Petition For A Stay of Execution Filed in Butts County for Warren Lee Hill, Jr.

Hill was sentenced to death for the 1990 killing of an inmate while serving a life sentence at the time.

Hill’s legal options are running out.

The latest legal filing is a petition for writ of habeas corpus.

WABE legal analyst Page Pate says this is common as an execution date draws near.

“What Mr. Hill’s lawyer has filed is another habeas petition asking a judge to stay the execution and to then determine whether or not Mr. Hill deserves another trial to adequately present his mental illness defense.”

In this petition, Carl Humphrey is the respondent.

He’s warden of the Georgia Diagnostic Prison in Jackson, Georgia.

There, Hill is scheduled to die by lethal injection Monday at 7pm.

Pate says there’s a reason Humphrey is listed on the petition.

“A habeas petition is technically a civil case. It’s not a criminal case,” says Pate.

“So the person that’s being detained, the inmate, has to sue the person that’s holding him, in this case a warden to secure his release.”

A decision from the United States Supreme Court is still pending regarding Warren Lee Hill, Jr.

This is an appeal of an earlier filing with the court which was denied.

Pate says it is somewhat interesting that the high court justices previously ruled not to hear the case.

Georgia law requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt for determining mental retardation to prevent an execution, that’s the highest standard in the country.

“So I think there’s certainly a need for uniformity among the states and so I’m surprised that the Supreme Court whichever way they decided to rule didn’t accept this case and make it one standard that could be applied in every state across the country,” says Pate.

Hill’s mental disability is thoroughly detailed in the petition.

It’s been the same primary defense used throughout all the legal filings on his behalf.

Page Pate says the case really comes down to a geographical location of where Hill’s murder took place.

“It seems ridiculous that basically whether or not we’re going to execute this person will depend upon where he committed this offense. Had he done this in Alabama, he would have been able to prove his mental disability by a preponderance of the evidence and he would likely not be executed.”

Hill’s execution was rescheduled because the state is changing its lethal injection protocol.