BREAKING: Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey announced on Tuesday that she was granting clemency to Sonny Burton, commuting his death sentence to a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.

As Law Dork reported over the weekend, Burton had been scheduled to be executed on Thursday for a murder that everyone agrees he did not commit. While a participant in the robbery in 1991 that led to the murder of Doug Battle, Burton was not the gunman — and was not even in the store at the time of the shooting. The gunman was ultimately sentenced to life in prison, while Burton was sentenced to death.

In announcing her clemency decision, reported by Alabama Reflector’s Brian Lyman, Ivey said in a statement, “I cannot proceed in good conscience with the execution of Mr. Burton under such disparate circumstances. I believe it would be unjust for one participant in this crime to be executed while the participant who pulled the trigger was not.”

This is only the second time Ivey commuted a death sentence since she become governor in 2017.

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