Sentenced to Death in Georgia
Essays from Hospitality, the newspaper of the Open Door Community, on the death penalty in its many forms.
The following essays share the terrible human cost of a culture of death that springs from a culture based on capital punishment, incarcerating mental illness and industries that profit off of the incarcerated and addicted.
The first is a bittersweet but hopeful essay on Willie James Pye’s execution last March and the ensuing organizing to pass House Bill 123 to prevent intellectually disabled prisoners from facing the death penalty in Georgia.
The second essay tells the story of Kenyatta Booze, a 58-year-old man experiencing homelessness who passed away on June 7 in Athens, Georgia, according to recent reporting. The essay was written before Mr. Booze passed away, but his story remains a powerful condemnation of a system that offered him no recourse. He was sentenced to a different kind of death penalty.
These essays were originally published in Hospitality, the newspaper of the Open Door Community in Baltimore and republished with permission.
You can read the full newspaper online here. Learn more about the Open Door Community here.
peace,
Renée
For Whom the Bell Tolls
By Mary Catherine Johnson
One year ago, in March of 2024, an intellectually disabled man named Willie James Pye was executed by the state of Georgia. Since I began my work to end the death penalty in Georgia in 2008, I have been a part of over 30 executions, and all of them have affected me deeply, but the execution of Willie Pye was particularly hard. It was the first execution in Georgia in over four years, and I had grown delightfully accustomed to my execution-free state.
But then March 20, 2024, arrived, and once again I had to lead a vigil on the night of an execution, a short distance from where Willie Pye would be put to death. A familiar rush of emotions came flooding back — sadness, despair, anger—and grief overcame me. Even during dark moments like that, I know from experience that resurrection always comes, and hope is always restored. Love always wins, and grace bats last, but in the midst of an execution, it’s often difficult to see the path that will lead us there, and that night I was overwhelmed with hopelessness.
Our beloved U.S. Senator Raphael Warnock from Georgia loves to quote Psalm 30, “Joy comes in the morning,” and it did come for me the morning after Willie Pye’s execution. This time my comfort and joy came in the form of pictures and stories from Georgians For Alternatives to the Death Penalty’s (GFADP) statewide vigils the night before. As I scanned the internet and social media for news about Willie Pye’s execution, I came across photo after photo of people standing up and showing up for Willie — beautiful people holding signs of justice and love, singing and pray- ing, and showing the world the path away from death and toward the light of life.
That morning, someone sent me a video of the bells chiming at Central Presbyterian Church in Atlanta at the designated hour
of execution, across the street from the GFADP vigil at the Georgia State Capitol. Tears came to my eyes as I listened to those majestic bells ring out, signaling to our fellow citizens that our brother Willie Pye had been unjustly murdered by the state, and that we envision a day when the barbaric practice of executions has ended.
Then as the day continued, I heard stories about other churches throughout Georgia that rang their bells for Willie the night before. Thinking about the sound of those bells, and all of the people who kept vigil for Willie the night before, filled me with hope, and I felt the fog of the execution lift.
A Call To Action
The expression “for whom the bell tolls” was coined by the poet John Donne in his meditation on the inter-connectedness of all people, surmising that a tolling church bell during a funeral was not just for the person who died, but meant to remind us of our kinship with, and responsibility to, our fellow humans. The phrase was popularized later when Ernest Hemingway titled his 1940 novel about the Spanish Civil War For Whom the Bell Tolls, which extolled the virtues of solidarity with the allied groups fighting the fascists of Hemingway’s day, and our moral duty to resist fascism.
A year after Willie Pye’s execution, I can still hear those bells tolling in his honor as I watch a new president do his best to undo the progress we have made in purging the U.S. of the death pen- alty. He issued a mandate in his first days in office that resumes federal executions and offers federal support to the states as they ramp up their efforts to maintain and carry out capital punishment. Willie Pye’s bells are a call to action, an antidote to the helpless- ness that many of us are feeling in the face of fascist ideology taking hold in our country.
It is often hard to know what type of action to take, or even where to begin. I’d like to suggest that you start at your state legislature. Discern which causes are nearest and dearest to your heart and then align with the local groups working on those issues. Find out how and when those groups will be lobbying for their causes at your state capitol and then show up for their lobby days. Find out who your legislators are and call them or email them to let them know how you feel about your causes and about any bills that may be on the agenda that will impact your causes.
