25 October 2017 :

Governor Asa Hutchinson has officially commuted the death sentence of Jason McGehee to life without parole. McGehee, 41, White, was one of the eight prisoners the state had scheduled for execution in April. His execution date was April 22. The Arkansas Parole Board voted 6-1 on April 5 (see) to recommend clemency and Governor Hutchinson announced his intention to grant clemency on August 25 (see). The governor's recommendation has to be followed by a 30-day comment period, and today it was formalized. McGehee's clemency petition drew support from both the former Director of the Arkansas Department of Correction, Ray Hobbs, and the trial judge who presided in his case, Robert McCorkindale. Speaking on McGehee's behalf, Hobbs told the Board, "He has learned his lesson, and he still has value that can be given to others if his life is spared." The parole board determined Mr. McGehee warrants clemency instead of death because of his exemplary behavior, his youth at the time of the crime, and also because his sentence is not proportional. Two of McGehee's co-defendants, whom his lawyers argued were at least as culpable as McGehee, had received lesser sentences. The Fair Punishment Project chronicled numerous mitigating factors that, because McGehee's lawyer at trial barely investigated the case, his jury never heard. This included evidence that McGehee had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and that he had experienced severe abuse and neglect as a child that led him to use drugs and alcohol as early as sixth grade. McGehee was 1 of 3 defendants convicted of capital murder and kidnapping in the torture/beating of 15-year-old John Melbourne in Harrison and his ultimate strangulation death near Omaha in August 1996. Melbourne was believed to have been a snitch.