ATLANTA - The State Board of Pardons and Paroles has invited representatives for condemned inmate Kenneth Fults to meet with the Board on Monday, April 11, 2016, at 9:00 a.m. to advocate clemency for him. Fults is scheduled to die by lethal injection on Tuesday, April 12, 2016, at 7 p.m. at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson. The Spalding County Superior Court issued the execution order.

On May 19, 1997, Fults pled guilty to the 1996 murder of Cathy Bounds. Fults pled guilty to malice murder, felony murder, burglary, kidnapping with bodily injury and possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime. On May 22, 1997, following a sentencing trial, the jury recommended a death sentence for Fults.

Kenneth Fults’ direct appeal proceedings and his state and federal habeas corpus proceedings have been concluded. The United States Supreme Court denied Fults’ request to appeal on October 5, 2015. 

In Georgia, the Parole Board has the sole constitutional authority to commute, or reduce, a death sentence to life with the possibility of parole or to life without the possibility of parole. Only after an inmate appears to have exhausted all 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 history of the life of the condemned inmate, the inmate’s criminal history and the circumstances of the offense that was committed resulting in the death sentence.

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, S.E., 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 Fults if they choose to grant interviews.

For more information please contact Steve Hayes, Director of the Office of Communications, at 404-657-9450 or [email protected] or visit our website at www.pap.georgia.gov.

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