I speak from personal experience when I tell you that taking part in your state’s legislative process is not only effective, it is also an incredible jolt of good energy that will inspire and sustain you in these difficult times. You will meet kindred spirits who care about the same things that you do, and who will stand by your side as you summon the courage to speak truth to power. Even when your cause does not prevail, you have taken part in a vital exercise of seed-planting that will blossom later.
This year one of my chosen groups – GFADP – led the charge to introduce HB123 in the Georgia state legislature. This bill seeks to amend Georgia law relating to criminal procedure in cases where the death penalty is sought when the accused has an intellectual disability, thus ensuring that the accused is not eligible for the death penalty. Had this law been in place at the time of Willie James Pye’s crimes, I seriously doubt he would have received the death penalty.
I took part in the course of HB123 at every step of the way, and it was exhilarating. A highlight was the GFADP Lobby Day in February, where I called my local representative “to the ropes” — an expression that means I sent a request to him through a legislative page to come out and talk to me at the series of red ropes outside of the House chamber. I knew that my representative, as a conservative Republican, would not be politically aligned with me in many, if any, ways, but I also knew that I had to take the chance that he would be willing to listen to my views as his constituent. I hoped that we could relate to one another as fellow humans seeking justice for some of the most vulnerable citizens of our state.
Not only was my representative willing to engage with me in a meaningful discussion about HB123, it turned out he was also on the committee that was vetting the bill before sending it to the House for a vote. That committee eventually voted unanimously to send HB123 forward, which means my rep voted for it! I’ll never know for sure if my interaction with him made a difference, but it sure did feel good to lend my voice to the process.
When a bill comes up for a vote in the Georgia House of Representatives, the Speaker of the House rings a bell over and over again as the votes are illuminated on a large monitor. During the voting for HB123, the bell ringing only lasted about 30 seconds, but it was an incredibly thrilling 30 seconds — matching the accelerated beating of my heart — as I realized the bill was not only going to pass, but it was going to pass with 172 yeas and zero nays.
As the potential impact of this victory sank in, I began to think of some of the people on death row whom I have known over the years — the ones who struggled, and often failed, to prove their intellectual disability to a judicial system indifferent, or even hos- tile, to their situation. At the committee level, the prosecutors who opposed HB123 claimed that no one with an intellectual disability had ever been executed in Georgia, which those of us who work directly with the people on death row and their attorneys knew to be a lie. Now we were one step closer to exposing that lie and protecting the Willie Pyes of our community from execution.
Epitaph
I am writing this article on March 5th, on what would have been the 77th birthday of Murphy Davis, my beloved mentor and co-founder of the Open Door Community. I think of Murphy often, and I feel her presence in so much of what I do at New Hope House, of which she was a founder.
The first time I met Murphy was at the Georgia State Capitol in 2009, at a GFADP Lobby Day. Of course I knew about Murphy’s work to end the death penalty prior to that day — everyone in the anti-death penalty community knew who Murphy was — but that was my first time seeing her in the flesh.
Like all who were present that day, I was drawn in by Murphy’s passionate speech at the press conference — words that were formed by her long-haul activism and her direct experience with the stories of the people impacted by the death penalty in Georgia. In those days, we viewed our lobbying efforts as mostly symbolic, laying the groundwork for the day when one of our bills related to the death penalty actually had a chance of being passed. Murphy’s words gave us both the strength and the roadmap for pressing ahead. She knew that the day would come when the bells of the Georgia legislature would be tolling in support of people facing the death penalty in Georgia, and that day finally came in March of 2025 when HB123 passed the House with no opposition. Whether this bill becomes law in Georgia remains to be seen. It still needs to pass the Senate and then avoid a veto from Georgia Governor Brian Kemp. It’s an uphill climb to victory, but with so many beautiful people helping to push this bill up the hill, and with the soundtrack of gorgeous pealing bells in our ears, I trust that HB123 will make it to the other side.
For Murphy Davis
For Willie James Pye
And Everyone With Intellectual Disability
Who Has Been Executed In Georgia
Mary Catherine Johnson is Executive Director of New Hope House, a ministry that accompanies the people on Georgia’s death row and their families. http://www.newhopehousega.org (mcjohnson78@yahoo.co)
Roundtable Editor’s Note: Governor Brian Kemp signed HB 123 into law on May 13, after this article was published.
