American prisoner and former death row inmate. In a January 2019 petition to the Supreme Court, lawyers asked whether evidence that one juror called the trial a “waste of time” and used the N-word to refer to Jones “establishes that racial prejudice influenced the decision of at least one juror to convict Mr. Critics have also argued racial discrimination played a role in Jones’ conviction. As supporters of Oklahoma death-row prisoner Julius Jones submitted more than six million signatures supporting his petition for clemency, new evidence emerged that another man had committed the killing that sent Jones to death row. Oklahomans to present petition with over 6 million signatures to Pardon & Parole Board, calling for Julius Jones’ death sentence to be commuted Jones was convicted back in 2002 after the 1999. Jordan, who testified against Jones at the trial, received a plea deal and served 15 years in prison for his role as the getaway driver. Jones did not match the description given by the lone witness of the crime-but Jones’ co-defendant, Christopher Jordan did, the Innocence Project claims. Jones had an alibi on the night of the murder, but his legal team failed to present his alibi at the trial and did not call Jones’ alibi witnesses to testify, according to The Death Penalty Information Center. ![]() West wrote in a series of tweets Tuesday about the “tragic miscarriage of justice” in Jones’ case, which rapper J Cole shared, calling the evidence that Jones is innocent “overwhelming.” Chief Critic
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