The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and American Civil Liberties Foundation have filed a lawsuit against the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) seeking a court order requiring the BOP to disclose how much the federal government’s resumption of federal executions is costing taxpayers and what steps the government has undertaken to assess and address the COVID-19 public health risks created by the executions. “As the nation faces both dire public health and economic crises,” the lawsuit says, “the federal government’s actions prioritizing the use of American tax dollars on executions that could further spread the virus is a matter of public concern.” The ACLU filed suit in federal district court in Washington on August 21, 2020 under the federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), following the BOP’s assertion that even an “expedited” response to the organization’s FOIA request could take as long as six months to process. Noting that two federal executions are scheduled...
Striving for a World without Capital Punishment