Today, the state of Oklahoma will execute Tremane Wood, a Black man, unless Governor Kevin Stitt or the U.S. Supreme Court intervenes. Mr. Wood is currently on death row despite compelling evidence of his innocence and significant deficiencies in his trial proceedings. The Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board voted to grant Mr. Wood clemency, but it has no binding power to halt his execution, so Mr. Wood’s fate may rest with Governor Stitt.
Mr. Wood also has an appeal pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.
In response, Legal Defense Fund (LDF) Director of Community Organizing Tré Murphy issued the following statement:
“The state-sanctioned killing of Tremane Wood will not make Oklahoma safer. Instead, it will perpetrate an injustice and undermine the Oklahoma clemency board’s carefully considered decision to spare Wood’s life. The facts are clear. Mr. Wood was failed by our criminal legal system in a number of ways, including through poor legal representation and by a trial that may have been infected by racial bias. And he has spent his life in prison as a result.
“An act of state-sanctioned violence can never be justice. Oklahoma’s clemency board has made clear that Wood should not die nor does the victim’s family seek his death. We urge Governor Stitt to accept the clemency board’s recommendation and halt this execution.”
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Founded in 1940, the Legal Defense Fund (LDF) is the nation’s first civil rights law organization. LDF’s Thurgood Marshall Institute is a multi-disciplinary and collaborative hub within LDF that launches targeted campaigns and undertakes innovative research to shape the civil rights narrative. In media attributions, please refer to us as the Legal Defense Fund or LDF. Please note that LDF has been completely separate from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) since 1957—although LDF was originally founded by the NAACP and shares its commitment to equal rights.
