Committed Suicide Before Texas Could Execute

"USA: Suicide at the Foot of the Scaffold Translated Monday 6 November 2006, by Liliane BollandUnited States: Condemned to die under very dubious conditions, he took his own life a few hours before his execution, claiming his innocence. He was condemned to death.He had been waiting for eleven years for his sentence to be carried out. He was due to be transported to the infamous prison of Huntsville, Texas, where last Thursday evening, he was to be given a lethal injection. He committed suicide a few hours earlier.Michael Johnson, 29 years old, had always claimed his innocence of the crime he was accused of. He was found in his cell, lying in a pool of blood. He slit his throat, using a blade he had made himself with a small piece of metal attached to a stick of wood. Before dying, the young man left a message on the wall of his cell, written in his own blood: “I did not do it.”...............................................Michael Johnson would have been the 46th victim since the beginning of this year of judicially-sanctioned murder in the United States.But, instead, he took his own life."source: http://www.humaniteinenglish.com/article406.html"Michael Dewayne Johnson Texas Death Row Scheduled for Execution on October 19, 2006 For a Crime to Which Someone Else has Already ConfessedIntroduction On October 19, 2006 the State of Texas is scheduled to execute Michael Dewayne Johnson for a crime he did not commit. Now 29 years old, Michael Johnson has been sitting on Texas Death Row since July of 1996 for a crime to which David Noel Vest had confessed in February of 1996. In fact, Vest signed a sworn confession before Michael Johnson even went to trial, and Crawford Long, the First Assistant District Attorney of McLennan County, Texas (one of Johnson's trial prosecutors) admits that this confession was suppressed, keep secret from Michael Johnson and his trial attorneys.In June of 2006 the Chicago Tribune published a series of articles by Maurice Possley and Steve Mills that provide .......................... " source: http://www.adelante.com/michaeljohnson/index.html