Philadelphia Death-Row Exoneree Harold Wilson Dies at 61 | Death Penalty Information Center

5.6.19

Philadelphia Death-Row Exoneree Harold Wilson Dies at 61 | Death Penalty Information Center: Harold Wilson, exonerated in 2005 sixteen years after his wrongful conviction and death sentence for a triple murder in a Philadelphia crack house, has died. He had recently suffered a series of strokes that were further complicated by pneumonia. His risk of stroke and the complications that followed had been worsened by the Posttraumatic Stress Disorder he developed as a result of the 17 years he faced the death penalty, most spent in solitary confinement on death row. He died on May 18, 2019. He was 61 years old.

After his exoneration, Mr. Wilson became a vocal advocate for the abolition of capital punishment, working with the death-row exoneree group Witness to Innocence and speaking at events across the country. Kirk Bloodsworth, the nation’s first death-row DNA exoneree and now executive director of Witness to Innocence, called the 6’4” Wilson “a mountain of a man, not just in stature. That was his heart. The way he’d speak and the passion he had in his heart made him twice the size he was.”