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READING EAGLE
readingeagle.com

KU withdraws
distasteful
symbols ban

Executing Justice
DEATH PENALTY PERSPECTIVESPART FOUR OF FIVE

The issue of innocence

Policy included Confederate ag,

swastikas; lawyers had concerns
By Ron Devlin
Reading Eagle

Kutztown University has pulled back a plan

to bar students from displaying what it called
distasteful and demeaning decorations
such as the Confederate ag and swastikas in
residence halls and common areas.
Matt Santos, a university spokesman, said
Tuesday that lawyers asked the university
to withdraw the policy because of concerns
about its constitutionality.
Due to a legal review, the university said
in a statement on its website, references to
any specic content, such as symbols, will be
removed from the policy.
Instead, the university will educate students and other members of the community
so they will understand the historical and
modern context for these symbols.
Santos said the ban stemmed from concerns
raised by students during recent national controversies over the display of the Confederate
ag. He was unaware of any specic incidents
on the Kutztown campus.
Residence hall advisers were informed
of the ban, a revision of a policy regulating
decorations in dorm rooms, on Dec. 7, a week
before students left for the Christmas break.
All decorations in common areas in the
residence hall and apartments must take
into consideration that obscene, distasteful
displays are demeaning to an individuals or
groups race, ethnic, religious background
and/or gender or ability, the revised policy
stated. They will not be permitted and will
be removed immediately, at the discretion of
Housing and Residential Services.
The Confederate ag and swastika are not
permitted in any residence hall, apartment
or student room.
Kenn Marshall, a spokesman for the state
university system, said he wasnt aware of
any other schools having adopted a similar
policy.
(The Associated Press contributed to this story.)
Contact Ron Devlin: 610-371-5030 or rdevlin@readingeagle.
com.

READING EAGLE: SUSAN L. ANGSTADT

One of the 150 Americans exonerated

while on death row describes his ordeal.

A soft-spoken Wilson added: Youre only going to die

once. How are the other victims going to get justice?
In 1989, when the jury sentenced Wilson, the electric
chair was still the commonwealths execution method,
though the last person sent to
the chair was Elmo Lee Smith
in 1962 for the rape and murder of a Manayunk schoolgirl.
Pennsylvania changed its
method of execution to lethal
injection in 1990.

By Nicole C. Brambila
Reading Eagle

CCOMAC, Va. Harold C. Wilson rose to his

feet to hear a Philadelphia jury sentence him to
death three times for the hatchet and butcherknife murders of three people in 1988.
The judge told me the amount of electricity that was
going to go through me three times, said Wilson, 57,
who lives in Accomac, Va. I thought, Are you crazy?
How are they going to kill me three times?

To Wilsons horror, his attorney had told jurors during the penalty phase that he
couldnt be that bad because
he eliminated drug dealers.
Wilson spent a decade on
death row before his sentence
was overturned because of ineffective counsel who did not
present mitigating circumstances such as the physical
violence he witnessed in his
home or his father threatening him with a rie.
[ See The issue >>> A4 ]

Harold C. Wilson spent

about 16 years
on death row
before being
exonerated
by DNA evidence.

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A4

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 16, 2015

READING EAGLE, READING, PA.

Executing Justice

For every nine executions,

one death row inmate has been exonerated
While 1,420 convicted killers have been executed since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976,
another 156 have been cleared of their crimes.
Harold C.
Wilsons
state prison
identication
card.
SOURCE: DEATH PENALTY INFORMATION CENTER

READING EAGLE: GARY VISGAITIS

The issue of innocence

[ From A1 >>> ]
Presented in the sentencing
phase, mitigating evidence
can reduce a defendants culpability or provide reasons
a jury should consider a life
sentence over death.
Wilson spent another six
years in prison before being
granted a new criminal trial
after a training video showed
Jack McMahon, who prosecuted his case, telling new
prosecutors how to keep poor
blacks from being selected for
a jury.
DNA evidence that was unavailable at his original trial
revealed a fourth, unidentied person was at the crime
scene and not Wilson. The
new jury acquitted him of all
charges.
He walked out of prison
with 65 cents in his pocket
and a bus token on Nov. 15,
2005, becoming the 120th
death row inmate exonerated
in the U.S., according to the
Death Penalty Information
Center in Washington, which
conducts national research
and reports on capital punishment.
Wilson, who spent 16 years
in prison before his acquittal, is one of six death row
inmates exonerated in Pennsylvania. His older brother,
Jonathan Wilson, said the
family always believed in his
innocence.
The stain has been removed
from him, said Jonathan Wilson, 59.

wealth working to end capital

punishment.
We are convicting and sentencing innocent people to
death, Lucas added. The fact
that it was recent means it can
still happen.
In the years since Wilsons
release, 36 more death row inmates nationwide have been
exonerated.
The growing list is notable
in that the appeals process
is not concerned with innocence; instead it focuses on
the procedures that lead to
a verdict.
Harolds case in many ways
illustrates the problem exonerees have in proving their
case and in getting released,
said Robert Dunham, Wilsons
appellate attorney.
Today Dunham is the executive director of the Death
Penalty Information Center.
We believed he was unconstitutionally convicted and
unconstitutionally sentenced
to death, he said.
In the years after being
sent to death row, Wilsons
attorneys litigated his sentence, not his innocence or
guilt.
Dunham added, For almost
seven years we were litigating
whether he should be sentenced to death, and here is
a person who was eventually
exonerated who spent another seven years in solitary
connement because we were
not able to present evidence
on his guilt or innocence.

