James Willie Brown
Mentally Ill Offender In Georgia
Execution Date: November 4, 2003
Case Overview
Letters Asking for Clemency
News
Case Overview
James Willie Brown suffered from major mental illness at the time of the offense for which he was executed November 4, 2003. He was sentenced to death for the rape and murder of Brenda Watson in 1975. Mr. Brown has been diagnosed as being a paranoid schizophrenic, a mental illness he has suffered from for the majority of his life. Mr. Brown's illness caused him to hear the voices of God and demons directing his actions, to experience hallucinations, and to have bizarre beliefs that people were trying to kill him. He has been diagnosed by ten different state doctors as being schizophrenic, paranoid type. From 1975 through 1989, these state doctors diagnosed Mr. Brown as being a paranoid schizophrenic seventeen separate times.
Paranoid schizophrenia, recognized by experts as a crippling and devastating thought disorder, evolved in Mr. Brown's case from a childhood marked by incomprehensible abuse. In spite of the fact that Mr. Brown's history was well documented in hospital records, the jury which sentenced him to death in 1991 heard little detail of Mr. Brown's background. Moreover, the jury was told that Mr. Brown was not mentally ill, but faking it, and that any hallucinations were the effects of his own behavior in taking drugs.
Below is a cursory overview of the background and case of Mr. James Brown.
Mr. Brown Was a Victim of Child Abuse
Mr. Brown's mental illness manifested following a childhood of severe abuse. Mr. Brown was born prematurely to a 15 -year-old mother. His father was a severe alcoholic who failed to provide basic food and shelter for Mr. Brown and his siblings. There was no running water, indoor plumbing or heat in the house. The children went hungry, living primarily on a single daily meal of beans and cornbread. They were bitten by rats and other vermin which infested the house.
In addition to the physical deprivation, the father methodically and sadistically beat the children, particularly James. These beatings occurred several times a day with belts, boards, branches, cords and fists. The beatings were severe, resulting in welts, bruises, blood, black eyes and even unconsciousness. The beatings took place in public as well as in the home, adding humiliation to the physical pain. Around the second grade, Mr. Brown developed a severe stutter, from which he still suffers. His stammering caused more public ridicule and humiliation, and although he liked school, he was afraid to speak or ask questions because of the unrelenting mocking of his peers and other adults, including teachers and his parents. He repeated grades 3, 7 and 8, dropping out after repeating 9th grade.
Mr. Brown's Evolving Mental Illness
In 1963, Mr. Brown was diagnosed by the Emory Medical Clinic as suffering from a convulsive disorder. Doctors prescribed medication to control his seizures. Despite being medicated, Mr. Brown's severe headaches and blackouts persisted.
By 17, Mr. Brown had left school after his second year of ninth grade and had entered the Marine Corps. Though accepted in the service, it soon became clear that Mr. Brown's mental health was deteriorating, and he was discharged for mental illness after 16 months and two hospitalizations, during which he received electroshock treatment.
As Mr. Brown's mental deterioration accelerated, he became increasingly unable to hold a job. He did odd jobs with his younger brother and tried to make ends meet, but his mental illness was debilitating. He turned to drugs, primarily LSD.
In 1968, Mr. Brown was arrested for the first time, but was deemed incompetent to stand trial and sent to Central State Hospital. Records indicate his symptoms included headaches and passing out, hearing voices and noises, and that he "attempted to cut throat in jail." 4//27/68. After six months at Central State, Mr. Brown was released with a diagnosis of psychoneurotic disorder with a dissociative reaction. Mr. Brown was readmitted to Central State within two months and remained hospitalized for eighteen months. At least one mental health expert diagnosed him as suffering from schizophrenic reaction, paranoid type.
In December 1972, Mr. Brown was again readmitted to Central State where he remained until January 1974, though part of this stay appears to have been on an outpatient basis.
Mr. Brown was arrested and charged with killing Brenda Watson in May of 1975. He was immediately referred by the court back to Central State. When admitted to the Forensic Division for evaluation, he "was out of contact with reality" and "overtly psychotic." (T 599, testimony of Dr. Jose Delatorre.) He was medicated with anti-psychotic drugs and found to be suffering from paranoid schizophrenia. Central State doctors determined that Mr. Brown was "legally insane." They went on to diagnose Mr. Brown as paranoid schizophrenic a total of seventeen (17) times between 1975 and 1989.
