Death Penalty News

CLEARWATER, Fla. — A former plastic surgeon accused of killing an attorney involved in a lawsuit against his former employer will put his fate in the hands of a judge. Tomasz Kosowski has waived his right to a jury trial in the murder of attorney Steven Cozzi, according to court records. He has also waived his right to have a jury determine his sentence if he is convicted and the case proceeds to a penalty phase. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. Kosowski plans to represent himself.

Alabama plans to execute Jeffery Lee on Thursday via lethal injection after a down-to-the-wire decision by the federal courts halted his death by nitrogen hypoxia in June. In response, Gov. Kay Ivey set the 30-hour window for the execution to be carried out by lethal injection beginning at 12 a.m. on Thursday, September 17, and expiring at 6 a.m. on Friday, September 18. Barring any further court action, the execution will take place at Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore.

On Sept. 11, Gov. Ron DeSantis issued a death warrant for William Thompson, convicted of the 1976 kidnapping, rape, and murder of 23-year-old Sally Ivester. Thompson, now 74, and another man were staying in a Miami Beach hotel room with Ivester and another woman, according to court records. After Ivester was unable to get money from her mother, the men beat and tortured her, prosecutors said. She died from internal bleeding and multiple injuries. Thompson was convicted in 1978 of kidnapping, rape, and first-degree murder.

There are 25 people on Alabama Death Row, despite their juries asking for life sentences. Gov. Kay Ivey could change that. A jury said they should live. A judge in Alabama decided they would die anyway. Now, it’s up to Gov. Kay Ivey to decide who the state should listen to. In Alabama, a jury’s decision wasn’t always the final word. And even though the state fixed that nine years ago, it’s still honoring old cases where a judge set aside the work of the jury—the only state in the nation to do so.

In Florida’s 15th execution this year, man put to death for killing linked to ‘Hog Trail Murders’  A Florida man convicted in one of a series of suspected killings that became known as the “Hog Trail Murders” in the 1990s was put to death Thursday, becoming the state’s 15th person executed this year.  Daniel Owen Conahan Jr., 72, was pronounced dead at 6:12 p.m. after receiving a 3-drug lethal injection at Florida State Prison near Starke. He had been sentenced to die for the 1996 kidnapping and strangling of Richard Allen Montgomery, whose mutilated body was found in a wooded southwest Florida area where authorities found the remains of at least 6 people over a 3-year span.

Johnny Morales struggled to find sleep. He dozed off for a few moments, but officers came to his death row cell and woke him a little after midnight. They needed to inventory and box up his belongings. He was leaving San Quentin.  Hands cuffed behind his back, he walked across the empty upper yard in the dim gray hours before daylight. An officer walked alongside him step for step, black latex-gloved fingers holding onto Morales’s arm. For almost 20 years, Morales could only experience the world outside his 4-by-11 foot cell in the condemned housing unit like this—chained and escorted by officers. Security protocols required all death row residents be handcuffed or shackled any time they were out in open space with staff.

Sheriff Vic Regalado and Father Bryan Brooks, pastor at the Church of Saint Benedict, are two men of influence in Tulsa County. They live different lives—one enveloped in faith, the other elected to lead a law enforcement agency of more than 600. Both were brought together by the death penalty. The men believe it is their duty to support families of victims but land on different sides of the aisle when it comes to executions. Regalado is in support of the death penalty, saying it is part of the criminal justice system and brings closure to the families of murder victims. 

Celeste Rivas Hernandez’s relatives speak out on the eve of her 16th birthday, revealing what justice should look like for the singer accused of her murder. On what would have been Celeste Rivas Hernandez’s 16th birthday, her family delivered a chilling message about the man accused of killing her. Relatives of the 14-year-old say they back the harshest possible sentence for singer D4vd, real name David Anthony Burke, should he be convicted of her murder. The timing was hard to ignore. Instead of marking a milestone birthday, Celeste’s loved ones spent the day publicly weighing in on the fate of the man accused of ending her life before it truly began, a detail that has only intensified attention on an already high-profile case.

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); 5 September 2026: At least 82 people were executed in August 2026, including 40 for murder, 34 for drug-related offences and eight for security-related charges. Amongst those executed were six women, marking the highest monthly total recorded for female executions in 2026. Three protesters arrested in connection with the January nationwide protests were also amongst those executed. In the first eight months of 2026, IHRNGO has recorded 528 executions, including 18 women, 20 foreign nationals and 91 ethnic minorities. The 2026 executions also include 31 protesters (29 from the January protests and two from “Woman, Life, Freedom”), 13 political prisoners affiliated with banned opposition groups and 14 espionage defendants.

In the aftermath of the 12-Day War between Iran and Israel, followed by the concurrent military conflict involving the United States, Israel, and the Islamic Republic of Iran, Iran’s penal statutes have undergone severe tightening. New criminal offenses have been added to statutory regulations, broadening the scope of criminally prosecutable acts and introducing significantly harsher penalties for existing security offenses. The majority of execution sentences handed down during this timeframe have not been made available to the public, nor have the executions been officially announced. However, based on official statements by judicial authorities, a substantial portion of recent executions was carried out under legislation passed following the 12-Day War.

