The Republican administration says "act on behalf of the public and families". Donald Trump's government is preparing to resume 17-year-old federal executions in the United States on Monday. Relatives of the victims, religious circles and the European Union have expressed strong opposition to this decision.
Unless justice gives him a break at the last minute, Daniel Lee, 47, will receive a lethal injection of pentobarbital in the death room of an Indiana penitentiary. A former supporter of white supremacy, he was sentenced to death in 1999 for the murder of a couple and an eight-year-old girl.
Most crimes are tried at state level
Two more executions are scheduled this week, and a fourth on August 28. All relate to men sentenced to death by federal courts for the murder of children.
In the United States, most crimes are tried at the state level, but the federal justice system can deal with the most serious acts (terrorist attacks, racist crimes, etc.) or committed on military bases, between several states or on Amerindian reservations. .
In the past 45 years, only three people have been executed at the federal level, including Timothy McVeigh, who was responsible for the Oklahoma City bombing (168 dead in 1995) in 2001. The last federal execution dates back to 2003.
"Irresponsible"
To everyone's surprise, Minister of Justice Bill Barr announced a year ago that he intended to return to this practice. After a series of judicial twists and turns, he set the schedule in June, at a time when cases of new coronavirus were on the rise in much of the country.
However, an execution involves many people: "prison staff, lawyers, relatives of victims or accused, journalists, a chaplain ...", lists for AFP Robert Dunham, director of the Center for Information on death penalty (DPIC) which refers to the subject.
It is "irresponsible to want to carry out so many executions in such a short time" in this context of health crisis, he adds, denouncing a "political instrumentalization of capital punishment".
Republican voters support 77%
According to polls, support for the death penalty has eroded among Americans but remains strong among Republican voters who are 77% in favor of it for murderers.
In front of his supporters, Donald Trump, who hopes to win a second term on November 3, regularly calls for a reinforced use of this ultimate sanction, especially for police killers or drug traffickers.
"No more pain"
As the deadline approached, calls were multiplied, however, for the tenant of the White House to show mercy towards Daniel Lee.
"As a supporter of President Trump, I pray that he will hear my message: the execution of Danny Lee for the murder of my daughter and granddaughter is not what I want and will bring more pain to my family, "said Earlene Peterson, mother of Nancy Mueller, murdered in 1996, in an open letter to the New York billionaire.
"Abolish the death penalty"
For their part, a thousand religious leaders, Catholic and evangelical, called on the president to "concentrate on the protection of life and not on executions" in these times of Covid-19.
And, on Friday, the European Union asked it to "reconsider" a position which, according to it, "goes against a general tendency in the United States and in the world to abolish the death penalty, by the law or in practice ”.
In fact, “only” 22 executions took place in 2019 in the United States and seven since the start of the year.
World
Chaplains prohibited from attending execution in Texas, she is suspended
World
Detainee to Be Executed in Missouri ... Respecting Social Distancing
- World
- Death sentence
- Donald trump
- United States
- Execution