Over the next five years, Mr. Brown continued to be diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. Psychotropic medications and tranquilizers would help for a time, but these periods fluctuated with periods of acute psychosis, in which he believed someone was trying to kill him through poisoning or germs, and in which he still suffered hallucinations of God and the devil.
Records from 1977 report him as "deranged, preaching the gospel and signing his name as Jesus Christ . . ." Later that same year, "staff reports patient appears to be regressing on ward B he sits alone with his coat over his head all day."
Mr. Brown was eventually ruled competent and was tried and convicted in 1980. The Central State Hospital team which found him competent because his schizophrenia had been in remission noted they had "no opinion at this time about criminal responsibility because of the fact that [he] has been so psychotic between the time the crime was committed and the present time . . . feel his mental condition should be considered a mitigating factor." However, Mr. Brown became psychotic during motion for new trial proceedings and was readmitted to Central State in an "acutely psychotic" condition expressing "many bizarre ideas and persecutory feelings." He was again made "competent" through psychotropic medication and was returned to the court in January of 1982.
Mr. Brown's conviction was overturned by the United States District Court in 1988 on issues related to his competency and he was retried in 1989. He was evaluated for competency prior to his retrial by a state doctor, then head of forensics at Central State Hospital. While he could not say whether Mr. Brown was psychotic at the time of the crime (T 662), the state doctor averred that Mr. Brown's mental illness was not schizophrenia at all, but hallucinogenic flashbacks stemming from LSD use in the 1970s, which were exacerbated by the psychotropic drugs with which Mr. Brown was being treated. The jury relied on this testimony in sentencing Mr. Brown to death. The state doctor's testimony is argued to be materially false.
Mr. Brown's Severe Mental Illness Warrants Clemency
At the time of the crime for which he is to be executed, Mr. Brown had been progressing more and more deeply into psychosis, and was floridly psychotic on admission to Central State following his arrest. Mr. Brown's execution for a crime committed when he was the throes of untreated major mental illness, suffering from delusions and hallucinations, and being directed by the voices of God and the devil, serves no purpose other than vengeance. Executing the mentally ill runs counter to basic American standards of decency and fairness, and is contrary to fundamental standards of international human rights.
The United States Supreme Court has recently followed the lead that the State of Georgia established over a decade ago, when it forbade the execution of offenders with mental retardation. The Court recognized that no valid penological purpose is served in executing persons whose disabilities in areas of reasoning, judgment and impulse control mean they do not act with the level of moral culpability that characterizes the most serious adult criminal conduct. Atkins v. Virginia, 122 S.Ct. 2242, 2244 (2002). It can be argued that paranoid schizophrenia, or another severe mental illness, although not mental retardation as addressed by Atkins, can have as debilitating an effect on judgment, impulse control and ability to reason.
Letters for Clemency
News
Dancer's slayer pays with his life
Convicted killer James Willie Brown was executed Tuesday for the 1975 rape
and murder of a woman he met in an Atlanta nightclub.
Brown, the 3rd man to die by lethal injection in Georgia this year, died
at 8:32 p.m. after an hourlong delay while the U.S. Supreme Court
considered his case.
The court denied his late appeal, as the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals and U.S. District Judge J. Owen Forrester had done earlier.
Brown, who appeared emotionless throughout, declined to make a last
statement or have a final prayer said for him.
He lay motionless, his eyes open. But as the combination of lethal
chemicals took hold, he closed his eyes and stopped breathing.
Gwinnett County District Attorney Danny Porter sat on the 1st row as one
of the witnesses.
About 4 p.m. Brown ate his final meal.
The 55-year-old man was the 34th man executed in Georgia since the U.S.
Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1973 and the 11th in Georgia
to die by lethal injection since the Georgia Supreme Court in 2001
declared the electric chair cruel and unusual punishment. He was the 1st
to die in the state since Carl Isaacs in May.
Only 5 states have executed more condemned prisoners than Georgia since
the death penalty was re-legalized in the USA on July 2, 1976 (Texas-310,
Va.-89, Okla.-69, Mo.-61, and Fla.-57)
Brown met Brenda Sue Watson, a topless dancer, at the "What It Is" lounge
in Atlanta May 12, 1975, according to court testimony. The couple went to
the Mark Inn hotel lounge in Stone Mountain, where they ate dinner, drank
and played pinball. Witnesses said Brown and Watson appeared to be a
couple enjoying an evening together.
