For years, the death penalty in the United States appeared to be on an irreversible decline, perhaps even headed to extinction. Death sentences have fallen by about 90 percent since their mid-1990s peak, when more than 300 were imposed every year. In 1999, there were almost 100 executions nationwide; in 2021, there were 11.
That downward trend is beginning to reverse. Driven by hardline prosecutors and tough-on-crime governors, the number of executions jumped 64 percent in 2022 and increased again in 2023 to a total of 24, the highest in five years.
Perhaps the most crucial player in the death penalty’s resurrection, though, is the U.S. Supreme Court, whose historic role of maintaining guardrails has given way to removing roadblocks. Under the conservative supermajority put in place by President Donald Trump, the justices are far more likely to propel an execution forward than intercede to stop it, including in cases where guilt is in doubt or where the means of carrying it out could result in a grotesque spectacle of pain and suffering.
States are responding. On Thursday, Alabama is scheduled to execute someone using a potentially dangerous method that has never before been used in the U.S. South Carolina announced it is restarting executions after a 12-year pause, a decision which is now the subject of a legal challenge that will be heard by the state’s highest court in February. On Dec. 22, a Utah judge ruled that the state could use a firing squad to execute Ralph Leroy Menzies, who was convicted and sentenced to death in 1988, even though past experiments with this method demonstrated that there was a “risk of a ‘botched’ execution, such as bullets missing the target placed over a person’s heart.” Earlier in 2023, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed six death warrants (compared to just two during his entire first term in office) and a law that ended a unanimous jury requirement for death sentencing. Florida also enacted a law that allows capital punishment in cases involving sex crimes against children in non-lethal cases; in December, a Florida prosecutor invoked it to seek the death penalty against a man accused of multiple counts of sexual battery against a child under the age of 12. The law flatly contradicts a line of Supreme Court precedent barring the death penalty in cases where “no life was taken.” DeSantis has vowed to defend the legislation against any legal challenge, offering the justices an opportunity to reconsider an entire line of death penalty jurisprudence. Similar laws have been proposed in Tennessee and Missouri.
On Nov. 16, Alabama executed Casey McWhorter, who had just turned 18 when he participated in the 1993 robbery and shooting death of the victim. The jury could not reach a unanimous verdict on the death sentence, but the judge imposed it anyway. In Louisiana, a coalition of prosecutors led by Republican Attorney General Jeff Landry
The Death Penalty Was Fading Away — Until the Supreme Court Stepped In
12
0
21.01.2024
For years, the death penalty in the United States appeared to be on an irreversible decline, perhaps even headed to extinction. Death sentences have fallen by about 90 percent since their mid-1990s peak, when more than 300 were imposed every year. In 1999, there were almost 100 executions nationwide; in 2021, there were 11.
That downward trend is beginning to reverse. Driven by hardline prosecutors and tough-on-crime governors, the number of executions jumped 64 percent in 2022 and increased again in 2023 to a total of 24, the highest in five years.
Perhaps the most crucial player in the death penalty’s resurrection, though, is the U.S. Supreme Court, whose historic role of maintaining guardrails........
© Politico
visit website
login
who are we?
contact us
qosheapp
Toi Staff
Gideon Levy
Belen Fernandez
Andrew Mitrovica
Mort Laitner
Rami G Khouri
Ali Fathollah-Nejad
Nikkei Editorial
