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

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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.

Iran Executes Prisoner in Front of Seven-year-old Son

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The Islamic Republic's judiciary has executed one more prisoner amid a surge in the death penalty.

Nategh Hosseini was executed at Qazvin Central Prison on Saturday, reportedly in the presence of his seven-year-old son. 

According to the Iran Human Rights Organization, Hosseini had been arrested three years ago on charges of alleged murder and subsequently sentenced to death.

His family requested the presence of Hosseini's young son at the execution. 

Hosseini's family, hoping the child's presence might inspire clemency, brought the boy to witness the execution. 

However, this did not alter the outcome, and Hosseini was executed with his son present.

Iranian state media and outlets associated with the country's judicial system have not announced or commented on this execution.

According to a report by Amnesty International, Iran has reached its highest level of death sentence execution in the last eight years, with the judiciary of the Islamic Republic executing 853 people in 2023 alone.

The report indicated that 481 executions, more than half of the total, were related to drug crimes. It marks an 89 percent increase in the death penalty compared to 2022, when 255 people were executed for drug-related offenses.

The latest numbers also show a 264 percent increase compared to 2021, when 132 individuals faced execution for similar charges.

Source: Iran Wire, Staff, June 25, 2024

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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: Qazvin, Qazvin Province, Iran
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