He later took Watson to an old logging road in Gwinnett County near the
DeKalb County line. He bound Watson with nylon cord, raped, sodomized and
suffocated her.
Brown had served prison time for a previous rape and was wanted by DeKalb
authorities for another killing when he was arrested in Watson's death.
Lawyers for Brown unsuccessfully argued that their client should not be
executed because he suffers from paranoid schizophrenia.
A fellow jail inmate who testified against Brown at his trial recanted her
story. Anita Jean Tucker told jurors that Brown advised her to act insane
in order to be exonerated. But Tucker later said she lied because she
hoped to get a lighter sentence in exchange for her testimony.
On Friday the state Board of Pardons and Paroles rejected Brown's clemency
pleas, clearing the way for Tuesday's execution.
The execution was opposed by Georgians For Alternatives to the Death
Penalty, a group that maintained a vigil outside the Georgia Diagnostic
and Classification Prison, where death row inmates are held and executions
carried out.
Laura Moye of Amnesty International noted that 3 of Watson's aunts wrote
the parole board to ask that Brown's sentence be commuted to life in
prison without the possibility of parole.
"The murder victim's family deserves justice, and even they agree that
putting such an ill man as Mr. Brown to death would not serve that
purpose," Moye said.
Brown's brother, Harold, has said that his brother was not mentally ill
but a mean man who deserved his fate.
Brown becomes the 59th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in
the USA and the 879th overall since America resumed executions on January
17, 1977.
(sources: Atlanta Journal Constitution & Rick Halperin) - November 4, 2003
Nov. 4 Execution Ordered for Killer
A man convicted of raping and strangling an Atlanta go-go dancer is
scheduled to be executed Nov. 4. James Willie Brown, 55, was sentenced to
death in 1975 for the murder of Brenda Sue Watson, 21, who died after a
night of dinner and dancing. Brown was set to die last November, but a
judge stayed the execution the day before it was to take place. Brown
argued that prosecutors had knowingly introduced false testimony against
him at trial. The Georgia Supreme Court later denied his petition for
release, and his execution by injection was ordered by the Gwinnett County
Superior Court on Thursday.
(source: Atlanta Journal Constitution) - October 24, 2003
Judge grants 48-hour stay for death row inmate Brown
November 19, 2002
By BETH WARREN
Atlanta Journal-Constitution Staff Writer
A Butts County Superior Court judge issued a 48-hour stay today for convicted rapist-murderer James Willie Brown.
Brown, 54, was slated to be put to death by lethal injection at 7 p.m. Tuesday for the 1975 slaying of Brenda Sue Watson in Lilburn.
Watson, an Atlanta go-go dancer was bound at the ankles and wrists, raped and suffocated with her panties.
Kevin A. Wangerin, a Superior Court judge, signed the one-page stay.
Heather Hedrick, a spokeswoman for the State Board of Pardons and Paroles, said the stay will give the board an opportunity to review Brown's request for a reduced sentence.
The five-member board was asked by Brown's attorneys on Monday to spare his life based in part on the fact that he is a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic who was sexually abused by an uncle, beaten regularly by his father and neglected by his mother.
The parole board, which has two new members, had been expected to issue a ruling Tuesday, but may now extend its deliberations, Hedrick said.
Brown initially was found incompetent to stand trial. He was brought to trial in 1981 and sentenced to die for Watson's slaying. But a federal court overturned the conviction in 1988 due to questions about his mental competency.
He was retried in 1990 and again sentenced to die for his crimes.
Laura Hill Patton and Jeffrey L. Ertel, attorneys with the Federal Defender Program Inc., asked the Board of Pardons and Paroles to consider evidence that a key witness lied at Brown's 1990 trial. They said the witness -- a female inmate -- now admits that she lied when she claimed Brown told her that faking mental illness could result in a lighter sentence.
The victim's family and the jurors who sentenced Brown also are asking for a commuted sentence, according to the lawyers' application. At the time of Brown's trial, life without the possibility of parole was not an option.
"It's very rare that the board would change the sentence of the courts," parole board spokeswoman Heather Hedrick said.
Forty-one death row inmates have sought executive clemency from the board since 1976, when Georgia reinstated the death penalty, Hedrick said.
Only seven of the 41 were spared. Six of the seven were given life sentences with the possibility of parole, she said. The seventh was sentenced to life without parole.
