#85: Pastor Kevin Burns & Pastor Kevins Riggs

“Today is the Best Day of My Life” has been the life theme of Kevin Burns ever since he landed on Death Row more than 30 years ago.
 
Kevin Burns is one of the pastors at Franklin Community Church and the “in-residence” pastor of Riverbend Maximum Security Correctional Facility’s The Church of Life – the only church on a death row anywhere in the United States. Kevin Burns will be with us, via cell phone, in this podcast along with Franklin Community Church’s senior pastor, Kevin Riggs.  
 
In 1992 Kevin was caught in a gun fight in Memphis in which two people were killed. Three people, including Kevin, were convicted of felony murder, although Kevin did not actually kill anyone. The other two, who did commit the murders and were convicted, are now out on parole. Kevin is still awaiting his execution. His case was appealed to the Supreme Court, which in April refused to review it in spite of the strong objections of Justices Sotomayor, Jackson, and Kagan.
 
A year after Kevin’s arrest, God called him to become a believer. “God has the ability to change people,” he says. “There is that opportunity for salvation, for reconciliation, for God to restore lives.”
 
It’s not often that we have a speaker at our little breakfast group that is featured in a national television story the same month they are at NCS. We’ll provide more details about an upcoming ABC News story about the inconsistences of felony murder convictions in the United States that features Kevin Burns.