When Stephen Bright takes on a new death row client, he makes them a promise. He pledges to stick with them all the way. He means it. Five times now he has gone with a condemned man into the death chamber.
In 1985, he had to do it twice in a single month. The first was Joseph Carl Shaw, a former military policeman in South Carolina. Shaw was schizophrenic and had been in the throes of a psychotic episode when he sought urgent medical help on his army base. They told him to come back after the weekend. The next day, he committed murder. Bright was with Shaw as he was strapped to the electric chair, kissing him on the cheek as a final farewell. Then Shaw was hit with 2,300 volts.
