A death-row inmate hours away from a lethal injection is appealing to the U.S. Supreme Court, after lower courts rejected his arguments that an intellectual disability and the fact that his trial lawyer was an alcoholic mean he should get a reprieve. Georgia’s high court denied Robert Wayne Holsey’s request for a stay on Tuesday afternoon as the clock ticked down to his 7 p.m. execution for the 1995 murder of sheriff’s deputy Will Robinson.
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“Robert Wayne Holsey is an intellectually disabled African-American man who was represented at trial by a chronic alcoholic who was more concerned about avoiding his own criminal prosecution than defending his client against the death penalty,” said his current lawyer, Brian Kammer.
