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As clock ticks toward another Trump presidency, federal death row prisoners appeal for clemency

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President-elect Donald Trump’s return to office is putting a spotlight on the U.S. penitentiary in Terre Haute, which houses federal death row. In Bloomington, a small community of death row spiritual advisors is struggling to support the prisoners to whom they minister.  Ross Martinie Eiler is a Mennonite, Episcopal lay minister and member of the Catholic Worker movement, which assists the homeless. And for the past three years, he’s served as a spiritual advisor for a man on federal death row.
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Wanted: Sri Lanka hangman. Very light work. Only males need apply

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(Reuters) - Sri Lanka on Tuesday began interviews for the post of hangman a year after two positions fell vacant, with at least 480 convicts on death row.

But it was not quite clear how the two successful candidates would fill their days - the death penalty has not been used in Sri Lanka, a predominantly Buddhist country, since 1976.

"About 176 applicants are there and interviews are going on today and tomorrow," Gamini Kulatunga, commissioner operations at the Prisons Department, told Reuters. "Only males will be eligible for the post."

The two posts fell vacant after one hangman was promoted and the other retired.

At least 480 people convicted of murder and drugs offences could potentially be executed, Kulatunga said.

There has been an alarming rise in child abuse, rapes, murders, and drug trafficking since the 25-year war against Tamil Tiger separatists ended in May 2009, prompting some lawyers and politicians to push for the death penalty to be reintroduced.

Source: Reuters, August 28, 2012
Location: Sri Lanka
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