Could Virginia abolish the death penalty in 2020?

Virginia could become the first state in the South to outlaw capital punishment, if a new initiative succeeds.

Activists announced a new initiative seeking to end the death penalty in Virginia – a state with the 2nd highest number of executions only behind Texas.

The organization known as Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (VADP) is set to formally unveil the effort in Richmond later this week.

Victims of violent crime will deliver a letter from the VADP to the General Assembly, asking for the dramatic change to the commonwealth's penal code.

"The death penalty, it forces law enforcement to become killers," Michael Stone, executive director of the VADP, said. "And in many respects, it's not worth it."

3 men are currently on Virginia's death row, including one from Fairfax County.

Mark Eric Lawlor received a death sentence in 2011, after he raped and killed a Falls Church woman in 2008.

Lawlor's fate remains in limbo, after an appeals court said he deserves a new hearing.

Stone said the VADP has support for the measure from both Republicans and Democrats, as the organization began to set its sights on a concerted effort four years ago.

"I think it's a bit of an urban legend that this is a Democratic issue and Republicans are against a death penalty repeal," Stone said. "We've found exceptions to the rule on both sides of the aisle, because it's just not an effective measure anymore."

Gov. Northam said earlier this year he would sign a bill abolishing capital punishment, if the replacement measure called for a sentence of life without parole.

"In a sense, the death penalty is not about what the perpetrator did, but, it's about what kind of people are we," Stone said.

Source: WUSA news, Staff, November 19, 2019

Group seeks abolition of death penalty in Va. as Democrats prepare to take control of legislature

With Democrats soon to be in control of the legislature, Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty are seeking an end to the death penalty in Virginia.

The group announced Monday that 13 Virginians who have lost a family member to homicide are asking the General Assembly to make Virginia the 22nd state to abolish the death penalty. One of them will be speaking at a press conference in Richmond on Thursday.

Michael Stone, executive director of the group, said Monday that, "to be honest, we have been targeting 2020 for years as the time we would kick off an abolition campaign. From our point of view, the election just adds momentum to the possibility of us being the 1st southern state to end the death penalty."

"We've been planning for a long, long time to target 2020 for a variety of reasons," Stone said. "I think we've got enough conservative support that we can really have a serious debate, so, we'll see where it goes."

Earlier this year, a spokeswoman for Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam told the Richmond Times-Dispatch that, "if the General Assembly passed legislation to replace the death penalty with life without parole, the governor would absolutely sign it."

She added that although Northam is personally opposed to the death penalty he has pledged to uphold Virginia’s laws, including the death penalty, as did former Democratic governors Mark Warner, Tim Kaine and Terry McAuliffe.

Virginia has executed 113 persons since the U.S. Supreme Court allowed the death penalty to resume in 1976, a toll second only to Texas with 568 over the same period. There are now just 3 persons on Virginia's death row.

The VADP’s position is that there are just 2 Virginia death row inmates because a federal appeals court ruled last year that the death sentence imposed in Fairfax County on Mark Lawlor was flawed and that his case is in limbo, Stone said.

The VADP said that Rachel Sutphin, of Christiansburg, will speak at Thursday's news conference in Richmond. Her father, Eric E. Sutphin, a corporal with the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office, was murdered in Blacksburg in 2006. His killer, William Morva, was executed in 2017, the most recent execution carried out by the state.

Sutphin will speak in favor of replacing Virginia’s death penalty with life in prison without the possibility of parole, the VADP said.

Efforts to end capital punishment in the legislature have failed in previous years.

"These citizens have come to understand that, far from bringing 'closure' to their grief, the death penalty brings only more trauma to their lives, as well as being an inefficient and ineffective means of justice," the group said in a news release.

A poll last year by the Pew Research Center found that 54 % of Americans favor the death penalty for people convicted of murder, and 39 % are opposed. Nevertheless, death sentences and executions have been trending downward for years.

Source: richmond.com, Staff, November 19, 2019

⚑ | Report an error, an omission, a typo; suggest a story or a new angle to an existing story; submit a piece, a comment; recommend a resource; contact the webmaster, contact us: deathpenaltynews@gmail.com.

Opposed to Capital Punishment? Help us keep this blog up and running! DONATE!

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

South Korea ferry disaster: Surviving passengers of Sewol tragedy give evidence in court

Surviving passengers of a South Korean ferry which sunk in April, killing 304 people, are due to give evidence in the trial of its captain and 14 crew members. Students from the Danwon High School in Ansan, 18 miles south of Seoul, will testify with other passengers in a smaller court nearer to their home, rather than the one where the defendants are being seen in Gwangju, in the south of the country. The Sewol ferry set sail on 16 April with 476 passengers and crew on board - more than 300 of which were schoolchildren. They were enroute from the mainland to the island resort of Jeju as part of a school trip, when nearing the end of the journey, the vessel, which was overloaded, also made a sharp turn to the right causing it to capsize. Captain Lee Joon-seok, 68, was caught on rescue footage being one of the first to leave the ship, while many passengers, obeying orders, remained in the cabins. It is thought a delayed evacuation order from the captain did n...

Tennessee | Questions Raised About the Doctor Who Was Overseeing Tony Caruthers’ Execution

Mark Fowler, according to a deposition, had not placed a central line in a patient for more than a decade when he attempted to put one in Carruthers Around 11 a.m. Thursday morning in the execution chamber at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, a medical doctor stepped in and attempted to place a central IV line in Tony Carruthers’ chest. By that point, the prison staff had spent some 30 minutes trying unsuccessfully to insert a backup IV line that would allow them to proceed with the lethal injection. According to Carruthers’ attorney Maria DeLiberato, who was in the room, after asking a staff member to attempt inserting a line through Carruthers’ jugular vein, the doctor moved on to the central line, which is identified as the last resort in Tennessee’s lethal injection protocol .