My Season with Kenyatta
By John Cole Vodicka
I’ve known Kenyatta Booze for almost two years. On July 12, 2023, I met him at the Clarke County jail in Athens, Georgia, after I’d handed $21 to the release officer to purchase Mr. Booze’s pretrial liberty. He’d been unable to post this small bond and been locked up seven days for trespassing at one of Athens’ public parks. Since that day in July 2023, my church’s community bail fund has posted seven small bonds — ranging from $1 to $33 — on Mr. Booze’s behalf.
In fact, since July 5, 2023, the 58-year-old Mr. Booze has spent a total of 531 pretrial days in our jail. He’s been arrested more than a dozen times over the past 20 months, all arrests alleging he committed misdemeanor offenses. He’s been busted for trespassing in our parks, in a local drug store’s parking lot (a half-dozen times), behind a grocery store (where he was sleeping in a shed), outside a chiropractor’s office (where he was using a garden hose to wash himself). Back in September 2023, Mr. Booze committed his most serious misdemeanor crime, shoplifting, after he went into Walmart and attempted to walk out with “Payday candy bars, a package of Snickers, Blow-Pops, a Coke Zero, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, a pair of socks, blue jeans and earbuds.”
Kenyatta Booze has been in jail more than out over the past several years. When he’s out, I’ve managed to spend time with him whenever I provide transportation to his courthouse hearings, or visit with him on the streets
of Athens. He has two adult children. He played football in high school. He drove 18-wheelers for a living. I’ve also gotten to know Mr. Booze’s 83-year-old mother, Dorothy Griffin, who lives an hour away in Lawrenceville but still has managed to get to Athens to attend some of his court hearings.
“My son is not a criminal,” Ms. Griffin told me. “Something happened to him several years ago, and he’s not right anymore. He’s never been like this.” Dorothy Griffin is convinced that her son needs neurological treatment in an appropriate care facility. “Just to look at him and to hear him speak should be obvious to anyone that Kenyatta isn’t right,” she said. “He has a hard time putting a sentence together now. He stumbles when he walks, and his hands and arms are always flailing about. When he’s sitting, his head jerks back and forth.”
But try telling any of this to the court officials in Athens, Georgia. Three months ago, on January 6, 2025, Mr. Booze appeared at a misdemeanor court status hearing. He’d been in jail over four months this time around, again charged with trespassing at the local grocery store. In a bewildering turn of events that day, Mr. Booze’s public defender Sydney Crudo brokered an agreement with the prosecutor that allowed her client to plead guilty to two of his twelve outstanding misdemeanor cases. The remaining ten cases would be dismissed. The guilty plea would result in Mr. Booze being sentenced to 12 months confinement, suspended upon his entering a long-term, inpatient recovery program in nearby Jackson County. According to lawyer Crudo, the sober living facility had already conducted a telephone interview with Mr. Booze and had accepted him, sight unseen.
Kenyatta Booze entered his plea of guilty to the two trespassing- ing charges. “Are you entering this plea freely and voluntarily?” Judge Charles Auslander III asked Mr. Booze.
“Yessir.”
“I’m happy for this outcome,” the judge announced from the bench, as the shackled Mr. Booze stood spasming and tossing his head from side-to-side. And then the judge offered this off-handed comment: “Mr. Booze, I enjoy seeing you in court. You’re always so positive.” Kenyatta Booze remained in the
Clarke County jail for 42 more days waiting for a bed to become available at the treatment facility. On February 17, I picked him up from the jail to take him to the rural institution. On our way there, I asked him if anyone had been present with him when he did the telephone intake at the jailhouse. Was his lawyer there? The public defender’s social worker? “Nope, just me.” He said the interview lasted at most ten minutes. When we pulled into the treatment center parking lot, a gentleman appeared at the car and escorted Mr. Booze into a nearby office building. “We have to drug test him and then we’ll be back out to get his belongings.” I had purchased socks, underwear, t-shirts, toiletries and a few clothing items to leave with Mr. Booze.
I had sat in my car for thirty minutes when Mr. Booze walked out of the office building, now accompanied by a female employee. “Are you family?” she asked me. “A good friend,” I replied. “Well, we’re not going to be able to accept Mr. Booze,” she announced. “Does he have anywhere else he can go?” I was dumbfounded. “I was told he’d been accepted here, and that you all had agreed to admit him after you had a phone interview with him. He has no place else to go — except back to jail.” “We didn’t know that he had physical limitations,” the young woman apologized. “We’re a program that requires the men to work while they are with us, to help pay for their room and board. He doesn’t meet that requirement.” The staff member told me she would make
a few phone calls to see if there might be another program that would consider accepting Mr. Booze.
