He was sentenced to death by hanging but yesterday 26-year-old Gilroy Wade was killed by a bullet. Tonight police say they have a suspect detained for yesterday afternoon’s jailhouse murder but no one has been charged. According to prison authorities, Wade - who was on death row – was coming off recreation break in the yard, and was going up on the stairs when he was shot in the back of the head. He was shot by a fellow prisoner armed with.38 revolver equipped with a homemade silencer.
The gun had been smuggled into the prison from sometime before and prison authorities have recovered it while police say they have the gunman. But that is about all we know about the killing tonight. Prison authorities say the case is in the hands of the police and the police say they are investigating.
But who was Gilroy Wade and why did someone want him dead? Here’s what Keith Swift found out.
Gilroy Wade, Deceased
[May 2007] “We are young and we all make mistakes…but how much I have to pay. How much I have to pay?”
Yesterday afternoon Gilroy Wade paid the ultimate price for that mistake – his life. Wade was on death row for the July 2000 murder of this man – Azrin White on Iguana Street. He was charged and convicted along with two other men. But for the entire seven years that he was in prison, 5 of which he was on death row, Gilroy has maintained his innocence – saying he wasn’t the gunman. He repeated this on Michael Finnegan’s Lik Road talk show in May of this year.
Gilroy Wade,
“They don’t know who killed this man. I have to come outright and say it plain: they don’t know who killed Azrin White. What I want to ask you…”
Michael Finnegan,
Were you on the scene?
Gilroy Wade,
“I was on any scene. I am in prison for hearsay; he said, she said. I am sentenced to death for he said, he said. How do you think I feel Mr. Finnegan?”
Gilroy could have escaped that death sentence last year when the Privy Council offered him a chance to serve life in prison instead of death. He refused.
The Kolbe Foundation’s CEO confirmed to us that for three months Gilroy Wade was on lockdown inside the supermax area of the prison. He was placed there in June after he stabbed a fellow prisoner - Clifford Hyde multiple times. The prison says he was locked down in supermax for his own safety but they returned him to the general population two weeks ago at the behest of his family. His mom Avis Williams says her only request was to see her son.
Avis Williams, Mother of Deceased
“So they would have kept him 18 years in the hole because of this boy Hyde and the conflict? That is why they
are there – to protect people and to prevent those kinds of situations. You can’t hide somebody because something is going to happen to somebody. You can’t do that. So what is your job if you can’t protect the people under your care. What is their job?
If they had kept him in the place and said, okay Miss Williams you could come, take a visit with your son. But many days I go there and they don’t even want me to see him. They turn me back. If you are protecting him, how can you protect him when you don’t even want him to see his mom, he can’t call his mom and he can’t get what his mom brings. I don’t call that protect - that is punishment. That is not protect. If you are protecting and say okay go over there, you could see your son today. Let’s say I could see him two times for the week but for months I didn’t see my son.”
The last time Avis Williams saw her son alive was Monday when she visited the prison. She says what hurts the most about her son’s murder is that she hasn’t received any call or any visit from prison authorities.
Avis Williams,
“Worse because nobody tells me anything. Nobody come and tell me. Somebody called his sister in PG and his sister called my son and then my son called me for me to know my son got shot here. You think that right?”
Lorraine Williams, Aunt of Deceased
“All we ask for is Mr. Woods, Mr. Skeen, whoever is responsible – give we the family respect. That is all we are asking for. Nothing we do, he won’t come back. He is not coming back but the thing is give us the respect which we deserve. This is not a dog whe dead. We are asking for the prison to just come to we and tell we what they think went on or what we could do…just give us some kind of explanation that we know that they are concerned or they are looking out for whoever else is there.”
Wade had been in prison on death row from before he turned 18. He became a man behind those prison walls and yesterday he died behind those walls. For him it is a life lesson other young men can learn from.
Gilroy Wade,
“Just look at we. We are the example why you have to change your lives.”
Michael Finnegan,
“How old are you now Gilroy?”
Gilroy Wade,
“I am 25 years old. I came here when I was 18. The youths have to wise up. Those who are going to school and watching man on street corners, don’t watch them. Go to school, don’t even look their way.”
Late news from police is that Deon Slusher has been charged for Gilroy Wade’s murder. Slusher is serving a life sentence for killing businessman Phillip Chin.
And as to what Wade was convicted for, he was charged along with Oscar Mendez and Glenford Baptist for the Azrin White murder. Supreme Court Justice Wilfred Elrington sentenced all three to death by hanging in November of 2001. All three appealed and in June of 2002 the Court of Appeals quashed Mendez’s conviction because of a faulty eyewitness identification. Mendez has since died. Baptist is still in prison. Gilroy Wade was one of 7 prisoners on death row.
