JULIUS JONES, PAUL HOWELL AND THE DEATH PENALTY

Julius Jones has spent half of his 41 years of life incarcerated, jailed for a crime he has steadfastly maintained he didn’t commit.

He’s been on death row in Oklahoma for 19 years, sitting in a cell alongside 53 others, stacked in two rows, inside the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester.

H Unit.

Waiting to be executed.

On November 18, 2021 at 12:58 CST, Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt granted Julius Jones a stay — life without parole, hours before his scheduled 4 PM CST execution.

On November 1, Oklahoma’s Pardon and Parole Board voted 3–1 to recommend clemency for Jones.

That recommendation from the board reaffirmed a recommendation they had made on September 13, 2021.

They voted in favor of commuting Jones’ death sentence to life in prison, with the possibility of parole.

Apparently there was strong, new evidence of his innocence.

Jones’s case drew widespread attention after it was profiled in “The Last Defense,” a three-episode ABC docu-series produced by Viola Davis, which aired in 2018.

Since then, a number of big-name NBA stars with Oklahoma ties — Russell Westbrook, Blake Griffin, Trae Young and Buddy Hield among them — have taken up his cause, urging Stitt to commute the death sentence and spare Jones’ life.

Dallas Cowboys QB, Dak Prescott — who lost his brother to suicide in April 2020 — jumped on board saying, he wanted the chance to “help somebody else save their life.”

“For me, it’s about continuing to do whatever I can do to help.”

Ditto for Baker Mayfield of the Browns.

Jones was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to die in the 1999 shooting death of Edmond, Oklahoma businessman Paul Howell, during a carjacking.

Howell was white.

For two decades, Jones has been proclaiming his innocence from death row, contending that he was framed by the actual killer, Christopher Jordan, a high school friend and former co-defendant, who was a key witness against him.

“As God is my witness, I was not involved in any way in the crimes that led to Howell being shot and killed,” Jones said in his clemency report.

“I have spent the past 20 years on death row for a crime I did not commit, did not witness and was not at.”

Julius Jones was at home having dinner with his parents and sister at the time of the murder.

His legal team did not present his alibi at Jones’ original trial.

His trial attorneys did not call Jones or his family members to the stand.

To testify.

The description of the person who committed the crime — provided by a sole eyewitness — specified that the individual had 1–2” of hair.

Jones did not match that description; he had a shaved head at the time.

Christopher Jordan matched the eyewitness’ hair description; he claimed to be the “getaway driver,” and not the shooter at trial.

He was the State’s star witness against Jones.

In exchange for testifying that the shooter was Jones, Jordan received a plea deal for his alleged role in the murder.

He served 15 years in prison, and today is free.

In sworn affidavits, three people incarcerated with Jordan at different times, have stated that Jordan confessed to the killing and framed Jones.

The men never met Jones and don’t know each other.

And none of them have been offered a shorter sentence, or any incentive whatsoever, in exchange for disclosing Jordan’s confessions.

Oklahoma has nearly the highest Black incarceration rate in the United States; has executed the most people per capita in modern U.S. history; and has a disproportionate error rate when it comes to wrongfully convicting Black death row inmates.

According to the Oklahoma Death Penalty Review Commission, in Oklahoma, those charged with killing whites, are almost three times more likely to get the death penalty than those charged with killing non-whites.

Further, Stitt’s official order halting Jones’ execution stipulates that Jones “shall never again be eligible to apply for, be considered for, or receive any additional commutation, pardon, or parole.”

In other words, his death sentence is now a life sentence.

Without the possibility of parole.

However, death penalty experts like capital punishment activist and a leading American advocate for the abolition of the death penalty, Sister Helen Prejean, says that Jones will still be able to seek exoneration through the court system, if he can prove he was wrongfully convicted in the first place.

“While Julius Jones’ death sentence was commuted to life without parole on condition that he can never again apply for a pardon or commutation, this does not preclude Julius from pursuing legal exoneration in state or federal courts,” she wrote on Twitter last week.

The Oklahoma death penalty system, as a whole, is so deeply flawed that words could never do it justice.

In October, the state executed John Marion Grant, its first execution in six years after a series of botched killings inspired a lengthy moratorium.

Though officials insisted that safety protocols were strengthened, Grant writhed on the execution table and vomited before losing consciousness.

Execution observers have characterized the state’s policy as tantamount to “torture and human experimentation.”

A number of Oklahoma inmates have challenged the state’s lethal injection process as unconstitutionally cruel, but the conservative-leaning US Supreme Court has intervened to allow executions to proceed against some anyway, despite a forthcoming federal trial on the issue, scheduled for February of next year.

Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board member Larry Morris remarked that he was “dumbfounded” that executions had resumed.

“It has to do with the drug cocktail, and whether or not it works, and whether or not it exposes an inmate to cruel and unusual punishment,” he said.

Twenty-plus years of fervent activism on his behalf, have greased the wheels and allowed Julius Jones to slide off death row.

Whatever a court ultimately decides, his case has helped convince thousands the world over, to question the inherent fairness of the Oklahoma death penalty.

That is nearly as unprecedented as bringing a man — a Black man at that — back from the brink of execution, with only hours to spare.

And maybe, just maybe, if the light shines hot and bright enough — and with the proper legal representation — Julius Jones will have his day in court, to ultimately prove that he was wrongfully convicted.

To finally prove his innocence.

[Editor’s Note: This piece was written by Mr. Kaplan in November 2021.]