From an early age, Conner's teachers suspected he was intellectually disabled, his lawyers wrote. Neither his trial jury nor state appellate courts heard about his upbringing or intellectual disability, his lawyers wrote. Conner was "raised in almost unimaginable circumstances of poverty and violence," his lawyers wrote in a clemency application asking that his sentence be commuted to life in prison. The parole board is the only entity authorized to commute a death sentence in Georgia. Conner grew up in a home where extreme violence, drug and alcohol abuse and sexual and emotional abuse were the norm, his lawyers wrote.

Source: ABC News July 13, 2016 08:03 UTC