Defense lawyers seek clemency for death row inmate Brown -- Lawyers say Brown is mentally ill; execution set for Tuesday
Convicted Gwinnett County murderer James Willie Brown has suffered from
mental illness for decades and shouldn't be put to death Tuesday, his
attorneys argued Monday.
Brown, a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic, also was sexually abused by an
uncle, beaten regularly by his father and neglected by his mother, the
attorneys claimed in a 29-page plea for a stay of execution or reduced
sentence.
The 5-member State Board of Pardons and Paroles will not rule on the
last-minute appeal until Tuesday. Brown's execution is set for 7 p.m.
Brown, 54, was convicted of killing Brenda Sue Watson, 21, near the
Gwinnett-DeKalb county line on May 13, 1975. Watson, an Atlanta go-go
dancer, was bound at the ankles and wrists and raped while she suffocated
on her panties.
Brown initially was found incompetent to stand trial. He was brought to
trial in 1981 and sentenced to die for Watson's slaying. But a federal
court overturned the conviction in 1988 due to questions about his mental
competency.
He was retried in 1990 and again sentenced to die for his crimes.
Laura Hill Patton and Jeffrey L. Ertel, attorneys with the Federal
Defender Program Inc., asked the Board of Pardons and Paroles to consider
evidence that a key witness lied at Brown's 1990 trial. They said the
witness -- a female inmate -- now admits that she lied when she claimed
Brown told her that faking mental illness could result in a lighter sentence.
The victim's family and the jurors who sentenced Brown also are asking
for a commuted sentence, according to the lawyers' application. At the
time of Brown's trial, life without the possibility of parole was not an
option.
"It's very rare that the board would change the sentence of the courts,"
parole board spokeswoman Heather Hedrick said.
41 death row inmates have sought executive clemency from the board since
1976, when Georgia reinstated the death penalty, Hedrick said.
Only 7 of the 41 were spared. 6 of the 7 were given life sentences with
the possibility of parole, she said. The 7th was sentenced to life
without parole.
(source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution) – November 18, 2003
Georgia: Urgent Action Appeal
4 November 2002
EXTRA 82/02 Death penalty/legal concern
USA (Georgia) James Willie Brown, aged 54
James Willie Brown, white, is facing imminent execution in Georgia. He
has been given an execution warrant which is valid from 19 to 26
November 2002. Past experience suggests that the authorities will
schedule the execution for the first day of the warrant, 19 November.
James Brown was sentenced to death at a retrial in 1990 for the rape
and murder of Brenda Watson in 1975.
James Brown has a long history of mental illness, which has included
repeated diagnoses of schizophrenia. At the age of 15, he was
diagnosed as suffering from convulsive disorder and prescribed
medication to control his seizures. By the age of 17 he had entered the
army but served less then two years before eventually being
discharged due to his mental illness. As his situation deteriorated, he
began to use illegal drugs, and was arrested for the first time in 1968,
at about the age of 20. He was deemed incompetent to stand trial, that
is, that he lacked the mental capacity to fully understand the
proceedings or assist in his defense. He was therefore sent to a state
mental facility. Between the time of his first arrest and his 1981 trial for
the murder of Brenda Watson, he was in mental facilities for 70 per
cent of the time, both on an involuntary and voluntary basis.
His trial for murder was delayed for 6 years on the grounds of mental
incompetence. He was eventually tried and sentenced to death in
1981, but was granted a new trial by a federal court in 1988 on the
grounds of doubts over his competency to stand trial in 1981. He was
retried in 1990, and again sentenced to death.
At the retrial, the defense presented 2 experts who testified that
James Brown suffered from chronic paranoid schizophrenia. In a
subsequent affidavit, given in 1994, one of these experts stated: 'Mr.
Brown's medical history establishes that his mental illness was of a
long standing nature... From Mr. Brown's post-arrest hospitalization in
June 1975 until shortly before his original trial in January 1981, Mr.
Brown was under almost constant supervision by mental health
professionals at Central State Hospital.' The affidavit continues:
'Considering the type of illness, his extensive medical history and my
examination of Mr. Brown, it was my opinion to a reasonable degree of
medical certainty that Mr. Brown was psychotic at the time of the
alleged offense and that he acted upon delusions and therefore, could
not distinguish between right and wrong at the time. Based upon my
recent review of the additional materials, I stand by my original
diagnosis and this opinion.' In addition, two inmates who were in the
county jail at the time of James Brown's arrest gave post-conviction
affidavits that describe how he was out of touch with reality and
psychotic.
