South Carolina executes inmate despite broad appeal for clemency

A broad appeal for mercy, including by jurors, the judge from his original trial, a former prison director, ordinary people, and members of his family, fell on deaf ears.

The United States state of South Carolina put inmate Richard Moore to death by lethal injection on Friday.

“Mr Moore was sentenced to death for killing 42-year-old James Mahoney on September 16, 1999, as Mahoney worked at a Spartanburg convenience store,” said the Chrysti Shain of the state’s Department of Correction.

Issues raised in the appeal for clemency include the fact that Moore was unarmed when he entered the store.

The white clerk pulled a gun on him which he wrestled away. Mahoney then grabbed a second gun.

As they scuffled, both men were shot, Moore in the arm and the shop assistant fatally in the chest with the first.

Moore’s lawyers said he was defending himself, and that no-one has been executed in the state in the past 50 years for a robbery that began unarmed and with no intention to kill.

They also noted that it was unfair that Moore, who was Black, was the only inmate on the state’s death row convicted by a jury without any African Americans.

His lawyers asked Republican Governor Henry McMaster to reduce his sentence to life in jail without parole because of his spotless prison record and willingness to be a mentor to other inmates.

But McMaster refused to grant clemency without giving any reasons why.

Moore’s execution comes amid rising opposition to the death penalty. South Carolina had not executed anyone in 13 years, but resumed killings last month.