Death Penalty News

The death penalty would not solve Fiji’s drug problem.  Former chief justice Daniel Fatiaki shared this yesterday while responding to calls for capital punishment for drug offenders, arguing that addiction should be treated as a health issue rather than punished as a crime.  Mr. Fatiaki said countries that impose the death penalty for drug crimes have not provided a model Fiji should follow.  “We (Fiji) used to have the death penalty. George Speight will tell you he got a death sentence given to him,” Mr. Fatiaki said.  He also said his opposition to the death penalty was rooted in his Christian faith, saying he believed the taking of life should not be left to people.  “But I’m Christian, and I believe in the Ten Commandments, and one of them says, Thou shalt not kill. And that’s all there is to it.”  Mr. Fatiaki said taking a person’s life was not the answer to addressing the country’s growing drug crisis and instead urged greater investment in rehabilita...

Dubai: A 28-year-old Kuwaiti man is currently on trial in Kuwait's Criminal Court, facing charges of fatally stabbing his mother and seriously injuring his 10-year-old brother in the Sabah Al Salem district. The accused has confessed, stating that he was under the influence of crystal meth at the time of the attack. He claimed he assaulted his mother after she refused to give him money to buy more drugs. According to his statement, the refusal "drove him crazy," prompting the fatal stabbing. When his younger brother witnessed the attack, the accused allegedly turned the knife on him, inflicting serious injuries.

Texas man is executed 13 years to the day of a store robbery in which he set a clerk on fire  A Texas man was executed Tuesday evening, 13 years to the day of a convenience store robbery in which he set a clerk on fire in a Dallas suburb.  Matthew Lee Johnson, 49, received a lethal injection at the state penitentiary in Huntsville. He was condemned for the May 20, 2012, attack on 76-year-old Nancy Harris, a great-grandmother he splashed with lighter fluid and set ablaze in the suburb of Garland. Badly burned, she died days afterward.

Matthew Lee Johnson is set to be executed in Texas on Tuesday for the death of an elderly woman he set on fire during a convenience store robbery. Johnson, 49, is scheduled to receive a lethal injection after 6 p.m. CDT at the state penitentiary in Huntsville. The Context Johnson was condemned for the 2012 death of 76-year-old Nancy Harris. He poured a bottle of lighter fluid over the great-grandmother, who was working as a cashier, before setting her on fire at a store in Garland, a northeast suburb of Dallas, on May 20, 2012. She was able to describe the suspect before she was taken off life support and died five days later. What To Know Johnson admitted to setting Harris on fire during his 2013 trial. "I hurt an innocent woman. I took a human being's life. I was the cause of that. It was not my intentions to—to kill her or to hurt her, but I did," he said. Johnson said he had not been aware of what he had done because he had been high after smoking $100 worth of crack....

Matthew Johnson was convicted of the 2012 murder of Nancy Harris in Dallas County. Matthew Johnson’s guilt was never in question. On the stand during his 2013 trial, he admitted to the crime that landed him on death row. The attack—an early morning robbery and murder in a populous Dallas suburb—was also caught on camera. Johnson is scheduled to be executed by the State of Texas on May 20, exactly 13 years to the day after he robbed a Fina Whip-In convenience store in Garland and set the store clerk on fire. Johnson was convicted of the murder of Nancy Harris, the 76-year-old clerk. 

Kim* is a young professional who started using cannabis when family life became messy. Things improved, but her drug habit stuck - and by then, her social circle was primarily made up of people who also used. With a reliable local supplier of weed, Kim’s friends asked her if she would get some for them. “That’s what I did,” Kim says. “I never marked up the price in any way, because this was friendship... It’s like, I’m helping you to purchase something we both use anyway.”

Derrick Dearman, who killed 5 in south Alabama axe murders, executed Thursday  Alabama death row inmate Derrick Dearman, who was convicted in the 2016 slayings of 5 people with an axe and 2 guns, was put to death Thursday night by lethal injection. He had given up his appeals earlier this year and volunteered to have his execution set.

A Texas man convicted of fatally stabbing twin 16-year-old girls more than 3 decades ago was executed on Tuesday evening.  Garcia Glenn White was pronounced dead at 6:56 p.m. CDT following a chemical injection at the state penitentiary in Huntsville. He was condemned for the December 1989 killings of Annette and Bernette Edwards. The bodies of the twin girls and their mother, Bonita Edwards, were found in their Houston apartment. White, 61, was the 6th inmate put to death in the U.S. in the last 11 days. His execution took place shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court, without comment, rejected 3 last-ditch appeals.

Texas serial murderer Garcia Glen White is scheduled for execution this week for the murders of 16-year-old identical twin sisters and their mother in 1989. This will be the nation's sixth execution in a 10-day period. But White's attorneys argue that his mental deficiencies − combined with prolonged use of crack cocaine − are more to blame than White, described by those who knew him as a gentle giant whose life went off the rails because of football injuries, job loss and an ensuing drug addiction.

