01/11/2021
Last week, for the third time in a row, Oklahoma has shown it cannot carry out a constitutional ex*****on following the of .
Below is a statement from John Grants attorney, Sarah Jernigan.
"John Grant took full responsibility for the murder of Gay Carter, and he spent his years on death row trying to understand and atone for his actions, more than any other client I have worked with.
However, we must not forget Oklahoma’s hand in this tragic story. When John stole to feed and clothe himself and his siblings, Oklahoma labeled him a delinquent instead of a desperate and traumatized child left to fend for himself. John wasn’t even a teenager yet when Oklahoma sent him to the first of several state-run youth detention facilities. ‘Oklahoma Shame’ would later be the label affixed to the horrors that occurred inside the walls of these facilities during John’s time there, after national investigations uncovered years of institutional abuse. John’s trauma from these facilities was so deep that he was simply unable to speak about it; what we learned of the myriad abuses he endured comes from others.
Oklahoma ultimately dumped John on the streets with no skills and no support for the mental illness that was exacerbated by years of being both the victim of and witness to beatings, rapes, and extended periods in solitary confinement, amongst other abuses. When he committed a robbery at age seventeen, Oklahoma sent him to an adult prison, subjecting him to further victimization, as later documented in a class-action lawsuit.
Through all of this, John never received the mental health care he needed or deserved in prison. And when he eventually committed a violent crime, the murder of a prison worker, Oklahoma provided him with incompetent lawyers who had no business handling a case with the ultimate punishment at stake.
I pray John Grant is at peace now, and I pray his death brings peace and closure to Ms. Carter’s family.”
