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Japan | Hakamada found religion, but then felt under attack by ‘the devil’

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Editor's note: This is the last in a four-part series on letters that Iwao Hakamada wrote while on death row. About a decade after cursing God, Iwao Hakamada was baptized Catholic at the Tokyo Detention House on Dec. 24, 1984. “Since I have been given the Christian name Paul, I am keenly feeling that I should be aware of the greatness of Paul.” (June 1985)

Florida: Death penalty opponents call on DeSantis to stop execution

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Bobby Joe Long
SARASOTA, Fla. (WWSB) - Death penalty opponents are calling on Gov. Ron DeSantis to stop the execution of serial killer on death row.

Bobby Joe Long is scheduled to be executed Thursday at Florida State Prison for the 1984 murder of Michelle Simms in Hillsborough County.

In 1985, Long pleaded guilty to seven additional first-degree murder charges and numerous charges for sexual batteries and kidnappings in the Tampa Bay Area.

Long’s attorney has filed appeals to try to block the execution, a process that likely will continue leading up to Thursday.

If given a lethal injection, he would be the first death row inmate executed since Gov. DeSantis took office in January.

Death penalty opponents want DeSantis to stop the execution, saying capital punishment is not a deterrent to crime.

“Once you cross a threshold, it can be tough to go back from," Michael Sheedy of the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops. "We believe that he does recognize the really serious nature of this. We are hopeful, again, that he will stay this execution.”

28 inmates were executed under the watch of former governor Rick Scott during his eight years in office, the most of any Florida governor since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976.


Source: mysuncoast.com, Staff, May 21, 2019


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"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde
Location: Florida, USA
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