The Story I am sharing is by Carolyn Amanda Shavers
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Alabama Almost Executed Charles ‘Sonny’ Burton. His Daughter Tells Her Story.
Justice has long been as elusive as Bigfoot, Carolyn Amanda Shavers writes. But when Alabama’s governor spared her dad’s life, she caught a glimpse.
Charles “Sonny” Burton sits in a wheelchair as his daughter, Carolyn Amanda Shavers, hugs him. COURTESY OF CAROLYN AMANDA SHAVERS
By CAROLYN AMANDA SHAVERS
Charles “Sonny” Burton Jr., 75, was scheduled to be executed in Alabama’s Holman Correctional Facility on March 12. But two days before he was to be forced to inhale fatal nitrogen gas, Gov. Kay Ivey has presided over 25 executions since she took office in 2017. She commuted his death sentence to life without the possibility of parole.
Burton’s sentence was as surprising as Ivey’s decision. While he participated in the 1991 robbery at an AutoZone in Talladega, Alabama, which led to the death of a customer, Burton didn’t pull the trigger. He had left the store before Doug Battle was shot and killed. But Burton was tried under the state’s felony murder law which allows prosecutors to bring murder charges against anyone who participates in a crime connected to a killing.
While Burton was on death row, Derrick DeBruce, the man who killed Battle, had his death sentence commuted to life without parole due to ineffective counsel. Ivey cited this disparity between DeBruce and Burton’s outcomes in explaining her commutation:“I can’t start in good conscience with the execution of Mr. Burton under such disparate circumstances,” she said in a statement, according to the Alabama Reflector. “I believe it would be unjust for one participant in this crime to be executed while the participant who pulled the trigger was not.”
Pushing a governor who is staunchly in favor of the death penalty to stop an execution requires intense advocacy. Burton’s daughter, Carolyn Amanda Shavers, was a driving force in the campaign. Here, she writes about the persistence of injustice in Alabama. She mentions how March 10 was the happiest day of her life. She also discusses how she is pushing for her dad’s release.
In my life, justice is like Bigfoot. A lot of people say it exists. Though, it sometimes seems that people like me and my family don’t ever get to see it.
My father, Charles “Sonny” Burton spent over three decades on death row, even though everyone knew he never killed a soul. March 12 was the day they were supposed to suffocate the life out of him. And all I could do was pray to God that they didn’t take him away from me, because he’s all I got left.
My dad did commit a robbery. It’s been hard for me to even believe that, because that’s not who he raised me to be. But one day, in Talladega in 1991, he and five other guys robbed a store. During the robbery a guy named Derrick DeBruce shot and killed a customer, Doug Battle. DeBruce got the death penalty.
So did my dad.
My father was the only non-shooter to get the death penalty. Two of his accomplices who didn’t pull the trigger were sentenced to 25 years. The other two who didn’t shoot anyone got life with the possibility of parole.
I refused to believe that my dad was facing execution. I made a decision not to have a child of my own. I would wait until my daddy somehow came home to me. So now, I’m 57, and mostly alone.
My dad’s case is only part of my story. I was mostly raised by my mother, Carolyn Burton, in Montgomery because my dad was in and out of prison. I spent my whole childhood waiting for him to come home.
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