Summary of Offense:
Sentenced to death in 1998 for the 1997 shooting to death of a north Alabama man, Harold Pugh, and his 11-year-old son, Joey, in a fishing boat. Ferguson was one of five charged in this case.
Summary of Offense:
Sentenced to death in 1998 for the 1997 shooting to death of a north Alabama man, Harold Pugh, and his 11-year-old son, Joey, in a fishing boat. Ferguson was one of five charged in this case.
On January 22, 2009, Ferguson filed a habeas petition in Federal District Court.
http://dockets.justia.com/docket/ala...v00138/125644/
On July 21, 2014, Ferguson's habeas petition was DENIED in Federal District Court.
http://docs.justia.com/cases/federal...0138/125644/16
On June 27, 2017, the Federal District Court agreed that they improperly dismissed Ferguson's habeas petition and allowed him to refile on an Atkins claim.
https://dockets.justia.com/docket/al...cv00138/125644
"There is a point in the history of a society when it becomes so pathologically soft and tender that among other things it sides even with those who harm it, criminals, and does this quite seriously and honestly. Punishing somehow seems unfair to it, and it is certain that imagining ‘punishment’ and ‘being supposed to punish’ hurts it, arouses fear in it." Friedrich Nietzsche
On June 23, 2022, oral argument will be heard in Ferguson's appeal before the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.
https://www.ca11.uscourts.gov/sites/...9_Ferguson.pdf
'He belongs on death row': Victim's brother speaks out after learning his the killer will appeal the death penalty
By Nicole Zedeck
WAAY News
Only on WAAY31, a family opens up after finding out through our exclusive reporting on a special hearing for the man convicted in the murders of two family members.
Thomas Ferguson is one of five men convicted in the 1997 murders of a father and son in Colbert County.
Ferguson has been on death row at Holman prison since 1998, a sentence he has been trying to overturn for two decades.
He will have a hearing before the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals on June 23rd.
Prior to WAAY31's reporting, the family of the two victims, Joey and Harold Pugh, had no idea Ferguson would be appearing in court again.
Matt McWilliams looks at old pictures of him and his brother, Joey, and is instantly taken back to two decades earlier.
"I remember all of it," says Matt.
Memories flooding back from when he was only three-years-old.
"It's pretty rough on me just not having an older brother to grow up with," he says.
It has been 24 years since Matt's older brother, Joey, was killed at Cane Creek after coming back from a fishing trip with his father, Harold Pugh. Two decades later, Matt still can't come back to Cane Creek.
"I don't know, I just don't want to be where that happened, it just doesn't sit well with me," he says.
Joey was only eleven when Ferguson and four others killed him and his father. All so the five convicts could steal their truck for a getaway car after robbing a bank in Mississippi.
"[Ferguson] belongs on the death row," says Matt.
The jury voted 11-1 for life in prison, but the judge overrode that recommendation and sentenced Ferguson to death. He has been fighting to overturn that sentence ever since, never letting family members like Matt find closure.
"We shouldn't be doing this however many years later," says Matt.
Decades later, he continues the fight to keep his brother's killer locked up. It's something their mother, who passed away in 2010, would have wanted.
"I do it because she would want me to, and I want to make her proud. And something needs to be said, something needs to be done, and I'm here for it," says Matt.
He says he will be at Ferguson's hearing in Atlanta later this month. He expects his friends and family members to be there as well.
The Attorney General's office says they sent out a hearing notification to the family on April 1st, but as people move and update their address, those notifications can get lost as well. They encourage families of crime victims to notify the office if their contact information changes.
https://www.waaytv.com/news/he-belon...cc79b04ce.html
"I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
- Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian
"There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
- Rev. Richard Hawke
“There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
- Rowan Atkinson
Habeas relief denied by the Eleventh Circuit.
https://law.justia.com/cases/federal...023-06-07.html
Thank you for the adventure - Axol
Tried so hard and got so far, but in the end it doesn’t even matter - Linkin Park
Hear me, my chiefs! I am tired. My heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever. - Hin-mah-too-yah-lat-kekt
I’m going to the ghost McDonalds - Garcello
The panel was made up of Judges Wilson (Clinton), Grant (Trump) and Luck (Trump).
En banc rehearing denied 8/7/23.
https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketP...20Exhibits.pdf
Thank you for the adventure - Axol
Tried so hard and got so far, but in the end it doesn’t even matter - Linkin Park
Hear me, my chiefs! I am tired. My heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever. - Hin-mah-too-yah-lat-kekt
I’m going to the ghost McDonalds - Garcello
Final petition for writ of certiorari filed 12/7/23.
https://www.supremecourt.gov/Search....%5C23-639.html
Thank you for the adventure - Axol
Tried so hard and got so far, but in the end it doesn’t even matter - Linkin Park
Hear me, my chiefs! I am tired. My heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever. - Hin-mah-too-yah-lat-kekt
I’m going to the ghost McDonalds - Garcello
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