On January 27, 1981, Hurtsboro, Alabama Police Chief George L. Claypool, 43, responded to a report of a suspicious person. A confrontation followed and Claypool was shot and killed with his own weapon. The suspect, identified as George Daniel, was arrested and eventually convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death.

Defense lawyers raised questions about Daniel’s competency, but a man presented at trial as a clinical psychologist testified that Daniel was fit to stand trial. That testimony proved to be false: the so-called expert was later revealed to be a high school dropout with no credentials in psychology. In 1990 Daniel’s conviction and death sentence were overturned; he was removed from death row and committed to a state mental hospital.

The case leaves open difficult questions about how the false expert’s testimony affected the original proceedings and about accountability for that fraud. Did anyone in Hurtsboro or the region recognize the man who posed as the psychologist or have information about his involvement in the trial?