U.S. rushing to expand execution methods like firing squads for federal death row inmates
By: Christina Carrega CNN
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
U.S. rushing to expand execution methods like firing squads for federal death row inmates
United States Attorney General William Barr, listens to LaToya Cantrell, New Orleans mayor, during the Grand Lodge Fraternal Order of Police's 64th National Biennial Conference at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center on Convention Blvd. in New Orleans, La. Monday, Aug. 12, 2019. (David Grunfeld/The Advocate via AP)
The U.S. Justice Department has rushed to change the rules around federal death penalties as they expedite a slew of scheduled executions in the final days of the Trump administration, including expanding possible execution methods to include electrocution and death by firing squad.
The approved amendment to the "Manner of Federal Executions" rule gives federal prosecutors a wider variety of options for execution in order to avoid delays if the state in which the inmate was sentenced doesn't provide other alternatives.
The rule was included among three dozen policy changes President Donald Trump is attempting to push through before the end of his term. The proposed changes were first reported by ProPublica .
Attorney General William Barr and the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs pushed the rule forward. Once the approved amendment is published in the Federal Register -- which could come as early as Friday, according to a Justice Department official -- it will become effective in 30 days.
It ultimately may be moot since President-elect Joe Biden campaigned to abolish the federal death penalty and four of the five inmates scheduled for execution already have their manner selected -- lethal injection.
The Justice Department did not provide comment on why the new rule was made.
The proposed amendment, which was published in August , calls for alternative means for federal executions if the lethal injection is not available in the state in which a defendant is given a sentence of death.
It also suggests that if the state where the crime occurred does not permit death sentences, a judge can designate another state with those laws and utilize their facilities to carry out the execution.
But a Justice Department official said "the federal government will never execute an inmate by firing squad or electrocution unless the relevant state has itself authorized that method of execution."
Attorneys involved in death penalty cases have argued that the use of "non-prescribed" pentobarbital lethal injection is a violation of the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act and subjects an inmate to suffer "the effects of flash pulmonary edema" -- a respiratory condition where fluid quickly floods the lungs, according to court documents.
Those arguments have been shut down by the Supreme Court and a federal judge, which have ruled it is not "certain" or "likely" that such an event could take place if the lethal injection is used and that it does not rise to the level of a Constitutional violation of "cruel and unusual punishment," according to court documents.
Earlier this year, Oklahoma resumed executions after a 2015 incident where Clayton Lockett , a death row inmate, received the wrong drug for the lethal execution. Lockett died of a heart attack 43 minutes after receiving the injection, according to earlier reports .
There are 28 states that allow federal and state executions , and the lethal injection is the primary manner of execution. At least nine of those states allow for alternative methods such as electrocution, lethal gas, firing squad and hanging. Hangings were not mentioned in the amended rule.
"No one on federal death row committed the offense in a state that uses the firing squad to execute prisoners," Robert Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, said on Twitter Thursday.
When the Justice Department's rule is published for future death penalty cases, prosecutors could request that the judge transfer the case to another state like Oklahoma, Utah, or Mississippi, where firing squads are allowed.
Barr announced on November 20 the schedule for the last three death row inmates before Biden is sworn in, and two are expected next month. If all the executions scheduled since July are completed, the Trump administration will have put the most federal inmates to death during a presidential transition since 1884, Dunham told CNN on Monday.
Four of the inmates , including Brandon Bernard -- the youngest in the United States to be sentenced to death for a crime he committed as a teenager -- and Lisa Montgomery -- the only woman on federal death row, who would be the first to be executed in nearly 70 years -- are expected to receive the lethal injection.
Montgomery was granted a stay on her execution until December 31 after her attorneys were diagnosed with the coronavirus. Her execution date is set for January 12.
The Trump administration has rejected Montgomery's request for a reprieve. Bernard's last request to stay his execution was denied by the Supreme Court last week.
Dustin Higgs, who in 2000 was the first person in Maryland to be sentenced to federal death row, does not have a manner of execution determined. Higgs' attorney did not return a request for comment.
There are 54 people currently on federal death row. Bernard's is the next scheduled execution on December 10.
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Hurry, Donnie, hurry up. The blood of 265,000 Americans on your hands isn't enough. Got to find ways to make it a record no POTUS can even in the future ever meet - Guiness Book of Records, here you come. Guess you didn't want the guillotine, cause it's too "instant" eh? After all, firing squads can miss hitting the "sweet spots" that cause immediate death, and electrocution - guess you watched The Green Mile. Why not hanging? Sometimes their neck doesn't get broken and they strangle to death - slowly. Are you going to start doing them in a public square so your loyal followers can watch your handiwork? Make some bucks out of it - sell tickets. You've got 74 milllion potential purchasers who will never admit that you have ever done or will ever do anything wrong or bad.
Billy Bizarre Barr.
Why bother? Can't wait to have another foot note in history for returning to the good old days?
What next? Restrictions on hollow point bullets during executions by firing squads?
or the opposite?
Actually, this bit from Arlo Guthrie's song Alice's Restaurant sort of fits this story...
So Buzz- care to comment on China's record of making people they don't like disappear? Reeducation camps ring a damn bell. Of course some on the left in the US seem to be in favor of those being used here.
Forcing US taxpayers to pay for violent criminals to be in prison for the rest of their damn lives doesn't seem to be a problem for some. Hey, maybe we will all get lucky and they will be able to kill again while in prison; or get a reprieve and be released so they can kill again on the outside.
Trump is in office for two more months; then the POS Biden can come in and make the changes he wants.
All of this pearl clutching going on by some is pathetic.
Yep. China executes people, as does America, but America is YOUR country where you vote, and Canada, where capital punishment is banned, is my country where I vote - I'm just a guest in China. They execute people in other countries too, but America is supposed to be the most advanced and civilized country in the world, whereas China is just a developing country. Funny thing about the reeducation camps here. Since they had them, there hasn't been an act of terrorism here (except one deranged old man who got into a primary school and stabbed some kids) and not one shooting for almost FOUR YEARS. So how are the terrorist acts and mass shootings, in fact ANY shootings, going these days in the much more advanced and civilized USA?
Yeah, so out of your 320 million +/- people, how many on death row are you supporting with your hard earned dollars? Aren't they making licence plates, or something? I do find it strange that statistics indicate that a bigger percentage of Americans are incarcerated than the percentage in any other country in the world. Maybe Biden will decide that kids who get caught with a joint don't really deserve to spend 5 years in jail.
It's 10 p.m. here and I'm tired so I guess I'll lock this seed for the night, but I'll unlock it in about 10 or so hours from now.
Open for comments - Read the group rules first. Click on the group avatar at the top of the page to access the rules.
Since nothing was posted on this seed today I'm now locking it permanently.