SOME TIME AGO my husband and I saw a television drama based on a true story of a man unjustly accused of murder and sentenced to death. While testifying on the stand, the real guilty party lied so convincingly that the jury believed him. We wondered if we had been on the jury, would we have believed the liar, too?
In an appeal, the governor of the state listened to the testimony again, found the truth about the liar, and commuted the sentence of the accused. However, the people were not happy with this decision, took the law into their own hands, and carried out the execution. Many years later the truth was brought out again, and the innocent man was then given a pardon posthumously.
In his investigation, the governor made a statement about another governor from 2,000 years ago who unjustly sentenced a man to death. He said that that governor went down in history as most despicable. This governor had said he could not live with the idea of going down in history as having been unjust.
