Death Penalty News

As the Church's liturgical readings recall Jesus’ encounter with the woman caught in adultery, the Director of the US-based Catholic Mobilizing Network explores the Lord’s rejection of capital punishment. This Sunday’s Gospel reading for Year C describes the event traditionally called the story of the woman caught in adultery (John 8:1-11). My friends have helped to give it new relevance for me this year. In our work at Catholic Mobilizing Network, we strive to end the death penalty, advance justice, and begin healing.

Pope Francis pens the preface to “A Christian on Death Row: My Commitment to Those Condemned ,” a new book by Dale Recinella, set for publication by the Vatican Publishing House (LEV) on August 27. The 72-year-old former Wall Street lawyer has spiritually accompanied death row inmates in several Florida prisons as a lay chaplain since 1998, alongside his wife Susan.

In an interview with Vatican News, death row prison chaplain and author, the Rev. Joseph B. Ingle, reflects on his pastoral work and advocacy and talks about the time he was part of an effort to gain pardon for Robert Sullivan, a death row inmate in the 1980s, that involved Pope John Paul II who personally pleaded for clemency to save Sullivan's life.

As the Rev. Jeff Hood was leaving for work one day back in January, his children begged him for one thing: to come back alive. “The kids would cry and say they didn’t want me to die,” Rev. Hood told OSV News. The plea was well-founded: Rev. Hood, ordained in the Old Catholic Church (which separated from Rome after the First Vatican Council), was heading to the Jan. 25 execution of Alabama inmate Kenneth Smith — and the nitrogen gas by which Smith would be put to death entailed the possibility that Rev. Hood and the other witnesses could be at risk.

Nitrogen. I keep hearing the word repeatedly. In fact, the word presently consumes a good part of my life. Will it happen? Will it kill me? What are the dangers? Is it all hyperbole? I don’t know. I just know that I’ve been asked by Kenny Smith in Alabama to accompany him to the 1st execution by nitrogen hypoxia…his execution. If that wasn’t enough, Smith was the victim of a botched execution just over a year ago. So, this is a moment of firsts for my ministry with guys facing execution…the 1st nitrogen hypoxia and the 1st in which someone is facing a 2nd attempt at execution. The temptation is to concentrate on the firsts. There is however something that is the same…the continuing evil of the death penalty. Indeed, it seems that talk of nitrogen is most fitting for this moment. One of the first effects of heavy nitrogen exposure is…a loss of consciousness.

Retired priest accompanied Johnny Johnson through the final moments of his life If there was one thing Father Gerry Kleba wanted to impart on Johnny Johnson in their short time together, it was this: You are a beloved child of God. Father Kleba, a retired priest of the archdiocese, served as Johnson’s spiritual adviser in the final weeks before his execution on Aug. 1, visiting him frequently and sitting by his side in the chamber as he died. During his visits, Father Kleba helped Johnson select a confirmation saint before confirming him in the Catholic faith. They landed on John, Jesus’ beloved apostle — and an easy name for Johnson to remember.

Maybe it’s too much to ask the state of Alabama to stop killing people. It’s like asking a dope addict to quit cold turkey. And besides, “right to life” has as much wiggle room around here as “bless your heart.” So maybe the best we can ask is that the state stop torturing people. I know, I know. Alabama has a long and illustrative history of killing those who did wrong, or looked wrong when they did it, or looked like they prolly did it. We used to hang people from trees, because mobs with torches and hoods were convinced some other human had to be the bad guy. The state figured it was more humane to wait until people were convicted by a jury – though in truth it rarely questioned the racial or ethical makeup of those juries – and in 1927 began to strap convicted killers into a death chair, to wait ‘til midnight and zap ‘em with 2,000 volts of electricity. Alabama loved that so much it gave its electric chair a nickname – “Yellow Mama.” You probably remember that name, if not any of t...

Do you know what happens to a body when the last gasp of hope slips out of it? You can see it. It’s the machinery of execution already at work in the body. As you know, Oscar Franklin Smith was placed on death watch and moved to an isolated containment unit with 24-hour surveillance for the days leading up to an execution. He’s stripped and chained if he moves to the visitation room, and if the condemned person has chosen the electric chair then they’re shaved. I visit him cell-side. He is eager to see someone. His shirt pocket, usually overflowing with pencils, is empty. We talk through the bars. He’s sleeping randomly, and when I come in he sits up on his bed, the two tufts of hair on either side of his head sticking straight up and out like wings. He sits cross-legged at the end of his cell bed like a kid at a sleepover. His wild beard spirals out and a random mustache hair swings down into his mouth while he talks, but he doesn’t mind. His last meal arrives, the main entrée a burge...

