The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday overturned a lower court
ruling that an Alabama man convicted of killing a police officer in 1985
was no longer legally eligible to be executed because strokes wiped out
his memory of committing the murder.
The nine justices ruled unanimously that Alabama can execute
67-year-old Vernon Madison, who has spent decades on death row. They
said Supreme Court precedent had not established “that a prisoner is
incompetent to be executed because of a failure to remember his
commission of the crime.”
Madison has suffered several strokes in recent years,
resulting in dementia and memory impairment, court papers said. He is
legally blind, cannot walk on his own and speaks with a slur.
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