Death Penalty News

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Monday rejected an appeal from a Texas death row inmate whose bid for a new trial drew the support of the prosecutor’s office that originally put him on death row. The justices left in place a Texas appeals court ruling that upheld the murder conviction and death sentence for Areli Escobar, even though Escobar’s case is similar to that of an Oklahoma man, Richard Glossip, whose murder conviction the high court recently overturned.

Kevin Burns is the pastor of the Church of Life, a congregation for the men on Tennessee's death row. Burns was convicted of felony murder and sentenced to death, but he maintains he was at the scene but did not kill. Every day, Kevin Burns says it is the best day of his life. He preaches with urgency. He trusts God in the face of misfortune. He tells his congregation to have faith. No one, no matter their past, is beyond God’s love, he says. During a two-hour service, he sings hymns with his church. He shares communion. From his well-worn King James Version of the Bible he reads aloud verse after verse.

The Louisiana Department of Public Safety & Corrections may have used compressed gas from a Pennsylvania company in the March 18 state execution of Jessie Hoffman, despite the fact that the company prohibits the use of its products for the purpose of killing people.  The office of Gov. Jeff Landry, an avid supporter of the death penalty, directed a request for comment by Gambit to the Department Public Safety & Corrections. Under a public records law passed last year, the department does not reveal information which could identify people or companies involved in executions. The department did not respond to a request for information about its procurement process.

The governor dismissed an ex-judge studying the death penalty in the state and failed to heed a leading voice on the matter. It’s no surprise n Wednesday, 19 March, Arizona executed Aaron Gunches by lethal injection . As ABC News reports , he was put to death for “kidnapping and killing 40-year-old Ted Price by shooting him four times in the Arizona desert”. Gunches’s case was unusual in many ways, not least that he stopped his legal appeals and volunteered to be executed, then changed his mind before changing it again. His execution was scheduled to be carried out almost two years ago. It was put on hold when the Arizona governor, Katie Hobbs, commissioned an independent review of the state’s death penalty procedures after a series of botched executions .

Dhaka, Bangladesh – Lesedi Molapisi, a Botswana national convicted of drug trafficking, was executed in Bangladesh on Friday, 21 March 2025. The 31-year-old was hanged at Dhaka Central Jail after exhausting all legal avenues to appeal her death sentence. Molapisi was arrested in January 2023 upon arrival at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka, where customs officials discovered 3.1 kilograms of heroin hidden in her luggage. Following a trial under Bangladesh’s Narcotics Control Act, she was sentenced to death in May 2024. Her execution was initially delayed due to political unrest in the country but was carried out last week.

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); March 19, 2025: Ezatollah Arab, Moein Arab and Abdolbari Jahani, three Afghan nationals on death row for drug-related offences, were executed in Bandar Abbas Central Prison. According to Haalvsh, an Afghan man was hanged in Bandar Abbas Central Prison on 25 February 2025. His identity has been reported as Abdolbari Jahani who was on death row for drug-related offences.

The trio, all of whom have experience in the shipping industry in Singapore, were arrested in July 2024 after Indonesian authorities intercepted their vessel in the Karimun district, near Singapore. Three Indian nationals from Tamil Nadu identified as Raju Muthukumaran (38), Selvadurai Dinakaran (34), and Govindhasamy Vimalkandhan (45), face the death penalty in Indonesia for allegedly smuggling 106 kg of crystal meth aboard the Singapore-flagged vessel Legend Aquarius.

Grissom used some of his last words on Earth to apologize to everyone he hurt and said that he prays they can find forgiveness for their own sake. As for his execution, he said it was a mercy. Oklahoma executed Wendell Arden Grissom on Thursday for the murder of 23-year-old Amber Matthews in front of her best friend’s two young daughters in 2005.  Grissom, 56, was executed by lethal injection at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester and pronounced dead at 10:13 a.m. local time, becoming the first inmate to be put to death by the state in 2025 and the ninth in the United States this year. 

Among the Japanese, public support for the death penalty remains rock solid. More than 80% of respondents have expressed approval for it. The Cabinet Office has released the results of a public opinion survey on the death penalty. Of the respondents, 83.1% said that having the death penalty is "unavoidable," while 16.5% said that it should be abolished. The Cabinet Office cautioned that simple comparisons cannot be made because the survey method has changed from in-person interviews to questionnaires sent by mail. Nonetheless, the new survey showed that support for the death penalty increased by 2.3% since the previous opinion poll in 2020.

Edward James received 3-drug lethal injection under death warrant signed in February by governor Ron DeSantis  A Florida man who killed an 8-year-old girl and her grandmother on a night in which he drank heavily and used drugs was executed on Thursday.  Edward James, 63, was pronounced dead at 8.15pm after receiving a 3-drug injection at Florida state prison outside Starke under a death warrant signed in February by Governor Ron DeSantis. The execution was the 2nd this year in Florida, which is planning a 3rd in April. 

Mohammad Abdullah al-Faraj is originally from al-Awamiyah, in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. He lived in Dammam and was working as an employee in the private sector. In 2011 and 2012, he allegedly participated in demonstrations and funerals that took place in al-Qatif district in Saudi Arabia protesting the treatment of Shi’a citizens. He was abducted from his workplace on February 28, 2017, by officials from the Mabahith (General Investigation Directorate or GID). Mohammad Abdullah al-Faraj was never informed that he was accused of any crime.

