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Near Commonwealth House (HQ of the Games) – just in case anyone goes hungry
Photograph by
Islay McLeod
He escaped the
death penalty, but
was robbed of his life
Alan Fisher
The first time I met Kenny Richey was in a room set aside for us on death row. His legs were shackled at the ankles and his hands were restricted by the belt and chain attached to his waist and locked onto our wrists. His movement was slow and painful. He was an unremarkable figure, about five foot seven and two stones overweight – ‘No exercise – we’re locked up 23 hours a day in here’, he told me.
Born in Holland to an American father and a Scots mother, he was brought up in Edinburgh and still spoke with a strong Scottish accent. Kenny Richey was a convicted child killer. A court in Ohio found him guilty of starting a fire in an apartment which killed three-year-old Cynthia Collins.
The prosecution alleged that he stole paint thinners from a nearby greenhouse, climbed up a pitched roof with a broken arm and then started a fire which burned down instead of up. The court was never told the three-year-old had been left alone by her mother. It never heard evidence that little Cynthia had, just days before, started a fire when playing with matches. When they tested Kenny’s boots and jeans, there was no trace of thinners.
Kenny was offered a plea deal but convinced of his innocence he refused. He didn’t want to spend 10 years in jail. His defence lawyer had never tried a capital case and advised him to reject trial by jury. He went in front of a single judge and was convicted of first degree murder. The sentence was death.
There were so many questions over the safety of the conviction, the then Pope and Archbishop of Canterbury, the European Parliament and Amnesty International called for a retrial.
When I interviewed Kenny for the first time, he’d spent 15 years on death row. Twice he’d been prepared for execution. He’d had his head shaved, he’d even ordered his final meal, only for the process to be stopped. He could be funny and engaging, but he could also show real anger. I asked him if he understood why people got so emotional about the case. He told me: ‘I understand. Of course. A wee lassie was killed. It was a very sad thing. It’s a shame the lassie died’. Then the bitterness rose to the surface: ‘But what about the life of a 37-year-old man? Does that no’ count for something? It should’.
Kenny was freed from jail in December 2007 after a surprise plea bargain
as he waited for a retrial. He admitted manslaughter and was released for time served. His return to society has not been easy.
Twice he was offered the chance of freedom, if he admitted his guilt. He refused. ‘I’m not pleading guilty to something I didn’t do. I’m innocent, plain and simple’, he told me. Kenny won an appeal, but despite the original evidence being heavily criticised by the court, the state contested the decision.
I met Kenny again on death row around that time, his prospects of freedom brighter. By now we had shared letters and understood each other better. We are of a similar age, from working-class backgrounds. But while he had spent 18 years in a tiny cell, I had travelled the world. I had lived a life. I asked him if he was bitter because of his experience: ‘I’m an innocent man. They know it. You will never meet a more bitter or angry individual than me. Hate and rage seethe through my blood’, he said with real quiet fury in his voice.
Kenny was freed from jail in December 2007 after a surprise plea bargain as he waited for a retrial. He admitted manslaughter and was released for time served. His return to society has not been easy. He’s plagued with health problems. He’s been arrested for assault on a number of occasions. He returned to the US to pick up the fragments of the life he had there. He attempted a reunion with his ex-wife and to bond with his son, now in his twenties. Both ended in failure. And now he faces returning to jail in the US after admitting threatening by phone the judge who tried his original case. He will be sentenced next month and faces three years in jail.
Kenny never struck me as someone I’d be friends with, or perhaps even like. But his experiences have shaped the man he is today. The anger and bitterness are understandable. He spent 21 years in jail for a crime the evidence suggests clearly he didn’t commit, and lived each day not knowing when they might decide to carry out the execution. He escaped the death penalty but was robbed of his life.
Alan Fisher is an Al Jazeera correspondent
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