Wrongful Execution

This website is dedicated to never forgetting a gentle man with an intellectual disability who was wrongly convicted and executed for a crime he never could have even begun to commit.

     Arridy was born to non-English-speaking immigrants fresh from Syria. A public school principal expelled him after his first year. A professional labeled him “an imbecile with an IQ of 48.” Neighbors viewed him as a pariah. Other children targeted him for bullying. Then a district court judge committed him to a “State Home for Mental Defectives” where he lived during his teenage years. At age 22, he jumped on a railroad boxcar passing the institution. After that, most of his whereabouts remained unknown – until he was arrested for vagrancy and was coerced into confessing to a horrible rape and axe murder. The real perpetrator had been apprehended and the weapon had been recovered in his home – but he refused to confess to the crime. Then a sheriff claimed that Arridy was with the killer. This “completed” the investigation. Both were convicted and sentenced to death.