Antonio Richardson was sentenced to death as a mentally retarded and disturbed juvenile offender.

Antonio Richardson's Application for Clemency also outlines the case and some very compelling reasons to commute Richardson's sentence, in short it is well worth the time to read.

Please send a message to Governor Holden asking that Richardson's life be spared.

For links to many articles and other sites relating to this case visit the American Bar Association

Sixteen-year-olds in the United States can’t vote, can’t legally buy cigarettes or alcohol, can’t sign a contract, can drive only during specific hours. Generally they’re held to a different standard than adults since they ’re not view-ed as being as responsible. They can, however be sen-tenced to death. Missouri officials plan to execute An-tonio Richardson late Tues-day night, officially in the opening minutes of March 7.

Richardson would become the youngest crim-inal offender to be convicted and executed in the history of Missouri and the second youngest in the United States since the 1960’s. He was 16 years old in April 1991 when he and three other individuals raped and killed two sisters, Julie, 20, and Robin Kerry, age 19, in St. Louis. The crimes, like all violent ac-tions (including executions), are contemptible. We extend condolences to the family and friends for their devastating loss. Killing another human being, though, only lowers us all to the immoral depths of those who murder and would condemn those who care for Richardson to mourn their loss.

During the past two years, only Iran, the Demo-cratic Republic of Congo and our country share the igno-minious distinction of con-tinuing to execute juveniles. Hopefully, Missouri will join the rest of the world com-munity in refraining from im-posing the most serious pun-ishment on child criminals. Several other issues make his killing by the state indefensible. Richardson is mentally retarded, bears a lesser level of culpability than the two older accomp-lices and cooperated with the police investigation. He was poorly represented at trial, was talked out of accepting “life” in prison just before trial and he was sentenced to death by the judge since the jury couldn’t agree on an appropriate punishment. At this point, only Gov. Bob Holden can halt this travesty of justice and shame for our state, by commuting Rich-ardson’s death sentence.

The Crime.
That tragic April night, Marlin Gray, then 23 years old, drove with the 16-year-old Richardson to the Chain of Rocks Bridge, where they met with Reginald Clemons, 20 years old and Daniel Winfrey, just 15 years old. On the bridge, crossing the Mississippi River and closed to vehicular traffic, the four encountered the Kerry sisters and Thomas Cummins, their 20-year-old cousin. After parting company, the four young men re-grouped. Clearly the eldest two orche-strated the crimes, easily dominating the two juveniles. Clemons suggested they rob the three people and Gray passed out condoms. Gray reputedly threatened both Winfrey and Richardson if they didn’t do as he ordered them. They returned to the trio, robbed Cummins and raped the young women. The real truth of who committed which crimes will probably never be fully known. But it’s generally undisputed that Gray struck Julie Kerry, knocking her off a concrete pier and into the river’s wa-ter. Clemons then pushed off Robin and Cummins jumped off on his own. Only Cum-mins survived. Authorities retrieved Julie’s body three weeks later, but have never found Robin’s. Gray and Clemons were both eventually sen-tenced to death in trials prior to Richardson’s, while Win-frey received a 30-year prison sentence. The crime victims were Caucasian, as is Win-frey. The three given death sentences are African American.

Despite being threat-ened, Richardson called po-lice the morning after the crimes. He brought them to the crime scene and recount-ed what happened. They released him, arresting him a few days later. Richardson has spent his entire adult life living under the death sen-tence. Among other issues to consider:

Mental Retardation

At the time of the crimes, mental-health experts reported Rich-ardson suffers from an organ-ic brain disorder and func-tions with the intellect of a third grader. He couldn’t, for instance, name the season following winter, the nation nor the state in which he re-sided. Consistently, he has tested in the IQ range of 70, considered by professionals to indicate mild mental re-tardation. He had to repeat 1st, 3rd and 4th grades and was finally entered into the St. Louis Special Education program at age 13. At age 15, he dropped out of school.

Richardson came from a fatherless home, with a mother who was 18 at the time of his birth. By the time he was 7 years old, his moth-er routinely abandoned An-tonio and his two brothers. Once she received her fam-ily’s monthly federal-assist-ance check, she frequently bought alcohol and drugs not food, then moved in with var-ious boyfriends until the money ran out. A couple times, individuals alerted the Division of Family Services of the neglect through their hotline.

Trial attor-neys contracted a neuro-psychologist, Dr. Eric Engum who confirmed Richardson’s mental retardation through two days of testing. Incred-ibly, his attorneys didn’t call Engum to testify (although he was willing) during the guilt phase of the trial, when issues of premeditation were consi-dered. Judge Jack Kohr refus-ed to allow his attorneys to enter the report into the re-cord at the beginning of the sentencing phase of the trial.
Current attorney Gino Batisti contends the court should have auto-matically chose a life sen-tence when jurors, after nine hours of deliberation were unable to agree there were aggravating circumstances justifying “death.” However, Judge Kohr assumed control of sentencing. He ruled there were six aggravators and im-posed the death penalty. It was only after he had already determined Richardson’s fate, that the judge point-lessly heard the testimony of Engum.

Batisti notes their plea for Richardson’s “life does not appeal for any-thing more than that which the State was prepared to accord him on the eve of his trial in March 1993.” A St. Louis photographer and ac-tivist, however, convinced Richardson (who was highly impressionable due to his retardation) to reject the plea bargain, publicly proclaiming that Gray, Clemons (who had already been convicted) and Richardson were innocent of any crime.
The activist por-trayed Richardson of being a racist martyr and accused Tom Cummins of killing his cousins. He visited the defen-dant in jail the morning be-fore trial and presented him a prepared letter to sign, which he did, requesting the public defenders be removed from his case. The prosecutor stat-ed in court that all previous plea offers were “hereby withdrawn” once he learned the plea arrangement had been rejected.

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