Florida: The Daily Routine of Death Row Inmates

The breakfast carts rattle through the concrete prison at about 5:30 am and as they approach Death Row the first sounds of morning repeat the last sounds of night - remote controlled locks clanging open and clunking closed, electric gates whirring, heavy metal doors crashing shut, voices wailing, klaxons blaring. A maximum security prison has no soft or delicate sounds. At the end of each corridor of death row cells a guard opens a heavy door of steel bars and a prison trusty pushes a breakfast cart inside. The door closes behind him and when it locks a second door opens and admits the trusty to the wing. He steers his cart along the wing stopping at each cell to pass a tray of powdered eggs and lukewarm grits through a small slot on the bars. Food is prepared by prison staff and transported in insulated carts to the cells. The food carts are full of cockroaches, the food is often undercooked or just rotten and is served on Styrofoam plates with a plastic "spork" - fork/spoon...

Arizona executes Leroy McGill

Arizona executes inmate who set couple on fire in 'horrific attack' Arizona has executed Leroy McGill for setting 21-year-old Charles Perez and his 24-year-old girlfriend on fire. Perez died the next day and Perez survived with severe burn injuries. Arizona has executed a death row inmate for setting 2 people on fire more than 20 years ago, killing 1 of them and changing the other's life forever. The state executed Leroy McGill, 63, by lethal injection on Wednesday, May 20, for the 2002 murder of 21-year-old Charles Perez. McGill set Perez and his girlfriend on fire after they accused him of theft, court records say. Perez died of his injuries the next day while his girlfriend survived with severe burns.

20 Minutes to Death: Witness to the Last Execution in France

The following document is a firsthand account of the final moments of Hamida Djandoubi, a convicted murderer executed by guillotine at Marseille’s Baumettes Prison on September 10, 1977. The record—dated September 9—was written by Monique Mabelly, a judge appointed by the state to witness the proceedings. Djandoubi’s execution would ultimately be the last carried out in France before capital punishment was abolished in 1981. At the time, President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing—who had publicly voiced his "deep aversion to the death penalty" prior to his election—rejected Djandoubi’s appeal for clemency. Choosing to let "justice take its course," the President allowed the execution to proceed, just as he had in two previous cases during his term: Christian Ranucci , executed on July 28, 1976 and Jérôme Carrein , executed on June 23, 1977. Hamida Djandoubi , a Tunisian national, was sentenced to death for killing his former lover, Elisabeth Bousquet. He was execu...

EU GSP+ Reform: Will Brussels Finally Enforce Its Own Conditions on Pakistan?

The EU has tightened the rules governing GSP+ trade preferences, but Pakistan’s record raises a harder question: whether Brussels is prepared to suspend market access when a major beneficiary fails to demonstrate sustained compliance with human rights, labour and governance obligations. The European Union has formally adopted revised rules for its Generalised Scheme of Preferences, strengthening the conditions attached to preferential market access for developing countries. The new framework will apply from 1 January 2027 and is intended to tighten monitoring, widen the list of international conventions, and make suspension of benefits easier in cases of serious violations.

Tennessee fails to execute Tony Carruthers after IV difficulties. State won't try again for a year

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Tennessee officials on Thursday called off the lethal injection of Tony Carruthers, who was convicted of kidnapping and murdering three people in 1994, after his executioners tried and failed for over an hour to establish an intravenous line. Gov. Bill Lee announced soon afterward that the state would not try again for at least a year. In a written statement, the Tennessee Department of Corrections said medical personnel had quickly established a primary IV line but were unable to find a suitable vein for a backup line as required by the state’s execution protocol. Efforts to insert a central line also failed, and officials called off the execution.

Former Oklahoma death row inmate Richard Glossip goes free on $500k bond

Richard Glossip was released from jail Thursday, May 14, on a $500,000 bond, a major victory for the former death row inmate who has come so close to execution that he has had three last meals. Glossip, 63, is awaiting his third trial in his 1997 murder-for-hire case. He walked out the front door of the Oklahoma County jail, holding hands with his wife, Lea Glossip, as a stiff Oklahoma breeze whipped his hair. "I'm just thankful for my wife and my attorneys," he told reporters. "I'm just happy." His release came hours after Oklahoma County District Judge Natalie Mai set bail in a 13-page order that pointed to issues with the key witness against him.

New Mississippi billboard warns criminals: ‘Firing squad is legal’

DESOTO COUNTY, Miss. (WREG) — A billboard standing on Interstate 55 southbound as you cross the Tennessee state line and enter Mississippi from Memphis is sending a grim message to those coming into the state. DeSoto County District Attorney Matthew Barton recently announced the new billboard campaign, which features the sign reading, “WELCOME TO MISSISSIPPI. WHERE THE FIRING SQUAD IS LEGAL. THINK TWICE.” It references Mississippi’s law permitting execution by firing squad under certain circumstances for inmates sentenced to death. Barton says this campaign is aimed at deterring violent crime and sends a direct message to criminals entering Mississippi.

Florida executes Richard Knight

Man convicted of killing a woman and her 4-year-old daughter is executed in Florida A Florida man convicted of fatally stabbing his cousin’s girlfriend and the couple’s 4-year-old daughter was put to death Thursday evening, becoming the 7th person executed by the state this year. Richard Knight, 47, was pronounced dead at 6:13 p.m. following a 3-drug injection at Florida State Prison near Starke. Knight was convicted of 2 counts of 1st-degree murder in the June 2002 killings of Odessia Stephens and her daughter, Hanessia Mullings. The curtain of the death chamber went up promptly at the scheduled 6:00 p.m. execution time. Knight was already strapped down with his arms extended and an IV line in place.

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog