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done, I’d like to shake his hand,” he told me. “Would that be all right?”
“I think he’d appreciate that.”
“This case has taught me things I didn’t even know I had to learn.”
“We’ve all learned a lot, Tommy.”
There were deputy sheriffs everywhere. When Bernard arrived, we consulted briefly at the
counsel table before a bailiff asked us to go back to the judge’s chambers. Judge Norton had
retired weeks before the ruling from the Court of Criminal Appeals. The new judge, Pamela
Baschab, greeted me warmly. We made small talk and then discussed what would happen
during the hearing. Everyone was strangely pleasant.
“Mr. Stevenson, if you’ll just present the motion and provide a brief summary, I don’t need
any arguments or statements, I intend to grant the motion immediately so you all can get
home. We can get this done quickly.” We went into the courtroom. There seemed to be more
black deputies in the courtroom for this hearing than I’d ever seen in my appearances in that
courthouse. There was no metal detector, no menacing dog. The courtroom was packed with
Walter’s family members and supporters. There were more cheering black folks outside the
courthouse who couldn’t get in. A horde of television cameras and journalists spilled out of
the crowded courtroom.
They finally brought Walter into the courtroom wearing the black suit and white shirt I’d
brought him. He looked handsome and fit, like a different man. The deputies didn’t handcuff
Walter or shackle him, so he walked into court waving to family and friends. His family had
not seen him dressed in anything but his white prison uniform since the trial six years earlier,
and many in the crowd gasped when he walked into the courtroom in a suit. For years
Walter’s family members and supporters had been confronted with menacing stares and
threats of expulsion whenever they expressed some spontaneous opinion during court
proceedings, but today the deputies accepted their expressive cheerfulness in silence.
The judge took the bench, and I stepped forward to speak. I gave a brief history of the case
and informed the court that both the defendant and the State were moving the court to
dismiss all charges. The judge quickly granted the motion and asked if there was anything
further. All of sudden, I felt strangely agitated. I’d expected to be exuberant. Everyone was in
such a good mood. The judge and the prosecutor were suddenly generous and
accommodating. It was as if everyone wanted to be sure there were no hard feelings or
grudges.
Walter was rightfully ecstatic, but I was confused by my suddenly simmering anger. We
were about to leave court for the last time, and I started thinking about how much pain and
suffering had been inflicted on Walter and his family, the entire community. I thought about
how if Judge Robert E. Lee Key hadn’t overridden the jury’s verdict of life imprisonment
without parole and imposed the death penalty, which brought the case to our attention,
Walter likely would have spent the rest of his life incarcerated and died in a prison cell. I
thought about how certain it was that hundreds, maybe thousands of other people were just
as innocent as Walter but would never get the help they need. I knew this wasn’t the place or
time to make a speech or complain, but I couldn’t stop myself from making one final
comment.
“Your Honor, I just want to say this before we adjourn. It was far too easy to convict this
wrongly accused man for murder and send him to death row for something he didn’t do and