Sept. 19 (UPI) — South Carolina death row inmate Freddie Owens will die as scheduled on Friday despite the introduction of an affidavit by his co-defendant proclaiming Owens’ innocence, the state’s high court has ruled.
Owen is scheduled to die by lethal injection at 6 p.m. EDT Friday for the 1997 murder of a convenience store clerk in Greenville, S.C., marking the state’s first execution in 13 years.
As the execution approached on Thursday, Owens’ attorneys introduced a statement from his co-defendant in the 1999 trial for the slaying of clerk Irene Graves during the commission of a robbery at a Speedway convenience store.
Steven Golden, who drew a 30-year sentence for the crime, said in an affidavit that, contrary to his trial testimony, Owens was, in fact, not the triggerman, and was not even at the scene of the robbery.
Rather, it was another unnamed robber who killed Graves, Golden stated.
“I thought the real shooter or his associates might kill me if I named him to the police,” he said in explaining his years of silence. “I am still afraid of that.”