ATLANTA – The State Board of Pardons and Paroles has invited representatives for condemned inmate Warren Lee Hill to meet with the Board on Monday, January 26, 2015, at 9:00 a.m., to advocate clemency for him. Hill is scheduled to die by lethal injection on Tuesday, January 27, 2015, at 7 p.m., at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson, Georgia.

Warren Lee Hill was serving a life sentence for the 1985 murder of his girlfriend, when he killed Joseph Handspike, another inmate at Lee Correctional Institute, on August 17, 1990. In 1991, a jury convicted Hill of murder in the case and sentenced him to death.

In July of 2012, the Parole Board considered and denied a petition for clemency for Hill. Subsequent legal challenges in the case filed by Hill’s representatives have been unsuccessful. On January 16, 2015, a new execution order was issued by the Lee County Superior Court.  Due to a change in the Parole Board’s composition since its 2012 decision, another meeting with Mr. Hill’s representatives has now been scheduled.

In Georgia, the Parole Board has the sole constitutional authority to commute, or reduce, a death sentence to life or life without parole. Only after an inmate appears to have exhausted all appeals and other judicial avenues of relief will the Parole Board consider granting a commutation to a death-sentenced inmate. The Board maintains a comprehensive file on every death-sentenced inmate. The file includes the circumstances of the offense, the inmate’s criminal history and a comprehensive history of the life of the condemned inmate. Board Members will complete a thorough review of this material prior to hearing from the inmate’s representatives on January 26, 2015.

It is anticipated that the meeting will be closed as authorized by O.C.G.A. § 50-14-3 (a)(2). No public comment will be taken at this meeting and no other business will be conducted. Media will be afforded the opportunity to take photographs prior to the meeting. Media should check in with credentials by 8:30 a.m., in the Board’s public reception office at 2 Martin Luther King, Jr., Drive, East Tower, 4th Floor, room 458. Media should first be cleared for entry by building security on the Plaza Level. Members of the media will be given an opportunity to wait until the conclusion of the meeting to interview those seeking executive clemency for Hill, if they choose to grant interviews.

For more information on the Parole Board, please visit the website at www.pap.georgia.gov.

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