Trooper Bob Martin was killed during a traffic stop on the Beeline highway; execution for his killer could be as soon as January PHOENIX (AZFamily)—The Arizona Attorney General is asking for an execution date to be set for a man convicted in the killing of an Arizona State Trooper over 30 years ago. On Aug. 15, 1995, Trooper Bob Martin was shot and killed while performing a traffic stop along the Beeline Highway.

Former Kansas corrections officials are urging Governor Laura Kelly to grant clemency to the state's death row inmates. Former Kansas Corrections Secretary Roger Werholtz has several reasons why he thinks the state should abolish the death penalty. Werholtz, who served as secretary from 2002 to 2010 and returned on an interim basis in 2019, uses his discussions with peers and family members of victims as well as experiences of seeing wrongly convicted people getting exonerated as his guiding points.

Florida state officials executed 74-year-old Harold Gene Lucas by lethal injection on Tuesday evening, concluding a 50-year legal saga stemming from the 1976 murder of a 16-year-old girl in Bonita Springs. STARKE, Fla. -- A man convicted of killing a teenage girl who rejected his romantic advances and wounding two of her friends was put to death Tuesday in the first of three executions planned this month in Florida. Harold Gene Lucas, 74, was pronounced dead at 6:18 p.m. following a three-drug injection at Florida State Prison near Starke, authorities said. He was sentenced to death for the 1976 shooting attack on Jill Piper and the wounding of her friends, Richard Byrd Jr. and Terri Rice.

23-hour solitary confinement. 115-degree heat. Jimmie Duncan is haunted by the decades he spent in Louisiana’s Angola Prison—and how, even after being released, he still isn’t truly free. Jimmie “Chris” Duncan wiped the sweat off his forehead as he assessed his temporary home from the parking lot of a rundown motel in central Louisiana. Sure, there’s drug dealing and prostitution, he said on a recent summer afternoon. And he suspected his neighbors were cooking meth on a floor below the room he paid $350 a week to rent.

MIAMI (AP) — A Florida man convicted of fatally shooting a 16-year-old girl who rejected his romantic advances and wounding two of her friends is set to be executed Tuesday in the first of three lethal injections scheduled this month in the state. Harold Gene Lucas, 74, is set to receive a three-drug injection at Florida State Prison near Starke starting at 6 p.m. He would be the 14th prisoner put to death this year in Florida, and Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis has already signed death warrants for two more executions set for later this September.

The court’s decision came a little more than two months after Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita asked the justices to schedule Weisheit’s execution. State attorneys argued Weisheit had exhausted his state and federal appeals, had no active stay of execution, and could lawfully be put to death. The inmate’s attorneys opposed setting a date, saying they needed more time to pursue available legal proceedings and possible executive clemency. The defense additionally pointed to public records that it said showed the Indiana Department of Correction lacked the drugs needed to conduct an execution and had no lawful source from which to obtain them.

OKLAHOMA CITY — The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals has scheduled the execution of Air Force veteran and longtime death row prisoner Jim Pavatt for Nov. 12, as his attorneys continue to challenge his conviction and contend that prosecutors relied on false arguments, disputed forensic evidence and an alleged confession they later described as bogus. Pavatt, who served nearly 22 years in the Air Force and rose to the rank of master sergeant, was convicted and sentenced to death for the 2001 killing of Rob Andrew in Oklahoma City. His execution is scheduled for the day after Veterans Day.

A U.S. air ‌force judge on Wednesday ordered Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the accused mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, to face trial before a military tribunal in June 2028, along with three co-defendants. The trial-scheduling order entered by the air force's Lt.-Col. Michael Schrama ​marked the latest milestone in a military prosecution beset by ​two decades of legal deadlock surrounding the four detainees held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia prison officials plan to execute a man next month who was convicted of fatally shooting two real estate agents in Atlanta’s suburbs more than two decades ago. Stacey Humphreys, 53, was convicted of malice murder in the 2003 killings of 33-year-old Cyndi Williams and 21-year-old Lori Brown. He is set to receive a lethal injection at the state prison near Jackson at 7 p.m. on Sept. 16, according to the Department of Corrections. Humphreys would be the first person executed in Georgia this year. The death penalty in the state has largely been tied up in litigation over an agreement related to the coronavirus pandemic that defense lawyers contend temporarily shields many death row residents from execution. The last execution in the state was in March 2024.

Gov. Ron DeSantis has signed a death warrant for Curtis. W. Beasley, who was convicted and sentenced to death in 1998 for beating a Dundee woman to death with a hammer three years earlier. Beasley's execution by lethal injection is scheduled for Sept. 29, according to the warrant signed by DeSantis on Aug. 26. Since his conviction, Beasley, 77, of Haines City has maintained his innocence. The jury that recommended the judge impose a death sentence was not unanimous.