People everywhere have long been oddly fascinated by the last meals of those on death row, specifically wanting to know more about the last meal requests of notorious criminals, like convicted serial killers: Did these men request an elaborate meal, or did they opt for something nostalgic like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich or an order of KFC ? Or, like Ted Bundy, did they refuse a last meal altogether? But instead of looking at the last meals of specific prisoners, perhaps the focus should be on how this practice got started in the first place and how it’s changed over time. The history of the “last meal” One of the most well-recognized “last meals” is the last supper shared by Jesus Christ and his disciples before his crucifixion, as depicted in the Bible. In fact, the ritual of a doomed person eating some special kind of final meal goes back even further to pre-Christian times. A faculty publication from the Mercer University School of Law titled “Cold (Comfort?) Food: A System...

Nitrogen is odorless, tasteless and colorless. And deadly – which is why the state of Alabama wants to use it to kill inmates on Death Row. Earlier this month, the state again confirmed its intent while refusing to describe the physical details of the nitrogen hypoxia system, any protocols or a timetable for its use. In fact, we only know the little bit we do because of the state’s involvement in a lawsuit regarding whether or not a Death Row inmate can have a spiritual advisor of his choosing at his execution. Alabama, a state that takes pride in being God-fearing and church-going — the same Alabama where 86 percent of us claim to be Christians. This Alabama – or at least its elected and appointed leaders – would begrudge an inmate about to meet his Maker, one last moment of spiritual comfort as the state kills him. Let the church say “Amen”? Speaking of the church, has anyone ever heard a rousing sermon about the virtues of the death penalty? The amazing grace of the state having the...

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster recently signed legislation that would allow the state to execute people by firing squad or the electric chair if chemicals used for lethal injections are not available. The death-row inmate would be able to choose between the other two options. It is sad that the US remains the one western nation still dedicated to this archaic practice. It is also particularly problematic given the racist realities of the death penalty. It is especially tragic that the legislators who voted in favor of this and the governor who signed it almost all claim to be Christians and pro-life, but deny the way of Jesus out of a desire to appear tough or appeal to some misplaced idea of justice. The United States is the only western nation, and one of the few democracies, that still actively practices the death penalty. In 2019, we were fifth in the world for executions behind China, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Egypt. Of course, none of these nations is known for its great human ...

As part of Slate’s project on the 80 most influential Americans over 80 , we spoke to some members of the list to reflect on aging, work, and life in their ninth decade and beyond. Sister Helen Prejean, 81, is a Catholic nun and activist for the abolition of the death penalty. She came to fame with her 1993 book, Dead Man Walking , about her experiences as a spiritual advisor to two men on death row. Susan Sarandon won an Oscar for playing Prejean in the 1995 movie adaptation. Slate spoke with Prejean by phone on Friday. The conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.  Molly Olmstead: Has your experience of aging changed the way you approach your activism? Sister Helen Prejean : Absolutely. Because I’m very, very conscious now that I don’t have an unlimited time. But these life-and-death issues—cruelty and torture and the death penalty— attenuate your consciousness to get out of the ego thing of self. Because it plunges you into, “I better use my time well.” I don’t wan...

WINDSOR TERRACE — In 2003, Lezmond Charles Mitchell received a death sentence after being convicted in a double-murder case. The victims of that deadly carjacking on the Navajo reservation in Arizona two years earlier were a 9-year-old girl and her 63-year-old grandmother. Now 38, Mitchell is the only Native American among 58 other death row inmates at the U.S Penitentiary in Terre Haute, Ind. He is scheduled to die by lethal injection on Aug. 26. Barring any last-minute stays or reprieves, Mitchell will be the fourth federal inmate executed this summer — three occurred in July — with another scheduled for Aug. 28, followed by two more in late September. While many Catholic bishops insist that the Church must vigorously oppose the death penalty, not all Catholics agree, with almost half not sharing the sentiment. “You see it in different polls,” said Bishop Frank Dewane of the Diocese of Venice, Florida, who previously chaired the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bish...

Federal executions resume in the US as the Covid-19 pandemic lays bare serious structural inequalities of the American judicial system. Anti-death penalty activist, Sr Helen Prejean, reiterates it is time to end the suffering. The U.S. Justice Department has set 26 August as the execution date for Lezmond Mitchell , who is scheduled to be put to death in the same week as Keith Dwayne Nelson. Three other people have been executed over the course of four days in July after the US Supreme Court cleared the way for federal executions after a 17-year moratorium. This is more than the United States has put to death in half a century. Analysts point out that the controversial decision represents an intrusion by the federal government into matters the states and cities normally handle. They say it is a decision taken despite a series of legal concerns including reservations regarding medical precautions and the opposition of family members of the executed prisoners’ victims. ...