Innocence is a huge issue

My children dont
even know me

More than 150 inmates

sentenced to death in the
U.S. have been exonerated
since 1973, according to the
Death Penalty Information
Center.
There have been roughly
1,400 executions in the U.S.
since 1976, meaning that for
every nine people executed
one person has been found
innocent.
Innocence is a huge issue,
said Kathleen Lucas, executive director of Pennsylvanians for Alternatives to the
Death Penalty in York.
Formed in 1997, the group
has more than 10,000 members across the common-

The State Correctional Institution at Greene is home to

the states hard-core prisoners, housing more than 1,700
inmates and the bulk of those
sentenced to death.
The prison has had its share
of scandals. Inmates have held
hunger strikes to protest their
harsh treatment, which included the use of unnecessary
force, racial slurs, conscating
their legal papers and spitting
tobacco juice into their food.
Though he supported the
hunger strikes, Wilson said he
did not participate, preferring
to expend his time and energy
on his appeals.

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Harold C. Wilson speaks at a Philadelphia rally against the death penalty in 2007. Wilson, of Philadelphia, was acquitted of a triple
murder after a 2005 retrial, and Ray Krone, right, was cleared through DNA after spending 10 years in prison.

He slept on the oor in solitary, having turned his bed

into a makeshift desk cluttered with his legal work. But
thats not why Wilson said he
walks with a pronounced limp
he calls SCI Greene arthritis
it was the years of enduring
a cold cell.
They used to keep my cell
cold deliberately, Wilson said,
noting he could often scrape
ice off his window because it
was so cold. Thats torture.
While he quit smoking in
prison, he picked up telltale
signs of an incarcerated life,
from obsessive cleaning (his
friends call him Monk after
the OCD TV character), to
a need for control at odds
with intimate relationships,
to small faux pas like leaving his pants zipper open,
forgivable because he lived
in a jumpsuit for nearly two
decades.
What can still bring him to
tears on the 10th anniver-

sary of rebuilding his life and

his rst Pats cheesesteak in
Philadelphia as a free man
are his kids, who were very
young when the jury sentenced him to death.
My children dont even
know me, Wilson said, noting his son is an Iraq War vet
and his daughter works as a
correctional officer in Maryland. I can only be a parent to
my grandchildren now.
Since his release hes
worked odd jobs as a day laborer, a Wal-Mart greeter and
as a street vendor until a debilitating car crash sidelined
him and put him on disability.
Hes become an outspoken
advocate against the death
penalty.
The death penalty is not
something you can shun,
Wilson said. Its a part of
me and I have to be at peace
with it.
Contact Nicole C. Brambila: 610-3715044 or nbrambila@readingeagle.com.

Executing Justice
About this series: A ve-day look at Pennsylvanias controversial death penalty system from the perspectives of those it
touches victims families, a prosecutor and defense attorney,
judges and the condemned.
Sunday: The widow of a slain
Reading police officer shares
her pain, and the convicted
killer apologizes.

Online at
readingeagle.com:
View an interactive
timeline of Reading police
officers killed in the line of
duty since 1900.
Monday: A defense attorney
shares why he opposes the
Watch a video about the
death penalty.
death penalty in Pennsylvania.
Tuesday: A former prison
Listen to reporter Nicole
chaplain talks about a convictBrambila and photographer
ed killers nal hours before
Susan L. Angstadt talk about
execution.
the series in a WEEU interview.
Today: An exoneree makes
Read our previous coverage
peace with the 16 years he lost
on the death penalty.
in prison, 10 on death row.
Thursday: A murder victims
son extends forgiveness to his
familys killer.

Exonerated in Pennsylvania
More than 150 death row inmates have been exonerated in the U.S. since 1973, six in the commonwealth. Here are their stories:
Jay C. Smith: A former principal of Upper Merion High
School in King of Prussia,
Smith was convicted of the
1979 murders of a teacher
and her two children. A jury
sentenced Smith to death
in 1986, but ve years later
the Pennsylvania Supreme Court overturned
Smiths conviction, nding prosecutorial misconduct, and justices ruled another trial would
amount to double jeopardy.
Nicholas Yarris: Yarris was
sentenced to die for the 1981
Delaware County abduction,
rape and murder of a mall
employee. Initial DNA testing proved inconclusive, but
in 2003 Yarris was exclud-

