Gov. Bill Lee announced Wednesday that he won’t intervene in Nicholas Sutton’s scheduled execution Thursday. Sutton will likely die in the electric chair Thursday night for killing a fellow inmate in January of 1985.
That’s after more than a dozen people asked the governor to let Sutton spend the rest of his life in prison. Prison staffers, jurors and some relatives of those killed say Sutton has gone from a life-taker to lifesaver.
On a hot summer day in 1985, just months after Sutton stabbed Carl Estep to death in a prison cell, Tony Eden thought he was going to die. The former correctional officer was caught in the midst of a prison riot at the now-shuttered Tennessee State Prison.
Five men armed with knives surrounded Eden and tried to take him hostage.
“I was scared. I guess I can tell you that. I was real scared,” he said. “I just figured my life was over with.”
But then, Sutton and another inmate pulled Eden out of the fray.
“They carried me down to the trap gate and let me go. I still had my keys on me,” he says. “And I figured, Nick, he saved my life. I wouldn’t be here talking to you today if it weren’t for him.”
Eden is one of five people — three correctional officers and two fellow inmates — who say they owe their lives to Sutton. They say both correctional staff and inmates would actually be safer if he remains in prison, instead of being executed.
Sutton’s supporters haven’t asked for him to be released from prison. Neither they nor Sutton deny that he killed four people — a pair of acquaintances and his own grandmother as an 18-year-old, and then a fellow inmate five years later.
But they say Sutton has spent the past 34 years on death row working to better himself. He’s kicked a drug addiction, taken classes with Vanderbilt’s Divinity School and mentored younger men in the unit.
“He’s different than the others, because he tries to help people all the time,” Eden said. “I guarantee you it’s not show. He truly helps people.”
Joyce House says Sutton also saved the life of her son, Paul, who served on death row with Sutton until he was exonerated in 2009. During that time, Paul developed multiple sclerosis. House says Sutton brought her son food when he was bedridden, helped him shower, and even carried him to the visitation room when he was too weak to walk.
In an affidavit provided for Sutton’s clemency petition, House called Sutton her son’s “saving grace.”
“He was doing what I couldn’t do,” House said in a phone interview. “And I was just grateful for what he did.”
House developed a close relationship with Sutton during the years she spent visiting her son, and she believes Sutton was different from many of the other men she met during her trips to death row. Sutton, she said, regretted the choices he’d made that had landed him behind bars.
“I could sit there and talk to him like an adult,” she said. “Nick told me more than once, ‘If I could take it back I would.'”
Every year at Christmas, House said, she’d send two packages to the prison — one for Paul and one for Sutton. And even after her son was released from death row, House continued to send Sutton letters, providing updates on Paul’s progress.
House still hasn’t told her son about Sutton’s pending execution. All Paul knows is that she recently took a trip to Nashville to help with the case.
“He said, ‘Oh, that’s a good thing, Mom, because Nick’s my friend.’ He said, He helped me so much,'” House told WPLN News. “‘I said, ‘I know he did.'”
Eden said Sutton has been a positive influence in Unit 2, the part of Riverbend Maximum Security Institution that houses death row inmates.
“He takes care of the inmates, the employees. I mean, he’s just a different guy than I’ve ever seen,” Eden said. “This is the first time I’ve ever tried to help an inmate, in 30 years. That ought to tell you something.”
Several relatives of Sutton’s victims have also said they want his life to be spared. Rosemary Hall, the oldest daughter of Carl Estep, says Sutton’s execution would only exacerbate the pain her family has already suffered in the wake of her father’s death.
“It breaks my heart that Mr. Sutton has lost so much of his life on death row for killing my father,” she wrote in an affidavit for Sutton’s clemency petition.
Lowell Sutton, a cousin, says Sutton “transformed his life in prison.”
“[A]lthough the loss of my aunt was very hard on our family, I forgive Nick, our family forgives Nick, and we do not want him to be executed,” Lowell wrote. “Our family supports a life sentence and we have no desire to see Nick put to death.”
Still, Amy Large Cook says she hasn’t forgiven the man who killed her brother, John Large. Cook tells the Knoxville News Sentinel that she plans to be at Riverbend prison for Sutton’s execution. She did not respond to WPLN News’ request for comment.
Sutton is the fourth person set for execution since Gov. Lee took office last year. Lee has denied appeals for clemency in all four cases. In a statement, the governor said, “After careful consideration of Nicholas Sutton’s request for clemency and a thorough review of the case, I am upholding the sentence of the State of Tennessee and will not be intervening.”
Samantha Max is a Report for America corps members.
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