[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----USA

[Rick Halperin]

July 25




USA:

Trump Justice Department to resume federal executions


The Department of Justice announced Thursday that it will resume capital 
punishment for the first time in nearly 2 decades.

Attorney General William Barr has directed that executions for 5 death-row 
inmates be scheduled. If carried out, they will be the first federal executions 
since 2003.

Only 3 federal executions have taken place since 1988, according to the Death 
Penalty Information Center. All 5 of the death-row inmates named in Thursday's 
release were convicted for the murders of children.

The Federal Bureau of Prisons has adopted a regulation that will require 
federal authorities to use a single drug, pentobarbital, in federal executions, 
according to the DOJ release. That drug is used by several states for lethal 
injections.

“Congress has expressly authorized the death penalty through legislation 
adopted by the people’s representatives in both houses of Congress and signed 
by the President,” Barr said in a statement Thursday.

“Under Administrations of both parties, the Department of Justice has sought 
the death penalty against the worst criminals, including these five murderers, 
each of whom was convicted by a jury of his peers after a full and fair 
proceeding. The Justice Department upholds the rule of law—and we owe it to the 
victims and their families to carry forward the sentence imposed by our justice 
system.”

(source: thehill.com)