Doubts On Death Row

WILLIAM HANCE'S APPOINTMENT with the electric chair was set for 7 p.m. Thursday. On Wednesday, the Georgia board of pardons and paroles rejected Hance's appeal for clemency. The next day, both a state and federal court refused to halt the execution; then the U.S. Supreme Court, after a two-hour stay, denied Hance's appeal. Soon after, Hance was strapped into Georgia's electric chair. At 10:10 p.m. he was pronounced dead. The legal skirmishing had gained him exactly 190 extra minutes of life.

Hance became the 231st convict to be executed since the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976. But this...