Contact Governor Perry to Urge Him to Stop the Execution of DaRoyce Mosley on Aug 28.
AP:
Defense attorneys were in the courts trying to keep DaRoyce Mosley from becoming the 22nd condemned inmate executed this year in Texas and the first of three set to die this week on consecutive nights in America’s busiest capital punishment state.
DaRoyce Mosley was convicted in the death of Patricia Colter, one of four people gunned down during a robbery on July 21, 1994, in a bar in the east Texas city of Kilgore.
Mosley contended he was involved only in the robbery and not the killings.
Cynthia Orr, one of Mosley’s trial lawyers, said the trial was held amid threats and rumors about Ku Klux Klan violence. Mosley is black. All the victims were white. Eleven of the jurors were white and one black. A request to move the trial elsewhere was denied.
Son, brother set for execution
Sunday, August 26, 2007
KILGORE — Holding a tissue to her tear-streaked face, Charline Jackson whispered to herself. “That’s my baby,” she murmured as she gazed at a picture of her son. Soon, pictures are all she will have of him.
Her son, DaRoyce Mosley, is scheduled to be executed Tuesday.
 Michael Cavazos/News-Journal Photo
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| Charles Hollis trys to comfort Charline Jackson on Saturday as Jackson tries to discuss the trial of her son DaRoyce Mosley, who received the death sentence and is scheduled to be executed Tuesday. On Oct. 28, 1995, Mosley was found guilty of the 1994 capital murder of Patricia Colter and was sentenced to death. |
Mosley, 32, was sentenced to death for killing a bar patron in 1994. His uncle, Ray Don Mosley, was also convicted in the shootings, and got three life sentences.
Even as Mosley’s family members and friends prepare themselves for his execution, they remain positive that he is innocent.
This makes it especially hard to face Mosley’s fate, said Reshunda Ross, his sister.
“If we felt like he was guilty and this was happening, it wouldn’t hurt as much,” she said, trying to choke back tears. Around her, Mosley’s mother, two grandmothers and family friends, began to weep as well.
Mosley’s mother and sister offered no explanation for his innocence other than to say the act was not part of his character. However, his sister hinted that others at the scene may have had a role in the shooting. Ross said that Christopher “Kaboo” Smith, a cousin of Marcus Smith — also a suspect in the shootings — may have given false testimony against Mosley.
“(Kaboo’s testimony) was a shock because him and DaRoyce were best friends,” Ross said. “I believe
(Kaboo) turned on his friend to save his cousin.”
She dismissed the idea that her brother had committed murder for money, since he had just won a settlement for a traffic incident.
“Money was not the issue,” she said, adding that being in the wrong place at the wrong time was his crime.
“If he’s guilty of anything, that’s what he’s guilty of.”
Ross and Mosley’s mother and grandmothers pointed out that he would never have shot someone because of race, since he was friends with many white people.
“Deep in my heart, I know he did not do it,” Jackson said of her son. “I think the system is doing him wrong. They’re taking an innocent life when they shouldn’t.”
Mosley was majoring in engineering at Kilgore College when the shooting happened. He played basketball and football, ran track and maintained good grades, his mom recalled.
“Never got in any trouble (before being arrested for the shooting),” Jackson said, shaking her head. “He didn’t even have a parking ticket.”
“He was a bright, smart young man,” said Edna Powe, one of Mosley’s grandmothers. “I’m sorry about the people that got murdered. I do not believe my grandson did that. He wasn’t that type of person.”
His sister agreed.
“I don’t believe my brother could have done this,” Ross said.
“My heart goes out to the families who lost their loved ones that night,” she continued. “We also lost two loved ones. Not only did we lose (DaRoyce) then, we have to lose him for a second time on (Tuesday). And for good this time.”
Powe and Mosley’s other grandmother, Francis Mosley, have talked with him about that night during visits. They are sure he is telling the truth when he says he didn’t kill anybody.
“My grandson told me, he said, ‘Nanny, they done stacked the cards on me,’ ” Francis Mosley said. “It’s not right.”
Once a week for the past 13 years, Jackson has visited her son in prison. She will get four more hours with him Tuesday before watching him be executed.
“It’s hard,” she said. “It’s hard not putting my arms around my baby. It’s hard not kissing him. If I could trade my life for him, I would, because he ain’t had a life.”
Still, Johnson refuses to give up hope that the execution may be called off. Francis Mosley doesn’t want to think it will happen, either, but at Mosley’s urging she has begun setting up funeral arrangements.
“Tuesday’s going to be hard for us,” Francis Mosley said. “If (it happens). If. That’s a big word.”
