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Gary Graham was sent to death row for shooting Bobby Grant Lambert in a grocery-store parking lot at the age of 17. Graham, who committed 9 aggravated robberies in May 1981, was arrested after falling asleep in the course of a robbery & rape. Several of his crimes involved guns & the threat of violence. From the start Graham admitted to the robberies, but he has steadfastly denied involvement in Lambert's murder. The chief evidence against him came from the eyewitness testimony of Bernadine Skillern, an African-American elementary school clerk who had witnessed the shooting, chased the suspect, & fingered him despite her opposition to the death penalty. To this day Skillern stands by her identification. Then in 1988, four witnesses came forward to say that Graham had been with them on the night the murder occurred. Other holes in the state's case were found & challenged. In 1993 Graham began to correspond with a woman in California, who publicized his case & enlisted the support of a number of celebrities. His age, his race, & the possibility that he was railroaded at trial have postponed Graham's execution several times. A man was to be executed 7 days hence. Gary Graham's attorneys had found witnesses for his alibi, to corroborate his claim that he was not the perpetrator. The Texas Resource Center had heard of our project, & wanted me to photograph their client to support their final pleas to the pardons board & Governor Ann Richards. I had been trying to get into Texas prisons for a long time, but to no avail. In fact, I had requested permission to visit 6 other inmates, & was hoping to go down for 2 days & photograph as many of them as time would permit-a tall order for any death row, but especially the black hole of Texas. I wanted to meet each inmate individually, with no glass, wire, or other restraints between us. I had just 3 days to make it happen: the Friday prior to the execution date was my only window of opportunity. Gary Graham had a history of rebelling against his jailers; he had been a dangerous juvenile when he was arrested. Totally out of control then, he has now accepted the fact that he may become a martyr in a fight to abolish the death penalty. |
"But most of the people that I deal with, they realize that we are basically fighting a war here. And, unfortunately, in wars you are going to have casualities. And we all recognize that we may...I may be a casuality of the system...." By the time we met him, Gary had been protesting his innocence for 12 years. He had even had to argue with his current lawyer, to convince him that his innocence should be used as his defense. "...We had a big fight because his main concern was dealing with the mitigation issue. And I'm saying, 'I'm innocent. Let's work on the innocent question.' But he didn't have much faith in that. And I could tell that in dealing with him....So I had to fight with him. And we had some serious fights. And eventually he began to piece by piece go back & look at the puzzle & investigate the puzzle & was able to uncover substantial evidence proving my innocence that we're really working on right now." But Gary's case illustrates the principle that innocence is no defense. That is to say, 14 years after his conviction, the question of his innocence is subordinate to legal procedure. Under Texas law, appeals are limited; if evidence is brought to light too late, an innocent prisoner can be executed under the statute of limitations. Though race & social class affect who is sentenced to death, probably the most significant factor is inadequate legal defense at trial. Witnesses who could verify that Gary was not the murderer were never called to testify. Like the majority of criminals who are subject to the death penalty, he was unable to pay for adequate legal representation, so the court appointed his lawyer. Because a court-appointed defense is often substandard and underfinanced, death sentences are often overturned on appeal. Nearly a third of those sentenced to death in the United States over the last two decades have had their sentences reduced to a prison term. I was talking to a man just days before his scheduled death. I was nervous about treading on sacred ground. Did we have any right to be with him during his final days? But Gary had rehearsed the end of his life so many times, he was unfazed. Despite his burden, he remained calm and deliberate as I tentatively worked around him. He was in charge of his emotions; it shows in the photographs. Days later Gary received a stay of execution. His case continues to perplex the appellate courts. |
