With three more inmates scheduled to be executed in the final week of the Trump administration — two of whom are sick with COVID-19 — legislation is being prepared that would end the federal death penalty. This follows a growing…
Clergy advocate to repeal death penalty in Virginia
A group of African American pastors, including three Baptists, urged Virginia lawmakers Jan. 7 to abolish the state’s death penalty, equating it to lynching and a declaration that Black lives do not matter. The ministers’ press conference, held on Zoom,…
Killin’ ’em for Christmas
In the midst of a surging pandemic that has killed 300,000 Americans plus an election that remains contested because the loser (and his idol-worshipping followers) will not accept the fact (defined as “a thing that is known or proved to…
Opposition to capital punishment reportedly growing among conservatives
Opposition to capital punishment isn’t just for liberals anymore. There’s a growing concern about the inequity and ineffectiveness of the death penalty among Republicans, independents and libertarians, according to Hannah Cox, senior national manager of Conservatives Concerned About the Death…
Trump wants to bring back firing squads, Trump supporters want to execute opponents, while support for death penalty continues to decline
While American support for the death penalty continues to decline, the Trump administration in its waning days seeks to return electrocution and firing squads as means of capital punishment. And several supporters of Donald Trump’s failed re-election bid this week…
Pope Francis calls for elimination of death penalty, and that’s only part of what he wants
On Oct. 4, Pope Francis published his third papal encyclical, Fratelli Tutti. Like all titles, Fratelli Tutti is revealing. Not only does it allude to the writings of the Pope’s namesake, St. Francis of Assisi, it also previews the themes…
Arkansas Supreme Court declines to prevent pastor/judge from hearing attorney general’s cases
The Arkansas Supreme Court on Thursday refused to bar a Little Rock judge from handling cases involving the office of the state attorney general who in 2017 got him removed from execution cases after he demonstrated against the death penalty in his extrajudicial role as a Baptist pastor.
Arkansas Supreme Court, Attorney General, continue to tangle with pastor/judge
The Arkansas Supreme Court won’t restore the authority of a circuit judge who also serves as pastor of a Baptist church to decide death-penalty cases, and the state’s top lawyer wants him barred from any civil cases involving her office in separate but intertwined controversies that began with a prayer vigil protesting capital punishment on Good Friday in 2017.
Arkansas Supreme Court refuses to step down from case challenging its own ruling against anti-death penalty judge
Justices of the Arkansas Supreme Court on Thursday refused to recuse themselves from a case claiming they improperly barred a Little Rock judge from hearing death penalty cases because he exercised his religious liberty by attending a execution vigil in his other role as a Baptist pastor.