ed from biological material connected to the

crime. In all, Yarris spent 21 years behind bars
for a crime he did not commit.
Harold C. Wilson: A Philadelphia jury sentenced Wilson to death for the 1988
slayings of three people who
were hacked to death. Wilson was retried twice, the
second retrial ending with
an acquittal in 2005 with the
help of DNA evidence.
Neil Ferber: Ferber was convicted for the murder of a reputed mobster and a female companion in a Philadelphia restaurant in 1982.
The prosecution used the testimony of a jailhouse informant who had failed a polygraph
test, which was not made known to the de-

fense. A judge granted a new trial in which evidence was presented that a detective and
sketch artist might have conspired to frame
Ferber. The prosecution dropped the charges,
and the city settled with Ferber for $1.9 million.
William Nieves: Nieves was
sentenced to death for a 1992
murder, but the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled he
was inadequately represented at his rst trial by an attorney who was paid $2,500
and had never handled a capital case. In preparation for his retrial, Nieves
attorney discovered an eyewitness statement
given to Philadelphia police describing the killer as short and African American. Nieves was
Latino. A second jury in 2000 found Nieves
not guilty.

Thomas Kimbell Jr.: Kimbell, a one-time crack addict,

was convicted and sentenced
to death for the 1998 murder of a woman and three
small children in a Lawrence
County trailer home. The
jury convicted Kimbell despite the lack of eyewitnesses or physical evidence linking Kimbell to the crime. In 2000,
the Pennsylvania Supreme Court overturned
his conviction, citing the unfair exclusion of
evidence that would have shed light on his innocence, which included placing the victims
husband in the trailer house. A second jury
found Kimbell innocent.
Source: Death Penalty Information Center
PHOTOS: THE ASSOCIATED PRESS, READING EAGLE,
PA. DEPT. OF CORRECTIONS

READING EAGLE, READING, PA.

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 16, 2015

A5

Executing Justice

Michael Wilkins, right, heads

to trial in June. He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison in the killings three years
ago of, clockwise from far right,
Rafael Alequin, Jennifer VelezNegron and Dario McLeMore. Wilkins brother, Maurice
Wilkins, pleaded guilty to the
same killings in October to
avoid the death penalty.
READING EAGLE: TIM LEEDY

Mother of convicted killers put in difficult spot

A Fleetwood woman describes the
punishment she has had to endure
for crimes she did not commit.
By Nicole C. Brambila
Reading Eagle

Negron had set them up

in the bogus drug deal, the
brothers kidnapped and tortured her before dousing her
with gasoline and setting her
on re.
We tell our children to pick
and choose who to be with,
but you cant be there when
they choose, she said. They
chose the wrong lifestyle; I
told them repeatedly not to
live that way.
At first, Gethers said she
was a nervous wreck. She
cried constantly. She couldnt
focus. Yet she had to pull herself together to support her
sons.
A minister from her con-

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Dressed in her Sunday best,

65-year-old Catherine Gethers each day pushed her red
walker to the third bench
behind the defendants table
where her eldest son sat accused of three murders.
Though the commonwealth
has tried hundreds of sons in
capital cases since the death
penalty was reinstated four

decades ago, few mothers

know, as Gethers does, the
anguish of having two sons
guilty of murder.
A jury in June would nd
Gethers eldest, 41-year-old
Michael Wilkins, guilty and
sentence him to life in prison over death. Her youngest,
34-year-old Maurice Wilkins,
would later plead guilty in October to the murders to avoid
the death penalty.
This is horrible. Its un-

real, said Gethers, who lives

in Fleetwood.
Gethers added: As a mother, you feel lost. It hurts.
The elder Wilkins is the
rst Berks County defendant
to stand trial in a capital case
since Gov. Tom Wolf placed
a moratorium on executions
in February. District Attorney
John T. Adams has two more
pending capital cases.
T h r e e y e a r s a g o, t h e
Wilkins brothers fatally shot
Rafael Alequin, 22, and Dario
McLemore, 22, in the 1100
block of Franklin Street after
the pair sold fake cocaine to
the siblings. Then, believing
26-year-old Jennifer Velez-

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gregation, New Hope Baptist

Church, prayed with Gethers before opening arguments.
But other than her granddaughter Michael Wilkins
daughter who testified on
behalf of her father during
the penalty phase Gethers
largely sat alone throughout
the proceedings.
The victims families,
though, sat huddled together,
comforting one another on
the opposite side of the courtroom, their pain sometimes
manifesting in uneasy glares
directed at Gethers. And on
at least one occasion, Gethers
said she was verbally attacked
by the victims families, who

took out their grief on her.

After that unpleasant exchange, Gethers said she took
pains to ensure their paths
did not cross in the hallways
or elevator.
I feel that its not right because my sons up there being
accused of a crime, she said.
What about me? Dont I have
feelings? Shouldnt someone
come to comfort me?
Following one particularly
long day in court, Gethers
wept inconsolably outside
courtroom 7A, her cries echoing in the hallway.
Gethers said, I havent
touched him (Michael) in
two years.