Four Canadians were executed in China on drug-related charges earlier this year, Canadian authorities have confirmed. All of them were dual citizens and their identities have been withheld, Canada's foreign minister Mélanie Joly said. A spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in Canada reportedly urged Ottawa to "stop making irresponsible remarks", as pundits feared a further downturn in relations between the countries after years of strain. China's foreign ministry said on Thursday that it had acted "in accordance with the law", while the embassy said there was "solid and sufficient" evidence for their crimes.

FLORENCE, Ariz. (AP) — An Arizona man who kidnapped and murdered his girlfriend’s ex-husband was executed Wednesday, the second of four prisoners scheduled to be put to death this week in the U.S. Aaron Brian Gunches, 53, was lethally injected with pentobarbital at the Arizona State Prison Complex in the town of Florence, John Barcello, deputy director of Arizona’s department of corrections, told news outlets. He was pronounced dead at 10:33 a.m. Gunches fatally shot Ted Price in the desert outside the Phoenix suburb of Mesa in 2002. He pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in 2007.

PHOENIX (AP) — An Arizona man who pleaded guilty to first-degree murder was scheduled to be executed Wednesday in the state’s first use of the death penalty in more than two years. Aaron Brian Gunches, 53, was slated to be lethally injected with pentobarbital at the Arizona State Prison Complex in Florence. Gunches fatally shot Ted Price, his girlfriend’s ex-husband, in the desert outside the Phoenix suburb of Mesa in 2002. Gunches is the second of four death row prisoners in the United States set to be executed this week. Louisiana executed a man on Tuesday and two more executions were scheduled in Florida and Oklahoma on Thursday. Gunches will be the first person executed in a state with a Democrat serving as governor since Virginia did so in 2017, when Terry McAuliffe was in charge.

BEIJING: A former Chinese engineer has been sentenced to death for leaking state secrets to a foreign power, Beijing's spy agency said Wednesday. The man, surnamed Liu, "secretly copied, duplicated, and sold a large volume of state secrets to a foreign espionage and intelligence agency", China's Ministry of State Security said in a post to its official WeChat account. Liu had worked as an assistant engineer at a research institute and had resigned after believing he had been treated unfairly, the ministry said.

Louisiana used nitrogen gas Tuesday evening to execute a man convicted of murdering a woman in 1996, the 1st time the state has used the method, a lawyer for the condemned man said.  Jessie Hoffman Jr., 46, was put to death at the Louisiana State Penitentiary, defense lawyer Cecelia Kappel said in a statement. He was the 1st person executed in the state in 15 years, and his death marked the 5th use of the nitrogen gas method in the US, with all the rest in Alabama.  Hoffman was convicted of the murder of Mary "Molly" Elliott, a 28-year-old advertising executive. At the time of the crime, Hoffman was 18.

On March 14, 2025, a group of nine death row pris­on­ers in Tennessee filed a law­suit chal­leng­ing the state’s sole use of pen­to­bar­bi­tal in its revised lethal injec­tion pro­to­col, argu­ing it cre­ates a ​“high risk of a tor­tur­ous death.” In December 2024 , the Tennessee Department of Correction (TDOC) com­plet­ed a mul­ti-year lethal injec­tion pro­to­col review and announced that instead of the pre­vi­ous three-drug pro­to­col, the state would shift to rely on just one drug: pen­to­bar­bi­tal.  Earlier this month, the Tennessee Supreme Court sched­uled exe­cu­tion dates for four indi­vid­u­als begin­ning in May 2025: Oscar Smith (May 22), Byron Black (August 5), Donald Middlebrooks (September 24), and Harold Nichols (December 11).

On March 12, 2025, Idaho Governor Brad Little signed House Bill 37 into law, mak­ing the fir­ing squad the state’s pri­ma­ry method of exe­cu­tion. In a state­ment to Catholic News Agency, Gov. Little said, ​“I have long made clear my sup­port of cap­i­tal punishment…My sign­ing of [this bill] is con­sis­tent with my sup­port of the Idaho Legislature’s actions in set­ting the poli­cies around meth­ods of exe­cu­tion in the state of Idaho.” The bill, which takes effect on July 1, 2026, passed both cham­bers of the Idaho Legislature by wide mar­gins, with a vote of 28 – 7 in the Senate and 58 – 11 in the House. Just three Republican law­mak­ers joined all 15 of their Democratic col­leagues in vot­ing against the bill. 

Dr. Joseph Antognini travels across the nation, being paid over $500 an hour by government officials who rely on him to vouch for their execution protocols. This [article] is part of “ Operating Capital ,” an ongoing Lens discussion about Louisiana’s resumption of executions. Earlier this month, Dr. Joseph Antognini, a California-based retired anesthesiologist, walked into the execution chamber at Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. He tried on the air-tight mask that prison staff plan to use to execute Death Row prisoner Jessie Hoffman , using nitrogen hypoxia, a method that Louisiana executioners have never before used.