In February 1998, James Edward Reid was sentenced to death for the capital murder, attempted rape, and attempted robbery of Annie V. Lester. Reid was 51 years old at the time of the crime. He has no recollection of the events that took place between the time he arrived at Lester's house and the next morning when he awoke with blood on his clothes. Because overwhelming circumstantial evidence linked him to the crime, Reid entered a guilty plea. Evidence connecting him to the crime included fingerprint and DNA matches and handwriting samples, all found either at the scene or on Reid's bloody clothes. His attorneys hoped to avoid a death sentence by showing that Reid blacked out during the crime.

During the sentencing phase of the trial, Reid's attorneys presented uncontradicted mitigating evidence, including evidence of three impairments which provided an explanation, if not an excuse, for Reid's actions. First, Reid's attorneys showed that he suffered brain damage stemming from head injuries sustained during a car accident that left him in a coma for five days. As a result of the accident, the part of Reid's brain that affects personality and the ability to control impulses was damaged. Second, his attorneys showed that the head injuries led to the development of a seizure disorder. Third, Reid's attorneys showed that Reid was an alcoholic and binge drinker. Three medical experts discussed these impairments and explained their effect on Reid's ability to form the requisite intent necessary to make him eligible for the death penalty. The experts testified to Reid's tendency to blackout when intoxicated and his inability to perform intentional acts during the blackout periods. In addition, Reid's family members and friends testified to the nature and extent of Reid's impairments and blackouts. Reid's attorneys argued that the combination of Reid's health problems, mixed with alcohol, triggered blackout periods during which Reid became a different person. However, when Reid was sober, he was a calm, kind, and conscientious person.

In his direct appeal to the Supreme Court of Virginia, Reid claimed that the trial court had failed to properly consider uncontradicted evidence, including evidence which showed no planning, premeditation, or memory of the crime. Reid argued that this evidence refuted the vileness factor, the aggravating factor relied upon by the trial judge in sentencing Reid to death. The Supreme Court of Virginia concluded that the trial court had properly considered Reid's mitigating evidence. The court also found that Reid's death sentence was neither excessive nor disproportionate.

How Reid could have been sentenced to death despite the compelling and uncontradicted medical evidence, may be explained by the abysmal quality of his legal counsel.

It was on the advice of his counsel, Peter Theodore and Robby Jenkins, that Reid pled guilty to capital murder, and was subsequently sentenced to death by Honorable Judge Ray Grubbs in January 1998.  In fact, Reid’s lawyers advised him to plead guilty without investigating whether he had a viable defense and while laboring under a misunderstanding of Virginia law regarding pleas.              

Reid’s attorneys advised him to plead guilty before they had obtained and considered reports from the medical experts who examined Reid and the State’s evidence.  After reviewing the evidence and Reid’s history, all experts concluded that due to Reid’s severe brain injury from a car accident years earlier, and his extreme intoxication at the time of the offense, Reid would have been unable to premeditate and form the intent necessary to sustain a charge of first degree murder.

In addition, at the time Reid’s attorneys advised him they erroneously believed that the trial court could reduce the charge after the plea, and in fact asked the court to do so in this case.   As the federal district court judge who presided over the habeas proceedings noted, Virginia law had not permitted a trial court to reduce charges after a plea for over 20 years.  Reid’s attorneys simply did not know the law.

Reid’s lead counsel, Pete Theodore, has since been suspended from practice for lying to the court in this case.  During state and federal habeas proceedings, the courts nevertheless upheld Reid’s guilty plea and death sentence relying upon an affidavit Theodore prepared, claiming that he told Reid to plead guilty because:

James Edward Reid was scheduled for execution on December 18, 2003.  The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals granted Reid a stay of execution on December 17, 2003 following an Amicus Brief filed on his behalf noting the Alabama case (Nelson v Campbell) pending in the Supreme Court that considers whether lethal injection is “cruel and unusual punishment.”  Virginia Attorney General Kilgore appealed this decision to the US Supreme Court. The court denied Kilgore's appeal, upholding the stay on Reid's execution. On August 11, 2004 the US Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision lifted the stay of execution. No reasons were given. However, on August 2nd, the Federal Court of Appeals in Richmond had ruled that Reid had raised legitimate claims that the particular manner in which the VA Department of Corrections (DOC) plans to execute him is prohibited by the Constitution. Thus establishing Reid’s right to file a Civil Rights suit (§1983).

Virginia Attorney General Jerry Kilgore, who also represents the DOC, did not object to the Court of Appeals about the legitimacy of Reid’s claims.  Instead, he went to the county circuit court and insisted that an execution date be set so soon it may prevent the federal court from resolving Reid’s challenge. Montgomery Circuit Court Judge Ray E. Grubbs has ordered that James Edward Reid be executed at the Greensville Correctional Center on Sept. 9^th.  The order sets the stage for a tense stand-off between the state and federal courts over Reid’s execution.  

Reid's call for a stay of execution to allow his case to be heard was denied, and Reid was executed on September 9, 2004.