Advocates for Missouri death row inmate Brian Dorsey plead for clemency with days to go before his execution

Missouri plans to execute death row inmate Brian Dorsey for the 2006 murders of his cousin and her husband, but a clemency petition shows scores of people have asked Gov. Mike Parsons to spare his life, citing Dorsey’s rehabilitation and what they call an unjust death sentence.

Missouri this week plans to execute death row inmate Brian Dorsey for the 2006 murders of his cousin and her husband, but a clemency petition shows scores of people have asked Gov. Mike Parsons to spare his life, citing Dorsey’s rehabilitation and what they call an unjust death sentence. Dorsey is deeply remorseful for the murders, his clemency petition says, contending the killings of Sarah and Benjamin Bonnie happened while Dorsey was suffering a “drug-induced psychosis and alcohol-induced blackout,” making him incapable of the deliberation required for a first-degree murder charge. Still, Dorsey accepts responsibility, the petition says, and in the years since has sought to atone: He has a spotless prison disciplinary record and works as a barber for the correctional staff, a position of immense trust. Indeed, more than 70 correctional officers support the inmate’s clemency petition, it says, which also cites the support of five jurors from the penalty phase of his trial, a former Missouri Supreme Court justice and at least three Republican state representatives. “His deep shame and remorse has shaped him, and apparently shaped the way he’s lived every day of his life since,” Megan Crane, one of his attorneys, told CNN. While Dorsey’s lawyers and advocates fight to have his sentence commuted, “that is still his focus in this final week: the shame and remorse he feels and reflecting on that.” Dorsey also deserves clemency, his petition argues, because his attorneys at trial were ineffective due to a “financial conflict of interest.” They were paid flat fees of $12,000, the petition says, meaning their compensation would equal about $3.37 an hour if they did the several thousand hours of work capital cases require on average.