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Biden Fails a Death Penalty Abolitionist’s Most Important Test

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The mystery of Joe Biden’s views about capital punishment has finally been solved. His decision to grant clemency to 37 of the 40 people on federal death row shows the depth of his opposition to the death penalty. And his decision to leave three of America’s most notorious killers to be executed by a future administration shows the limits of his abolitionist commitment. The three men excluded from Biden’s mass clemency—Dylann Roof, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, and Robert Bowers—would no doubt pose a severe test of anyone’s resolve to end the death penalty. Biden failed that test.
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Saudi Arabia executes two for murder

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Public execution in Saudi Arabia (file photo)
Public execution in Saudi Arabia (file photo)
April 4, 2016: Saudi Arabia executed two citizens for murder, raising to 84 the number of death sentences the kingdom has carried out so far this year.

Baddah al-Dusari was found guilty of killing Saudi national Abdullah al-Qahtani by repeatedly running him over, the interior ministry said in a statement carried by SPA state news agency.

Mansur al-Azuri was convicted of stabbing to death fellow citizen Saad al-Subaiee following a dispute, the ministry said in separate statement.

They were both executed in al-Kharj, near the capital Riyadh.

Most people put to death in Saudi Arabia are beheaded with a sword.

The executions so far this year include 47 for "terrorism" carried out in a single day on January 2.

In 2015, Saudi Arabia executed 153 people, most of them for drug trafficking or murder, according to an AFP count. 

Source: Agence France-Presse, April 4, 2016

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Location: Riyadh Saudi Arabia
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