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all credits: The Associated Press
August 24, 2010

A federal judge has ruled Georgia death row inmate Troy Anthony Davis failed to prove his innocence after Davis was granted a rare hearing by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Tuesday’s ruling against Davis sets the stage for Georgia officials to move forward with executing him for the 1989 shooting death of Mark MacPhail, an off-duty Savannah police officer.

In June, U.S. District Court Judge William T. Moore Jr. heard two days of testimony from witnesses in Savannah seeking to cast doubt on Davis’ conviction. The Supreme Court ordered the hearing for Davis a year ago.

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originally published by: Law.com
9th August 2010

Lawyers for Troy Davis are fighting to fix the damage caused by their failure to call at a recent hearing the man they say committed the murder for which Davis has been sentenced to die.

The problem occurred in June, during an event Davis’ supporters had fought for years to achieve: an evidentiary hearing at which Davis could press his claims that he did not kill Savannah, Ga., police officer Mark Allen MacPhail.

Courtesy of an unusual order from the U.S. Supreme Court, they received that opportunity before U.S. District Judge William T. Moore Jr. But after the hearing got under way, Moore said he had a problem with Davis’ case: Where was Sylvester Coles? Going back to Davis’ murder trial in 1991, Davis’ advocates had pointed the finger at Coles as the real killer of MacPhail.

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originally published by: Freep.com
11th August 2010

The FBI is investigating the death of a 7-year-old girl killed by a shot from a Detroit Police officer’s gun, U.S. Rep. John Conyers announced today. Conyers said he asked for the review.

In a statement today, he said Justice Department prosecutors assigned to the Criminal Rights Division will review the FBI’s findings. The Civil Rights Division looks into allegations of official misconduct and civil rights violations, including use of excessive force by police.

“The shooting of Aiyana Jones has shaken the entire city community, and it demands a thorough and independent investigation,” Conyers said in the statement.

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originally published by:
The Washington Post
1st August 2010

Disney-owned ABC’s new scripted cop drama (Detroit 1-8-7) dropped its “documentary” conceit as a result of the shooting death of a Detroit child during a police raid being recorded by cameras for a reality series on a Disney co-owned cable network.

In the wake of 7-year-old Aiyana Jones’s death, some family members, and attorneys, suggested cops were playing to the camera crew during the raid. “The main reason …that was pretty real and pretty scary stuff,” “Detroit 1-8-7″ executive producer Jason Richman told TV critics about the May shooting death, when asked why the format on his fictional, scripted drama series had been changed.

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