FEATURED POST

Activists Call on President Biden to End the Federal Death Penalty Before Leaving Office

Published
Image
A conversation with Death Penalty Action Co-founder and Executive Director Abe Bonowitz. Now that Joe Biden is a lame duck president, activists are holding him accountable to make good on his promise to end the federal death penalty during his remaining six months as president. Biden’s election campaign in 2020 had pledged to end the federal death penalty and incentivize the remaining 27 states that still allow executions to do the same. While he made history as the first president in the United States to openly oppose the death penalty, there has been no movement to actually end federal executions during his nearly four years in office.

UK: Amnesty slams death penalty call

Published
Amnesty International has slammed a call by a DUP politician for the use of the death penalty in the UK and internationally.

Mass murderers like Ian Brady have sacrificed their right to life, according to East Londonderry MP Gregory Campbell.

He added that there was a cosy political consensus to deny the people of the UK their wishes.

"There are times when the death penalty, operated within a robust legal framework, is an appropriate form of punishment," Mr Campbell said.

"We can all think of mass murderers who through their evil acts forfeited their right to life.

"I have no compunction at all in saying that someone like Ian Brady, the Moors Murderer who murdered 5 innocent children has forfeited their right to live through their actions."

'Sordid'

Amnesty International's Northern Ireland Programme Director Patrick Corrigan said: Beheadings, electrocutions, hangings, lethal injections, shootings and stonings have no place in the modern world. Any popular support which exists for the death penalty falls dramatically when people are confronted with the sordid reality of capital punishment. All the more so when people realise that there is no evidence that it even deters crime.

"The good news is that executions are only carried out by a small number of countries and that this number is getting smaller by the year. Our members in Northern Ireland will continue to campaign for a death penalty-free world."

Mr Campbell, a former Stormont Culture minister, was addressing a Westminster Hall debate on capital punishment and added polls regularly showed a majority in the UK favoured the death penalty for crimes like premeditated murder.

SDLP Justice spokesman Alban Maginness was appalled at the suggestion.

"I think there is a well-established view that capital punishment in the western world is regarded as abhorrent and unlawful and inappropriate," he said.

"Capital punishment doesn't work. Quite apart from that it goes against the modern view of human rights and indeed there's a protocol attached to the European Convention on Human Rights outlawing capital punishment."

Source: UTV News, Oct. 28, 2009
Related content:

Most Viewed (Last 7 Days)

Kuwait | Six Executed, Female Convict Spared at Last Minute

Published
Image
KUWAIT CITY, Sept 5: This Thursday morning at exactly 7:00 am, the Criminal Execution Prosecution carried out the death penalty for six convicts at the Central Prison. Among those executed were three Kuwaiti citizens, two Iranians, and one Pakistani. However, the execution of a Kuwaiti woman, convicted of killing her friend, was withdrawn at the last moment after the victim's heirs accepted blood money and pardoned her. 
Read more

Idaho death row inmate Thomas Creech claims second execution attempt would violate Eighth Amendment

Published
Image
The execution of Thomas Creech failed in February when a prison medical team was unable to establish an IV line to carry out the lethal injection. BOISE, Idaho — After a failed execution in February, Idaho's longest-serving death row inmate said a second attempt to execute him would be "cruel and unusual punishment" - violating his Eighth Amendment rights.
Read more

South Carolina | Inmate asks to delay execution, says co-defendant who blamed him for killing had secret deal

Published
Image
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — An inmate set to be executed in South Carolina in three weeks wants the state Supreme Court to delay the execution so his lawyers can argue his co-defendant who testified against him lied about having no plea deal in exchange for his testimony. Attorneys for Freddie Owens also said in court papers filed late Friday that a juror saw an electronic stun device Owens had to wear in court to assure good behavior and a judge never talked about why he had to wear it.
Read more

Activists Call on President Biden to End the Federal Death Penalty Before Leaving Office

