James Earl Reed has been granted a stay

James Earl Reed has been granted a stay. The stay came just in the nick of time. He was scheduled to die at 1800 hrs and the stay was issued at 1740 hrs.

Reed was to die in the electric chair. The stay triggered several other legal moves by the State as it sought out to carry out the death penalty.

Prisons spokesman said state lawyers filed a motion with the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., to vacate the stay. They also filed the motion with the U.S. Supreme Court in case they were successful at the lower level and challenged again.

Even if state attorneys got the stay lifted Friday night, the state might have to reschedule the execution because it must be carried out by midnight.
Reed, 49, has been on death row since 1996, when he was convicted of murdering Joseph and Barbara Lafayette in their Charleston County home two years earlier. Prosecutors said he was looking for an ex-girlfriend

James Earl Reed fired his attorney during the trial. Reed then decided to represent himself, denying the killings despite a confession and arguing that no physical evidence placed him at the scene. Jurors found him guilty and decided he should die.


James Earl Reed operates his own web site HERE.

Here is the first part of his site.

My name is James Earl Reed, with the SCDC number of 5041 being incarcerated upon South Carolina Death Row, here within Ridgeville S.C. at Lieber Corr. Inst. Where I am within a urgent need of help!

This case is upon black and white, meaning court transcribe, along with being upon television camera for my lawyer at the S.C. appellate defense 1122 Lady St. Suite 940 Columbia S.C. 29201-3243 Joseph L. Savitz trial transcribes. News channel 2 NBC (843) 884-2288, Mrs. Jill Ford I gave her a one hour and thirty minute interview before trial, plus a thick folder of all the state paperwork, with all the covering the full trial in court camera, for I was my own lawyer within this death penalty case/trial. News channel 4 ABC (843) 881-4444 covered the full trial only in court camera. News channel 5 CBS (843) 577-6397 Ben Mankiewicz, I gave him a one hour and 45 minutes interview along with a thick folder with all the evidence, plus other state paperwork, along with on camera all the pictures of the crime. I didn’t every hide, nor hold back anything from anyone!

The big issue within this death penalty case/trial, was that I would be representing myself which I have come to find out this hasn’t been done, until I became the first! Within this state, and was told perhaps within any other state! I didn’t become my own lawyer for no type of fame nor glory! Yet to save my life period! I had the head public defender of Charleston S.C. Ashley Pennington, for his trial strategy was call reconciliation, that’s it! Not to do a effective cross-examination, to whittle down the adversary’s state

evidence, which all the state evidence help’s me! So I fired both lawyers, and took my own case not knowing the law well enough to handle a death penalty trial as such, just the truth and knowing this truth it carried me through the 7 day trial without stopping it to teach me anything!

Where I am within a urgent need of help!