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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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Indian state passes law seeking death penalty for rape

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The law raises punishment for rape from the current sentences of at least 10 years to either life imprisonment or execution

An Indian state, shaken by weeks of protests demanding justice after the rape and murder of a doctor, passed a law on Tuesday that could lead to the execution of rapists.

Protests erupted in West Bengal after the discovery of a 31-year-old doctor’s bloodied body at a state-run hospital in the local capital Kolkata on August 9.

The law, passed by the state assembly but yet to be approved by the president, expresses outrage at the chronic issue of violence against women.

The new West Bengal law is largely symbolic because India’s criminal code applies uniformly across the country.

However, presidential approval could make an exception and see it become state law.

The law raises punishment for rape from the current sentences of at least 10 years to either life imprisonment or execution.

The doctor’s murder sparked strikes by doctors and rallies backed by thousands of ordinary citizens across India, although many doctors have since returned to work.

Protests in West Bengal have since transformed into clashes between rival political party loyalists, including the ruling All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

The Hindu-nationalist BJP holds power nationally but sits in opposition in West Bengal. It and the AITC both backed the new state law.

The gruesome nature of the attack has invoked comparisons with the horrific 2012 gang rape and murder of a young woman on a bus in the capital Delhi.

The 2012 incident became a major political issue and was seen as one factor in the BJP’s subsequent success in elections.

Death penalties in India are often stalled by years of appeals. Executions are usually carried out by hanging.

Source: Agence France-Presse, Staff, September 3, 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: Kolkata, West Bengal, India
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