Florida exonerees met with legislators to support death penalty repeal

Ron Wright, Herman Lindsey, and Clemente Aguirre attended a community film screening of "Where There is Darkness" and participated in the 2020 FL Death Penalty Abolition Advocacy Days along with FADP and other supporters. the intensive advocacy meetings were a success. There were multiple simultaneous meetings with legislators and executive branch staff and every legislator or their staff was hand-delivered an information packet containing the WTI information and press clippings.

Clemente Aguirre and Ron Wright were able to visit the Supreme Court, the room where the unanimous decisions to acquit them of all charges were made. Ron, who served in the Air Force for 22 years met with Danny Burgess, Exec. Dir of FL Dept. of Veterans Affairs, in the hopes of having his record corrected and his pension restored. The three exonerees meet with death penalty repeal bill co-sponsor Rep. Diane Hart's legislative aide to discuss next steps and wrongful incarceration compensation legislation and met with Ingrid Delgado, Assoc. for Social Concerns, Respect Life - FCCB.

It was a successful visit to Tallahassee and despite the fact that the bill will not be heard this year, the abolition movement in Florida made significant progress with 20 sponsors and co-sponsors for the bill compared to 4 sponsors and co-sponsors in 2019.