Six months into 2016, the pace of exe­cu­tions in the United States remains at the same lev­el as the 24-year low set in 2015. Fourteen exe­cu­tions have been car­ried out so far this year in five states — Texas (6), Georgia (5), and one each in Alabama, Florida, and Missouri — while 23 oth­er sched­uled exe­cu­tions have been halt­ed by stays or reprieves. States car­ried out 28 exe­cu­tions in 2015. Eight exe­cu­tions are cur­rent­ly sched­uled for the sec­ond half of the year, with sev­en in Texas and one in Georgia. Death penal­ty cas­es in two states that have car­ried out exe­cu­tions this year — Alabama and Florida — as well as in Delaware, are in lim­bo as state courts decide the ram­i­fi­ca­tions of the U.S. Supreme Court deci­sion in Hurst v. Florida, which struck down Florida’s death sen­tenc­ing scheme. The Supreme Court also ruled in favor of death row pris­on­ers in two oth­er major cas­es this spring. The Court over­turned the Georgia con­vic­tion of Timothy Foster because pros­e­cu­tors uncon­sti­tu­tion­al­ly exclud­ed blacks from the jury, and it direct­ed state courts in Alabama and Mississippi to recon­sid­er cap­i­tal con­vic­tions in two oth­er cas­es in which sim­i­lar abus­es have been alleged. The Court also ordered a new appeal for Terry Williams in Pennsylvania because of judi­cial bias in his ear­li­er appeal. Executions also have been affect­ed by the ongo­ing con­tro­ver­sy con­cern­ing lethal injec­tion. In May, Pfizer joined numer­ous oth­er phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies in imple­ment­ing sales and dis­tri­b­u­tion restric­tions to pre­vent states from using its prod­ucts in exe­cu­tions. Two states — Louisiana and Arizona — have recent­ly announced that they are unable to obtain lethal injec­tion drugs and Arkansas’ sup­ply of the lethal injec­tion drug mida­zo­lam expired on June 30.

(Posted by DPIC, July 1, 2016.) See Lethal Injection, U.S. Supreme Court, and Executions.

Citation Guide