A man's life was saved this week.

[MadHound]

"Jay Nixon has commuted the sentence for a man scheduled to die by injection Wednesday to life in prison without parole. The governor’s office made the announcement Monday afternoon in the case of Richard Clay. Clay was convicted in the 1994 killing of a southeast Missouri man, but has maintained he was innocent. In a brief statement, Nixon says he is convinced Clay is guilty of the killing of Randy Martindale of New Madrid. The governor’s statement does not say why he commuted the sentence. The execution would have been the first in Missouri since 2009 and just the second since 2005 as the courts have considered whether Missouri’s three-drug execution method could potentially cause cruel and unusual punishment for the inmate."

<http://www.kansascity.com/2011/01/10/2574493/missouri-governor-commutes-death.html>

I know a fair amount about this case, and Clay's conviction was rammed through by Kenny Hulshof, who, as an assistant AG, prosecuted capital cases vigorously, some say too vigorously.

It could very well turn out that Clay is an innocent man

<http://www.columbiatribune.com/news/2010/dec/26/doubt-clouds-murder-case/>

What is known is that Hulshof's thirst for big convictions in order to fuel his budding political career has already resulted in two innocent men spending decades in jail. Hopefully Clay gets the new trial he deserves.

[MadHound]

1. A kick for good news n/t

[MuseRider]

2. Good news indeed! n/t

[MadHound]

3. What Hulshoff did in his rush to garner fame and political capital is a crime,

And every single case that he prosecuted should be reviewed. This is the third capital case that has come under scrutiny, and the other two wound up with the convicted but innocent man being freed after almost twenty years in jail.

[MadHound]

4. Another kick to see if anybody is interested in good news. n/t

[blondeatlast]

5. I've seen prosecutors work; they HAVE to win or they lose their jobs.

If that means tampering with evidence or allowing police witnesses to outright lie on the stand, so be it for them.

Yet another in the many, many reasons I oppose the DP.

[MadHound]

6. True that,

But this case was especially egregious. Kenny Hulshof, then a young AG assistant assigned to capital cases, had political ambitions, and thus prosecuted his cases with vigor, and in some cases with vigor that stepped over the line. But he got what he wanted, a tough on crime rep that propelled him into the US Congress for twelve years.

Two men have already been cleared of charges due to Hulshof's sloppy work, and now, hopefully, another man will be cleared as well.