Disability rights advocates called on Gov. Bill Lee to stop the upcoming state execution of Byron Black, a convicted murderer who meets statewide guidelines for intellectual disability.
Black is on Tennessee’s death row for the 1988 triple homicide of his then-girlfriend Angela Clay, 29, and her two young daughters, aged 9 and 6 at the time, in Nashville. Black was convicted of the crime in 1989 and has been held at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution ever since.
His original execution was halted by Covid. The Tennessee Supreme Court recently re-ordered his execution this year, now set for August 5th. Only Lee can now stop the execution from going forward.
Black’s attorneys in the 1989 trial argued he was not mentally competent to stand trial, saying he “is not able to deal with reality.” Mental health officials at the time disagreed and his trial continued.
A coalition of disability advocates are now urging Lee to commute Black’s execution to life in prison, saying he has an intellectual disability, dementia, and brain damage. The Arc Tennessee, Tennessee Disability Coalition, and Disability Rights Tennessee (DRT) signed a letter to Lee asking him to spare Black’s life.
In a Thursday news conference, Zoë Jamail, a longtime advocate for people with disabilities, acknowledged the “unbearable pain and heartbreak” caused by Black’s actions. Also, though, “both our state and our nation have made clear that executing those with intellectual disability is prohibited.”
In a 2002 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court banned the execution of people with intellectual disability as cruel and unusual punishment. In 2021, the Tennessee General Assembly voted to protect those with intellectual disabilities form execution, Jamail said.
“Mr. Black was tested under the state’s current standards for intellectual disability,” Jamail said. “The state’s own medical experts agree. Mr. Black demonstrated all three of the criteria: sub-average intellectual functioning, adaptive deficits, and onset during development.
“Based on the new information, the Davidson County District Attorney agreed that Mr. Black is a person with intellectual disability and should not face execution.”
Federal public defender Dumaka Shabazz has represented Black for the last 25 years. In a letter for clemency to Lee earlier this month, he said Black had Fetal Alcohol Syndrome and was exposed to toxic lead as a toddler. Now, Shabazz said Black is wheelchair-bound, and takes 18 medications for a litany of diagnoses from kidney failure to prostate cancer.
“His body is failing, and his mind is deteriorating,” Shabazz wrote. “His execution would not serve justice — it would mark an irreversible act of cruelty against a profoundly physically and mentally impaired man who poses no threat to anyone and would leave his entire family, who cherish him, devastated.”
However, Black’s execution marks a “procedural hiccup,” advocates said Thursday. His attorneys quickly attempted several times to appeal his death sentence under the new laws. However, they were denied as judges ruled Black’s case had already been decided in court. They said Black would be ineligible for the death penalty in Tennessee if he were tried today.
“A man should not be executed because his lawyers were too diligent in bringing his case to the courts expeditiously in 2004 when the Tennessee ID standards were inaccurate,” said Donna DeStefano, an advocate for Tennesseans with disabilities for 30 years. “There is no doubt that Mr. Black meets the medical standard for [intellectual disability], and that his execution would not only be unconstitutional but inconsistent with our Tennessee values that protect people with intellectual disability.”
