Original judge, prison director, jurors ask for mercy for SC man on death row

The original presiding judge, two jurors and a former state prison director are among the more than 20 people who have signed a clemency petition for a South Carolina man on death row.

Richard Moore, 59, is scheduled to die by lethal injection on Friday. His last hope for clemency will be from Gov. Henry McMaster.

Nearly two dozen people contributed to the petition asking McMaster to commute Moore’s sentence to life in prison. Among them were former state prison director Jon Ozmint, two people on the trial jury — Doris Robertson and Sandra Taylor — and the presiding judge, Gary Clary.

“His story and manner of living would allow him to be an influential force for good in the general population with an ability to have a positive impact on the most recalcitrant and hopeless of young offenders,” wrote Ozmint, who directed the state’s prison system from 2003 to 2011. Ozmint said he supports the death penalty and had never signed a clemency petition before.

Moore was sentenced to death for the September 1999 killing of convenience store clerk James Mahoney in Spartanburg, S.C.

According to court documents, the two men began arguing after Moore was 12 cents short while attempting to buy something. Moore grabbed a gun from Mahoney and shot him in the chest. Mahoney, who had a second weapon, shot Moore in the arm.

Unlike many death row petitioners, Moore did not argue for his own innocence. But according to his attorneys, he’s the only person to be sentenced to death in South Carolina for a robbery in which he entered unarmed.

South Carolina governors have denied clemency in all 44 cases they’ve reviewed since the death penalty was reinstated nationally in 1976. McMaster has only ruled in one of those cases — the execution of Freddie Owens last month — after the state was forced to pause the death penalty for 13 years because it couldn’t obtain the deadly drugs necessary for lethal injection.

With News Wire Services