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 The Chronicle welcomes you online! Please feel free to respond to these editorials or letters to the editor by sending your letters to the editor.

We condense letters; most, as published, won't exceed 300 words. A letter must include the writer's name and city, which will be published, and an address and telephone number for verification, which will not be published. Writers may be limited to one letter every 30 days. Open letters, letters to third parties and poetry are not considered. Letters from people living outside the Chronicle's circulation area usually are not considered.

No clemency for Williams

Web posted August 20, 2000

 Have a thought? Go to the @ugusta Forums.

Augusta Chronicle Editorial Staff

Killer Alexander E. Williams IV has yet to pay for the evil he did 14 years ago when he kidnapped, robbed, raped and murdered a 16-year-old girl here in Augusta, and stashed her lifeless, violated body in the woods.

Although he was tried and convicted in 1986, only last week - just before his scheduled execution - did he finally admit his guilt, and only as a desperate plea for his own sorry life.

That is not remorse. That is a deviant's hope that he'll be spared the electric chair, which is a kinder death than his victim experienced.

The Georgia Board of Pardons and Parole will hear his clemency plea on Tuesday and decide whether to grant a stay of execution. Williams' attorneys want the board to convert the sentence to life in prison. If the board denies the clemency plea, Williams could be executed on Thursday.

Years have passed while Williams' lawyers made appeal after appeal, including one that said he had not received adequate representation. None of that matters now that he has admitted his guilt.

The delays have gone on long enough. The family of Aleta Bunch has suffered long enough while waiting for justice that never seems come.

Although in Georgia many of those who have been sentenced to die have been resentenced to life in prison, the pardons and parole board should take Williams' letter of admission as proof positive.

The aggravating circumstances surrounding the girl's death - the fact that Williams kidnapped, robbed and raped her - are what got him the death penalty. Let earthly justice finally be done. Send Williams on to his final judgment.