He?s known as the first “death row blogger.”
As his attorneys argue this week in U.S. District Court that Maryland?s lethal injection process violates the U.S. Constitution?s ban on cruel and unusual punishment, Vernon Evans Jr., 57, of Baltimore, and his supporters have used the latest technology to make his case to the public.
Evans, who is hoping Gov. Robert Ehrlich will grant him clemency, has used a Web site, a blog and a DVD to try to get the message out that he should not be put to death.
“Life in prison is a slow death, but at least if you take that slowness and create something good, it will always in my opinion be better than the death penalty,” Evans wrote in his latest post on his Web log, www.meetvernon.blogspot.com, where he posts through an intermediary. “You cannot atone from death but you can make a difference alive.”
Evans supporters have also started a Web site, www.savevernonevans.org, that argues against his execution, partially on the grounds that there is “strong evidence ? never heard by the jury ? that Vernon was not the shooter.”
Evans was sentenced to death for the April 28, 1983, contract murder of David Scott Piechowicz and Susan Kennedy in Pikesville. Piechowicz and his wife, Cheryl, had been scheduled to testify in a federal drug dealing trial.
But an eyewitness has “testified under oath that the shooter was taller than Vernon and that the shooter?s clothes did not match what Vernon was wearing at the time of the murders,” Evans? supporters? site states.
Evans? backers have also produced a 17-minute DVD they sent to Ehrlich pleading for his life.
Between tears, Frances Evans, Vernon?s mother, calls out to Ehrlich on the DVD: “Please hear my plea. Don?t execute my son.”
Evans? father, Vernon Sr., also states: “If my son is executed, it will be devastating to me and my family.”
Ehrlich?s lawyers have reviewed Evans? DVD appeal for clemency, but the governor has not, Ehrlich?s spokesman Henry Fawell told The Examiner.
“The governor has not viewed the video yet because the matter is still before the courts,” he said.
