单选题
The State of North Carolina is set to execute a man for two murders he may not have committed. Had a jury heard all of the evidence in David Junior Brown"s case, he likely would not be contemplating death by lethal injection on November 19, 1999.
The deaths of Shelly Diane Chalflinch and her daughter, Christine, surely deserve justice, but justice is not served by the execution of a man whom prosecutors cheated of the opportunity to prove his innocence. Concerned citizens, international human rights organizations, and religious leaders throughout the state are calling on Governor Jim Hunt to grant clemency.
Brown was arrested in Pinehurst, N.C., on August 28, 1980, after the medical examiner found Brown"s ring in Ms. Chalflinch"s body. After the sensational discovery of the ring, law enforcement authorities effectively ended their investigation, ignoring or not pursuing evidence and leads that raise serious doubts about Brown"s guilt. Those doubts cry out for Governor Hunt, who has never granted clemency to a death row inmate, to do so in Brown"s case.
The US Supreme Court has identified the Governor"s clemency power as an important safeguard for innocent persons condemned to death who for procedural reasons might be beyond the reach of the Court"s ability to protect. The Court writes, "Clemency is deeply rooted in our Anglo-American tradition of law, and is the historic remedy for preventing miscarriages of justice where judicial process has been exhausted. " The criminal justice system and the clemency process are not perfect: two credible researchers, Hugo Adam Bedau and Michael L. Radelet, have identified at least 23 innocent people who were executed in the US in this century.
The Governor should also consider the role racism played in Brown"s prosecution. Brown is African American; his jury was all white. In February 1999, nearly 20 years since the trial, the state was ordered to turn over all of its files. In the state"s files was a trial note, written by an assistant district attorney prosecuting the case, re{erring to "two nigger hairs".
At 8:30 a. m. Tuesday, August 26, 1980, the bodies of Ms. Chalflinch and her 9-year-old daughter, who had been stabbed repeatedly, were discovered, and two days later Brown was arrested. The jury never heard evidence that raises not only serious questions about the prosecution"s theory of the murder, but evidence that in some cases directly contradicts it.
It is impossible to dispute the assertion that Brown did not receive a fair trial. It is also certain that there are grave doubts about his guilt. The murders of Diane and Christine Chalflinch were horrific and incomprehensible. The execution of an innocent man, in an attempt to acknowledge their family"s and society"s devastation and fear, would only compound the horror.
单选题
According to the passage, the chief mistake made in the conviction of Brown was that ______