Defense often inadequate in 4 death-penalty states, review finds

The jurors heard all about the convenience-store holdup, the gunshots and the dead clerk. Their unanimous verdict came swiftly: Warren King was guilty of a senseless murder that shocked rural Appling County, Ga.

A death sentence almost certainly would be next, unless King's lawyer could persuade the jury to spare his life.

But G. Terry Jackson, King's state-appointed lawyer, didn't do much.

With little money to unearth details about his client's past, Jackson did not chronicle the mitigating circumstances that could have helped his client. The jury learned almost nothing about the import of King's low IQ, his childhood in a log cabin with no plumbing or electricity, the beatings he took from his alcoholic parents or the succession of foster homes he shuttled through.