
Judge vacates death sentences of Pervis Payne, who was to be executed for a crime he says he didn't commit
CNN
A Tennessee judge this week vacated the death sentences of Pervis Payne, who has spent more than three decades on death row for two murders he says he did not commit, due to the inmate's intellectual disability.
As a result, Payne now faces two life sentences, though it remains to be decided whether he will serve them concurrently or consecutively.
"Thirty-four years of trauma and pain and fear just released themselves in that courtroom," Payne's attorney, Supervisory Assistant Federal Public Defender Kelley Henry, said in an interview Friday, describing the moments before Tuesday's hearing when Payne wept as he hugged her.

The alleged drug traffickers killed by the US military in a strike on September 2 were heading to link up with another, larger vessel that was bound for Suriname — a small South American country east of Venezuela – the admiral who oversaw the operation told lawmakers on Thursday according to two sources with direct knowledge of his remarks.

The two men killed as they floated holding onto their capsized boat in a secondary strike against a suspected drug vessel in early September did not appear to have radio or other communications devices, the top military official overseeing the strike told lawmakers on Thursday, according to two sources with direct knowledge of his congressional briefings.