A man facing execution next month for the murder his girlfriend’s mother asked state officials Monday to spare his life, saying he is not the same person he was when he killed the woman after a day of drinking and using drugs.

Texas executed Ramiro Gonzales on Wednesday despite a stunning reversal from a psychiatrist who helped send him to death row 17 years ago.  Gonzales, 41, was killed by lethal injection as punishment for kidnapping, raping and murdering Bridget Townsend when they were both 18. At the time, Gonzales was struggling with drug addiction. He killed Townsend, his drug dealer’s girlfriend, while trying to steal drugs. He had turned 18 two months before the killing, making him barely old enough to be legally eligible to be sentenced to death.

A jury of 12 Johnson County residents voted Thursday to send 31-year-old Jerry Elders to death row for the murder of Robin Waddell, agreeing with prosecutors who requested the death penalty. The defense argued for life in prison without parole, saying Thursday morning that Elders’ actions came after a lifetime of drug addiction and going in and out of jails and prisons, being kicked out of his family home as a teenager and not receiving support from family members.

Brian Dorsey is a “rare case where those of us who sit in judgment of a man convicted of capital murder got it wrong,” according to a former judge who upheld his death sentence. Brian Dorsey's appointed trial lawyers were paid a flat fee of $12,000 to represent him. Against the advice of another lawyer, they advised Dorsey to plead guilty without a deal from prosecutors to take the death penalty off the table. 

A convicted killer on death row in Alabama told NBC News he no longer wants to delay justice for the families of the five people he murdered eight years ago and is ready to pay the ultimate price for his crimes. In his first-ever interview with a reporter, Derrick Dearman said he mailed nine letters earlier this week to Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey, Attorney General Steve Marshall, as well as the judges and others involved in the horrific case, informing them he is dropping his appeals and wants to be executed.

The convict burnt the corpses in an attempt to cover up his crime Saudi authorities have executed a citizen after he had been convicted of fatally stabbing his mother and sister and burnt their bodies. The execution was carried out on Saturday in Medina, the Saudi Interior Ministry said. The convict, identified as Abdul Rahman bin Saleh, had set the two victims’ dead bodies on fire in an attempt to conceal the murder and his addiction of prescription tablets, the ministry added.

On Wednesday, December 13, the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari in Thornell v. Jones , its first death penalty case to be heard at oral argument in the 2023 term. Unlike most death penalty cases that seek Supreme Court review, the petitioner here is the state of Arizona, which asks the Court to reverse the Ninth Circuit’s grant of relief for death-sentenced prisoner Danny Lee Jones. The Ninth Circuit held that Mr. Jones demonstrated ineffective assistance of counsel at his sentencing phase under Strickland v. Washington (1984). 

Since the reinstatement of the death penalty, Texas has executed 583 people, which is more than any other state. Each execution, regardless of questions of actual guilt or innocence, has been contentious and controversial. But few have been more divisive than the execution of Karla Faye Tucker. Karla Faye Tucker's case epitomizes some of the problems within the Texas death penalty system. Tucker was convicted of a 1983 double murder in Houston. Tucker and her accomplice, Daniel Garrett, broke into the apartment of Jerry Lynn Dean and Deborah Thornton. Both Tucker and Garrett were under the influence of drugs at the time. They attacked and killed both victims with a pickaxe and other objects, resulting in a particularly gruesome and brutal crime.

NEW YORK – In a final statement before his execution Tuesday night, Florida death row inmate Michael Zack III said he made no excuses for the crimes he committed, but said he wished he could have had “a second chance, to live out my days in prison and continue to do all I can to make a difference in this world.” Zack’s request for a stay of his execution in favor of a life in prison is precisely what the state’s Catholic bishops asked Governor Ron DeSantis to consider last month, to no avail.  Zack died by lethal injection, a cocktail administered by the execution team that includes a sedative, paralytic, and a drug to stop his heart.  The drugs were administered at 6:02 and he was pronounced dead by 6:14 p.m., although there were no visible signs of breathing after the first minute. The family of Ravonne Smith witnessed the execution but chose not to speak with the media following the execution. When asked if he had any last words, Zack replied, “Yes sir,” lifting his head to...

ORLANDO, Fla. — Florida is preparing for its fifth execution of 2023 as James Barnes is scheduled to be executed on August 3. Governor Ron DeSantis signed the death warrant on June 22, and Barnes, a convicted murderer, has chosen to waive all appeals and proceed with his execution. Barnes, now 61 years old, was serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole for the murder of his wife, Linda, in 1997. He later confessed to the rape and murder of Patsy Miller, a nurse, in her Melbourne home in 1988. Barnes converted to Islam and confessed to Miller’s murder in an attempt to find closure for her family.

Convicted of killing two women ― including his wife ― and admitting to two more murders while on death row, Barnes destroyed numerous families. For his actions, the state of Florida will inject him with poison on Aug. 3 and his life will end. The pain and suffering he imposed on his victims' families will surely simmer on. But at least one family is hoping his execution brings them some sort of point to reset, or at least a chance to live the rest of their lives out from under his shadow of violence and blood.