Published
Image
A conversation with Death Penalty Action Co-founder and Executive Director Abe Bonowitz. Now that Joe Biden is a lame duck president, activists are holding him accountable to make good on his promise to end the federal death penalty during his remaining six months as president. Biden’s election campaign in 2020 had pledged to end the federal death penalty and incentivize the remaining 27 states that still allow executions to do the same. While he made history as the first president in the United States to openly oppose the death penalty, there has been no movement to actually end federal executions during his nearly four years in office.
Read more

Iran’s Top Court Upholds Death Penalty for Guard Volunteer over 2022 Protest Killing

Published
Image
TEHRAN: The Supreme Court of Iran has upheld a death sentence awarded to a member of the all-volunteer wing of the country’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard who stormed a house during the 2022 protests over the death of Mahsa Amini and killed a 60-year-old man, said a lawyer on Tuesday. The capital punishment awarded to the Basij member marks a rare moment for Iran to hold accountable its security forces. It is pertinent to mention that more than 500 people were killed and over 22,000 were detained in the 2022 protests.
Read more

The New York Times Editorial Board Argues United States ​“Does Not Need the Death Penalty”

Published
Image
In an August 31, 2024, editorial from The New York Times , the newspaper’s editorial board writes that capital punishment is “immoral, unconstitutional and useless as a deterrent to crime,” and asserts that President Joseph Biden should follow through with his campaign pledge to end the federal death penalty.  The Times believes “it would be an appropriate and humane finale to his presidency for Mr. Biden to fulfill that pledge and try to eliminate the death penalty for federal crimes.” Since 2000, public support for the death penalty has steadily declined, as have the number of new death sentences and executions. 
Read more

Indian state passes law seeking death penalty for rape

Published
Image
The law raises punishment for rape from the current sentences of at least 10 years to either life imprisonment or execution An Indian state, shaken by weeks of protests demanding justice after the rape and murder of a doctor, passed a law on Tuesday that could lead to the execution of rapists. Protests erupted in West Bengal after the discovery of a 31-year-old doctor’s bloodied body at a state-run hospital in the local capital Kolkata on August 9.
Read more

USA | Former Florida Death-Row Prisoner with Innocence Claim Released Pending Outcome of Federal Appeal

Published
Image
More than thirty years after a Florida judge sentenced him to death following an 8-4 sentencing recommendation by an all-white jury, Crosley Green has been freed. Citing Green’s age and health risks related to continued incarceration during the pandemic, Judge Roy B. Dalton of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida on April 7, 2021, ordered Green’s immediate release while a federal appeals court considers prosecutors’ appeal of the district court’s July 2018 decision overturning his conviction. “The Court determines that, because of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the length of time to resolve Petitioner’s appeal, … Petitioner would be substantially injured since the Court has already reversed his conviction and ordered a new trial,” Dalton wrote. “Additionally, the public has a strong interest in the release of a prisoner whom the Court has found to be incarcerated in violation of the Constitution. The Court finds that the public interest weighs in favor of
Read more

An art exhibit reckons with Alabama’s death penalty toll

Published
Image
The state of Alabama executed Gary Brown more than two decades ago for his connection to a fatal stabbing. But at a recent Sunday service in Birmingham, you could hear him preaching. In the bustling foyer of the Unitarian Universalist Church, an archival recording of one of Brown’s sermons in prison thrummed under patrons’ lively chatter. Visitors stood with their necks craned back, reading rows of letters fixed to a wall. The display was part of an art exhibit that’s been traveling through Alabama this summer. Using art and archival materials, “The Art of Resistance: Documenting Alabama’s Death Row” aims to spark conversations about the state’s use of capital punishment.
Read more

Florida executes Loran Cole

Published
Image
Florida executes man convicted of killing college student, raping victim’s sister in national forest  A Florida man convicted of killing a college freshman and raping the murder victim’s older sister while the siblings camped in a national forest 30 years ago was executed Thursday.  Loran Cole, 57, received a lethal injection and was pronounced dead at 6:15 p.m. at Florida State Prison for the 1994 killing of the 18-year-old student. Cole also was serving t2life sentences for rape.
Read more