DENVER (AP) — A mentally disabled man executed more than 70 years ago has been pardoned in Colorado.
Outgoing Gov. Bill Ritter on Friday awarded a posthumous pardon to 23-year-old Joe Arridy, who was executed in 1939 by lethal gas after being convicted of killing a Pueblo girl with a hatchet.
Ritter said an overwhelming amount of evidence suggests Arridy didn't commit the crime.
He had an I.Q. of 46 — too low to be considered for the death penalty today. Arridy appears to have given a coerced confession and was likely not in Pueblo when the 15-year-old girl was killed.
Ritter is a former prosecutor who leaves office Tuesday. He called the Arridy case a "tragic conviction."
It's the first time a Colorado governor has pardoned someone who has been executed.