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Thread: Louisiana Capital Punishment News

  1. #121
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    Jeff Landry, the AG, and who has been pushing for new execution methods and what not, has won the Governors race and will assume the role next year. It remains to be seen if he will pursue any DP-related issues as he has made no dent as the AG.
    "There is a point in the history of a society when it becomes so pathologically soft and tender that among other things it sides even with those who harm it, criminals, and does this quite seriously and honestly. Punishing somehow seems unfair to it, and it is certain that imagining ‘punishment’ and ‘being supposed to punish’ hurts it, arouses fear in it." Friedrich Nietzsche

  2. #122
    Senior Member Frequent Poster Fact's Avatar
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    As the AG in a non-unitary executive, he had relatively little power over what the Louisiana Department of Corrections did to procure execution drugs. Especially with a governor who was silently opposed to the death penalty for more than 90 percent of his tenure.

  3. #123
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    Federal judge denies relief to death row inmates seeking clemency

    By GABRIELLA KILLETT
    Nola

    A federal judge in Baton Rouge on Thursday rejected a challenge to the state pardon board's decision to forego swift pardon hearings for 55 of 56 death row prisoners in Louisiana.

    Chief U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick of the Middle District of Louisiana denied the inmates' request for a preliminary injunction. Those prisoners argued that the state Pardon Board denied them due process by refusing them swift pardon hearings in a deal with Attorney General Jeff Landry and district attorneys in the state.

    "There is no constitutional right to a clemency hearing, nor is there a right to challenge the Board's failure to follow its own procedures," the judge wrote. "Plaintiffs have presented no evidence that they have been denied access to Louisiana's clemency process."

    Cecelia Kappel, with the Capital Appeals Project, said in a statement that Dick's rejection of the inmates' request "abstains from reaching the critical issue here: that AG Landry improperly interfered with the clemency process."

    The decision leaves little chance that those prisoners, who applied en masse this year for mercy from Gov. John Bel Edwards, will be granted full pardon hearings before he leaves office and Landry takes over as governor on Jan. 8.

    "This is a loss not only for the people on death row and their families, but for the citizens of Louisiana who value life and want an honest evaluation of how this state has imposed death sentences in the past," Kappel said. "There is still time for action, but time is running short."

    Edwards, a Democrat, had asked the board to conduct those hearings after coming out against the death penalty this year, his last after two terms in office. All of those prisoners asked for Edwards to convert their death sentences to life in prison, which only governors can do on the board's recommendation.

    The board first scheduled clemency hearings for 20 death-row inmates, then rescinded them after Landry tossed the board's lawyers and appointed his own to represent it.

    The board, whose members are appointed by the governor, agreed on Sept. 29 to convert them to administrative hearings meant to decide if those prisoners are eligible for full pardon hearings at least 60 days later. The deal dimmed the chances for all but a handful of those condemned prisoners, and their advocates cried foul.

    In her ruling, Dick, who was nominated to the federal bench by President Obama, sidestepped a claim by those prisoners that Landry colluded with the board to scuttle the governor's exercise of his power to grant mercy.

    Meanwhile, the pardon board has conducted administrative hearings for 10 of the death row prisoners seeking mercy, and it rejected full pardon hearings for all of them.

    https://www.nola.com/news/courts/bat...7b70682ae.html
    "There is a point in the history of a society when it becomes so pathologically soft and tender that among other things it sides even with those who harm it, criminals, and does this quite seriously and honestly. Punishing somehow seems unfair to it, and it is certain that imagining ‘punishment’ and ‘being supposed to punish’ hurts it, arouses fear in it." Friedrich Nietzsche

  4. #124
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    Lawmakers in Louisiana want to join Alabama in using nitrogen gas as a means of execution

    By Associated Press

    Louisiana may resume executions after a 14-year pause after the state's Republican-dominated Legislature gave final passage to a bill to add electrocution and the use of nitrogen gas as means of administering the death penalty. The legislation comes one day after the country's most recent execution in Texas and a failed attempt in Idaho, both by lethal injection. The bill now heads to the desk of Governor Jeff Landry, a tough-on-crime Republican who has signaled his support for the measure.

    Amid ongoing challenges over obtaining lethal injection drugs, Louisiana's bill follows in the steps of other reliably red states that have expanded their execution methods — from firing squads in Idaho to the newest method of oxygen deprivation via use of nitrogen gas in Alabama.

    Proponents of expanding execution methods say it's past time for Louisiana to uphold "contractual obligations" between the state and victims' families after a death sentence has been handed down in court. They say this bill is a tool to once again carry out executions. Opponents, however, questioned the legality of the proposed methods and have argued that new methods could violate legal protections against cruel and unusual punishment.

    Discussions of the bill on the Senate floor Thursday also reignited the age-old debate over the morality of capital punishment, which has been in state law for decades. Supporters told harrowing stories of victims' families who are awaiting their day of justice.

    Those who say the death penalty should be abolished pointed to the cost of executions, religious beliefs, racial disparities and Louisiana's exoneration rate — from 2010 to 2020, at least 22 inmates sentenced to death have been exonerated or had their sentences reduced.

    "We are not debating if the death penalty is right or wrong," said Democratic Sen. Katrina Jackson-Andrews. "We are debating how far we will go to kill a man."

