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Former death row inmate pleads for life of legal offices
©Associated Press
January 31, 2003
TALLAHASSEE -- A year after being released from Florida's death row, Juan Melendez said Thursday he is a living example of what's wrong with capital punishment.
Melendez, who lived nearly 18 years with a death sentence, told reporters he's also an example of the success of the state legal offices that file appeals for death row inmates.
Gov. Jeb Bush has proposed closing the three agencies, called the offices of the Capital Collateral Representative Counsel. Bush instead wants to expand the state's use of private lawyers and cut overall funding for death row attorneys from $10-million to $6-million.
"If it wouldn't have been for CCR, I would have been a dead man today," Melendez said.
Melendez spoke at a news conference by Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, which brought him back to Florida from Puerto Rico to offer support to Rudolph Holton, who was released from Florida's death row last week.
"One of the reasons I also came was to support Rudy in his freedom . . . and to celebrate," Melendez said.
Melendez walked off death row in early January 2002.
Melendez was freed after prosecutors in Polk County decided they would not go ahead with a new trial after his conviction was overturned. The prosecutors said they no longer had enough evidence.
Melendez was convicted on witness testimony in the 1983 killing of cosmetology school owner Delbert Baker, even though there was no physical evidence linking Melendez to the murder.
Holton was released from death row last week after prosecutors in Tampa said they didn't have enough evidence to retry him for the 1986 murder of a Tampa teenage girl.
He was the 25th Florida death row inmate to be freed in the past 30 years.
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