Forty-five years after Jimmie Lee Jackson was killed, former Alabama state trooper James Bonard Fowler has been prosecuted by Michael Jackson, a black district attorney general who agreed to a lesser charge against the 77-year-old man — a type of “truth and reconciliation” moment as The Star’s John Fleming noted in a New York Times article.

I think a thorough truth and reconciliation exploration, akin to that in South Africa, could help further the greatly needed racial healing in our state.

The Fowler prosecution/sentencing makes me think of some people on Alabama’s death row who, unlike Fowler, have yet to receive justice, much less mercy, and thus additionally the urgency of overhauling Alabama’s capital system. Last year, a House Judiciary subcommittee recommended a serious study to rectify injustices, but at the end of the session the proposal died — and in the meantime five people have been executed by our state, which has the highest per-capita death row population in the U.S. (Having inadequate representation, the mentally retarded Holly Wood was executed, despite the fact that it is unconstitutional to do so.)

For more information, visit Project Hope to Abolish the Death Penalty at www.phadp.org. Urge legislative support for moratorium study and judicial rectification.

Judy Collins
Lanett