This week, a three-judge panel on the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Michael Sockwell, 62, who was convicted of killing former Montgomery County Sheriff Isaiah Harris in 1988.
The ruling means Sockwell is eligible for a retrial, after Sockwell’s lawyers claimed the State violated his 14th Amendment rights by allegedly excluding 80% of the black jurors. They also argue that Sockwell has a low IQ, which disqualifies him from the death penalty.
According to court documents, Sockwell was hired by Harris’ wife to prevent him from discovering her ongoing affair and to collect her husband’s life insurance.
The jury ruled 7-5 for Sockwell to receive a life sentence. However, a judge discarded the jury’s recommendation and sentenced him to death by the electric chair. Judges are no longer allowed to override a jury's verdict.
Sockwell had been hired by a man named Lorenzo McCarter, with whom Harris’ wife had been having an affair. In the late evening hours of March 10, 1988, Harris, a deputy sheriff in Montgomery County, was shot in the head while he was driving to work.
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