    Louisiana's bill passed in the Senate 24-15. Each Democrat in the chamber and four Republicans voted against the bill.

    Currently 58 people sit on Louisiana's death row. However, an execution has not occurred in the state since 2010 and, at this time, none are scheduled for the future, according to the Louisiana Department of Public Safety & Corrections.

    Nationally, over recent decades, the number of executions have declined sharply amid legal battles, a shortage of lethal injection drugs and even waning public support of capital punishment. That has led to a majority of states to either abolish or pause carrying out the death penalty. Last year there were 24 executions carried out in five states, according to the Washington, D.C.-based Death Penalty Information Center.

    However in Louisiana, between a new conservative governor and, just recently, the nation's first execution using nitrogen gas — the first time a new method had been used in the U.S. since lethal injection was introduced in 1982 — there has been a renewed push to explore other methods.

    The proposal to add the use of nitrogen gas came as no shock to political pundits in Louisiana — as the method gains traction elsewhere in the country — but reinstating electrocution has surprised some.

    For four decades until 1991, when the state moved to lethal injections, Louisiana had used the electric chair — dubbed by death row inmates as "Gruesome Gertie."

    Currently, only eight states allow for electrocution, however seven of them have lethal injection as the primary method, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. Likewise, lethal injection would be the preferred method in Louisiana based on the bill, but the head of Louisiana's Department of Public Safety and Corrections would have final say.

    Supreme courts in at least two states, Georgia and Nebraska, have ruled that the use of the electric chair violates their state constitutional prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment.

    Louisiana's execution bill is among a slew of "tough-on-crime" policies voted on during the state's short special legislative session, which the governor called to address violent crime in the state.

    https://www.apr.org/news/2024-02-29/...s-of-execution

  5. #125
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mastro Titta's Avatar
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    Jeff Landry signs bills to expand Louisiana death penalty, eliminate parole

    By James Finn
    Nola.com

    Gov. Jeff Landry signed into law Tuesday a bill allowing executions by nitrogen gas and electrocution, opening the door for Louisiana to revive capital punishment 14 years after it last used its death chamber.

    Landry signed the legislation, House Bill 6, and 10 other bills into law while surrounded by crime victims' loved ones and law enforcement officials in a ceremony at the State Capitol. HB 6 also shrouds records of the state's procurement of lethal injection drugs in secrecy, a step supporters say will make it easier to obtain those drugs.

    The death penalty bill headlined a slate of tough-on-crime legislation approved by the Republican-controlled state Legislature last month and championed by Landry, a Republican and former state attorney general who campaigned on a promise to punish criminals and uplift people affected by violent crime. The new laws reverse a path charted by the state's 2017 Justice Reinvestment Initiative by slashing chances for convicted criminals to be released from prison early and lengthening sentences for some crimes.

    "This is what I ran on," Landry said Tuesday.

    The governor also signed bills that allow people to carry concealed handguns without permits, eliminate parole for adults who commit crimes after Aug. 1, dramatically cut availability of good behavior credits in prison and limit how people can request plea deals after their convictions, among others.

    Landry is expected to sign additional bills passed in last month's special session in New Orleans on Wednesday, including measures to publish court minutes for youth accused of violent crimes, increase penalties for carjacking and weapons offenses and give Landry more control over the state's public defense system.

    Protests against that legislation — particularly the death penalty bill, which opponents caution promotes one method that has hardly been tested and another ruled inhumane by courts in some states — spurred fiery debate but did little to sway lawmakers, most of whom fell in line with Landry's agenda.

    A series of criminal justice advocacy groups spoke out against the new laws again on Monday, saying they will do little to curb crime and risk bloating the state's prison population to pre-2017 levels.

    The 2017 public safety laws, which drew bipartisan backing and support from law enforcement, released people with convictions for nonviolent crimes and saved the state some $153 million, a recent audit found.

    "Blaming the wrong problems doesn’t get the right solutions, and our communities for years have made clear the solutions necessary to address the very real concerns and needs of all Louisianans," said Danny Engelberg, the chief public defender in New Orleans. "These misguided bills will balloon our already bloated legal system, jails and prison system, and further widen the inequities in justice, safety, and community well-being."

    A group of Jewish activists was set to demonstrate in New Orleans Tuesday against the death penalty bill's proposed use of nitrogen gas. They said the bill evokes the Nazi regime's systematic use of gas as a means of killing millions of people across Europe in the mid-20th century.

    Difficulty obtaining the cocktail of execution drugs from pharmaceutical firms, along with former Gov. John Bel Edwards' opposition to capital punishment and a series of federal court orders pausing executions in recent years, had kept Louisiana from putting anyone to death since 2010.

    It's unclear when state officials might begin taking steps to obtain materials needed to carry out executions or when executions could resume in Louisiana. Also unclear is which of the three execution options the state will use; the new law leaves that choice to the secretary of the state's Department of Public Safety and Corrections.

    HB 6's sponsor, Rep. Nicholas Muscarello, R-Hammond, said in an interview last month that Landry has indicated that his preferred execution method is lethal injection.

    Last week, a DPSC spokesperson referred questions about the death penalty process to Landry's office, which did not respond to requests for comment. Landry left Tuesday's bill-signing ceremony without taking questions from reporters.

    https://www.nola.com/news/politics/l...ign=user-share

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