Forty-five minutes later, we were still sitting in the car. No one ever returned with any information. Kenyatta Booze and I drove back to Athens to the courthouse, where Mr. Booze’s public defender was busy entering guilty pleas for other indigent clients. She told us her social worker was on the way to the courthouse to speak with Mr. Booze.
The social worker never showed up. Instead, while the three of us were sitting outside the courtroom, Ms. Crudo phoned a for-profit company called “Sober Living America.” Sober Living America is an addiction-recovery corporation that owns and operates a half-dozen facilities in Georgia. Ms. Crudo explained to whoever answered the phone that her client needed an inpatient treatment bed ASAP, and what would he have to do to gain admission?
“Put him on the phone. ” Here is how Kenyatta Booze answered Sober Living America’s intake specialist’s questions: “I’m 58.” “I’m homeless.” “I really don’t have a problem with drugs or alcohol.” “Okay.”
And then he handed the phone back to Ms. Crudo. “Do you know how soon?” she asked the intake person. Then, “Thank you. Bye.” “You’ve been accepted,” she told Mr. Booze. “Maybe as soon as sometime this week.” The judge ordered Mr. Booze to return to jail to spend a few more days serving the 12-month sentence until he could be transported by the sheriff to the Sober Living America’s Jonesboro, Georgia franchise, two hours from Athens. That all happened on Monday, February 17.
Four days later, on Friday, February 21, Kenyatta Booze was still in the Clarke County jail. He was brought back to court because apparently Sober Living America, like the Jackson County treatment program, was having second thoughts about accepting him. Their program also required residents to maintain employment and pay for room, board and treatment costs. Clearly frustrated (and I’m convinced ready to wash his hands of Mr. Booze), Judge Auslander announced he was ending the case altogether. “Mr. Booze has already spent nearly five months in jail, and if he were to get a day’s credit for every day served he’d be just a few weeks shy of serving the 12-month sentence,” the judge reasoned. “I’m concluding this matter. Mr. Booze, you’ll be able to get out of jail Monday morning. I’m ordering that the sheriff release you to Mr. Vodicka at 10 a.m., Monday, February 24.” Really, Judge? Released to what? And where?
Kenyatta Booze walked out of the Clarke County jail that Monday morning. Sitting in my car in the jail parking lot, we talked about his options. He’d stayed at the Salvation Army shelter on previous occasions, but that shelter was closed indefinitely for renovations. The only other adult shelter in Athens, Bigger Vision, has a first call-first serve policy. If you are seeking an overnight bed there, you have to call them at 4 p.m. and hope your call is among the first received. Even if you are lucky enough to land an overnight bed, you can’t check in until 6 p.m. and have to leave the building the following morning at 5 a.m.
“Take me to the church downtown,” Mr. Booze said. “I’ll get some lunch there.” We drove to First Baptist Church. I gave Mr. Booze a used backpack stuffed with the socks and underwear and t-shirts I’d bought him for his now-abandoned treatment program. I added a gray hoodie to the mix. I gave him a little spending money and walked back to my car. We hugged. “It gonna be alright, John.” An hour or so later, I spotted Mr. Booze, walking alone on Prince Avenue, heading in the direction of the grocery store from which he’s been barred.
The very next day, Tuesday, February 25, around 10 a.m., almost exactly 24 hours from the time he’d left the jail with me the day before, Kenyatta Booze was arrested and jailed. This from ACCPD officer Kalina Thurmond’s report:
“The suspect was identified as Kenyatta Booze. Wearing a gray sweatshirt with the hood up and blue jeans. I went to speak to the manager of Bell’s, who stated that they had video footage of Mr. Booze on their property. After viewing the video footage of a B/M wearing a gray sweatshirt with the hood up and blue jeans identical to what Mr. Booze was wearing when I encountered him, he was placed under arrest for criminal trespass.”
John and Dee Cole Vodicka and sons were Resident Volunteers at the Open Door Community in 1985-86 and 1992-93. John founded and, for 15 years, directed the Prison & Jail Project in Americus, Georgia. Today, he is an activist, writer and community organizer who lives in Athens, Georgia. (johncvodicka@gmail.com)
These essays were originally published in Hospitality, the newspaper of the Open Door Community in Baltimore. You can read the full newspaper online here. Learn more about the Open Door Community here.
I knew Murphy as well, and the open door community of the mid-ninties