The state's position at the 1990 retrial, however, was that James Brown
was faking his mental illness. It presented a doctor who stated that, in
his opinion, the defendant did not have schizophrenia, but had suffered
drug-induced flashbacks. This doctor appears to have ignored James
Brown's long history and repeated diagnoses of mental illness (over the
years more than 25 mental health experts employed by the state have
found James Brown to be mentally ill and not malingering). Moreover,
in closing arguments, the prosecutor stated to the jury: 'That brings us
to the question that [the defense lawyer] wanted you to consider,
should we put the mentally ill to death. Well, I don't know the answer to
that question... And you don't have to decide that question in this case.
Because, ladies and gentlemen, this man isn't mentally ill, he has never
been mentally ill, and he is not mentally ill today. He was not mentally ill
on the [day of the crime].'
To bolster the state's theory that the defendant was malingering, the
prosecution presented two witnesses; a police officer and a former
inmate, who said that James Brown had made statements suggesting
that he was faking his mental illness. The credibility of these witnesses
has since been called into serious question. Appeal courts have held
that the trial lawyers were ineffective in not having impeached this
testimony, but under the stringent US Supreme Court precedent on this
issue, have ruled that the prisoner had not proved that this failure had
affected the outcome of the proceedings.
Like many on death row in the USA, James Willie Brown comes from a
background of poverty, deprivation and serious abuse. According to a
1994 affidavit given by a clinical psychologist, James Brown was born
in 1948 to a 15-year-old mother and an alcoholic father. Theirs was
one of the poorest families in a low-income neighborhood. The children
were subjected to routine physical abuse, principally by the father.
According to the psychologist: 'Instruments of abuse included belts,
boards, branches, cords, and fists, and the children were also kicked.
In addition to beatings of the children, the father also often brutally beat
the mother with his fists in front of the children. When [James Brown]
attempted to aid his mother while she was being beaten, he only
earned himself yet another beating from his father... According to
[James Brown], his brothers and his mother, the father's beatings were
extremely severe, leaving welts, drawing blood, and even, in [his] case,
causing unconsciousness. The father not only beat [him] at home but
also did so in public, in front of friends and family, and [James Brown]
reports that the father appeared to take great pride and pleasure in
humiliating him like this.'
This psychologist noted that James Brown had 'adjusted well to prison
life... Based on my evaluation of Mr Brown, I would opine to a
reasonable degree of psychological certainty that he will not present a
security risk or disciplinary problem during his incarceration if he were
sentenced to life in prison'.
Background Information
Each year since 1997, the United Nations Commission for Human
Rights has passed a resolution that, among other things, calls on
retentionist countries not to impose or carry out the death penalty
against anyone with any form of mental disorder. The US grassroots
advocacy organization, the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill,
opposes the use of the death penalty against people with
schizophrenia and other serious mental illness. Amnesty International
opposes the death penalty unconditionally. While 111 countries are
abolitionist in law or practice, the USA has put 805 prisoners to death
since resuming executions in 1977.
RECOMMENDED ACTION: Please send appeals, to arrive as quickly
as possible, in your own words:
- expressing sympathy for the family and friends of Brenda Watson, and explaining that you are not seeking to condone the manner of her death or to minimize the suffering caused;
- noting that James Willie Brown has a long history of serious mental illness stemming long before the crime, and that his illness has been recognized by the state on numerous occasions, including when he was in the military and the state hospital;
- expressing concern that the prosecution argued to the jury that he had never been mentally ill, and expressing concern that the testimony of two state witnesses used to bolster this theory has been called into question;
- pointing to the United Nations resolutions and the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill's position opposing the use of the death penalty against people with mental illness, whether at the time of the crime, trial, or execution;
- urging clemency for James Willie Brown in the interest of decency and the reputation of Georgia.
APPEALS TO:
State Board of Pardons and Paroles
2 Martin Luther King, Jr. Drive, SE
Suite 458, Balcony Level, East Tower
Atlanta, GA 30334-4909
Fax: 1 404 651 8502
Salutation: Dear Board Members
COPIES TO:
You may copy your appeals or write a brief letter (not more than 250
words) to:
Please send appeals immediately.
Amnesty International is a worldwide grassroots movement
that promotes and defends human rights.
This Urgent Action may be reposted if kept intact, including contact
information and stop action date (if applicable). Thank you for your
help with this appeal.
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