Local Church Leaders Across Alabama Speak Out About State’s Death Penalty Process

In a let­ter to Governor Kay Ivey (pic­tured) of Alabama, over 170 local faith lead­ers from many denom­i­na­tions and tra­di­tions across the state asked her to com­mit to a ​“com­pre­hen­sive, inde­pen­dent, and exter­nal review of Alabama’s death penal­ty pro­ce­dures” in the wake of a series of botched exe­cu­tions. The church rep­re­sen­ta­tives thanked the gov­er­nor for paus­ing exe­cu­tions but urged her to ensure trans­paren­cy and inde­pen­dence in review­ing how Alabama performs executions.

The let­ter also raised con­cerns about cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment itself: ​“The death penal­ty also pre­cludes the pos­si­bil­i­ty of redemp­tion. When so many of the con­demned men com­mit­ted their crimes at such a young age, many before the age of 25, we find it regret­table that these young men are denied a chance to redeem them­selves or atone for what they have done. God’s Word is clear: all life is pre­cious. When there is life, there is hope – there is the abil­i­ty to seek repen­tance and truth. This seek­ing takes place even in the hearts of those who have com­mit­ted the most heinous of crimes. Death cuts short this search for redemption.”

Governor Ivey halt­ed exe­cu­tions in November 2022 after the state mis­han­dled three con­sec­u­tive lethal injec­tions. In July 2022, Alabama took more than three hours to kill Joe Nathan James. Two months lat­er, the state had to call off the exe­cu­tion of Alan Miller because cor­rec­tions offi­cials couldn’t set an IV line before his exe­cu­tion war­rant expired. On November 17, the state once again had to call off an exe­cu­tion due to fail­ure to set an IV line for Kenneth Smith. The faith lead­ers called Ivey’s deci­sion to pause exe­cu­tions ​“a bold and necessary step.”

The lead­ers asked that ​“The review process should not be shroud­ed in secre­cy” and expressed skep­ti­cism that an inves­ti­ga­tion could be con­duct­ed ​“in a month or two,” as sug­gest­ed by the Department of Corrections. They point­ed to inde­pen­dent reviews of exe­cu­tions car­ried out in oth­er con­ser­v­a­tive states, such as Tennessee and Oklahoma and expressed par­tic­u­lar reser­va­tions about intro­duc­ing the gas cham­ber: ​“We are very con­cerned that the state is even con­tem­plat­ing a form of exe­cu­tion which involves gassing peo­ple to death.” The governor’s office respond­ed by agree­ing, ​“we’ve got to get this right.”