Nebraska

History of the Death Penalty

Nebraska had a ref­er­en­dum on the bal­lot in November 2016 to deter­mine whether to retain or sus­pend the leg­is­la­ture’s repeal of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. The ref­er­en­dum passed, 61% — 39%. For more infor­ma­tion, see Ballotpedia, Nebraska Death Penalty Repeal, Referendum 426 (2016).

Timeline

1863 — The first record­ed exe­cu­tion car­ried out in Nebraska. Cyrus Tator is hanged for murder.

1973 — Nebraska rein­states the death penal­ty fol­low­ing Furman v. Georgia.

1979 — The Nebraska Unicameral Legislature pass­es a bill abol­ish­ing the death penal­ty, but it is vetoed by Governor Charley Throne.

1987 — William Marion is grant­ed a posthu­mous par­don 100 years after his exe­cu­tion on the grounds that his ​“vic­tim” had been seen alive in 1891.

1999 — Jerry Simpson and Clarance Victor are tak­en off of Nebraska’s death row because of intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty. Both men had IQs less than 70, and it is uncon­sti­tu­tion­al to exe­cute peo­ple with developmental disabilities.

1999 — The Nebraska Legislature is the first in the nation to pass a mora­to­ri­um on the death penal­ty dur­ing a study on the fair­ness of its application.

2000 — The Nebraska Supreme Court vacates the death sen­tences of Randy Reeves after find­ing that the court sen­tenced him with improp­er pro­ce­dures. Mr. Reeves was resen­tenced to two life terms.

2007 — The Nebraska Unicameral Legislature comes with­in one vote of pass­ing a repeal bill.

2008 — The Nebraska Supreme Court rules the elec­tric chair uncon­sti­tu­tion­al, cre­at­ing a de fac­to mora­to­ri­um on executions.

2009 — A bill to instate lethal injec­tion as the state’s pri­ma­ry method of exe­cu­tion is passed and signed, end­ing the de facto moratorium.

2015 — Nebraska Unicameral Legislature pass­es a bill abol­ish­ing the death penalty.

2015 — A large ship­ment of lethal injec­tion anes­thet­ic sodi­um thiopen­tal is halt­ed in India by FedEx before it can reach Nebraska due to a lack of FDA clearance.

2016 — Nebraska vot­ers approve a bal­lot ques­tion that revers­es the leg­is­la­ture’s repeal of the death penal­ty and restores capital punishment.

2018 — The Nebraska Legislature issues a sub­poe­na requir­ing Director Scott Frakes to tes­ti­fy about efforts to obtain exe­cu­tion drugs due to alle­ga­tions that they had not com­plied with fed­er­al drug laws. Attorney General Doug Peterson sues the leg­is­la­ture to block Mr. Frakes from testifying.

2018 — Nebraska exe­cutes Carey Dean Moore, after 21 years with­out an exe­cu­tion. He is exe­cut­ed is a nev­er-before-tried four-drug exe­cu­tion pro­to­col of diazepam (Valium), fen­tanyl cit­rate, cisatracuri­um besy­late, and potassium chloride.

2018 — German-based phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­ny Fresenius Kabi files suit in fed­er­al court alleg­ing that Nebraska intend­ed to exe­cute Carey Dean Moore using drugs obtained ​“through improp­er or illegal means.”

2020 — Nebraska Supreme Court orders the Department of Correctional Services to release pub­lic records relat­ed to the pro­cure­ment of drugs used in the exe­cu­tion of Carey Dean Moore.

2020 — Governor Ricketts vetoes a bill that would have increased trans­paren­cy in the state’s exe­cu­tion process by allow­ing wit­ness­es to see the exe­cu­tion the moment the pris­on­ers enters the death cham­ber until the pris­on­er is declared dead or the exe­cu­tion is halted.

2023 — Nebraska Judiciary Committee pro­pos­es con­sti­tu­tion­al amend­ment that would pro­hib­it the death penal­ty in the Nebraska Constitution if approved by vot­ers in the 2024 general election.

2023 — Death row pris­on­er Aubrey Trail waives appeals and peti­tions Nebraska Supreme Court for an exe­cu­tion date, despite unavail­abil­i­ty of lethal injection drugs.

Famous Cases

The Beatrice Six

The 1985 case of the rape and mur­der of 68-year-old Helen Wilson in the town of Beatrice result­ed in the arrest of six peo­ple, even though the orig­i­nal FBI inves­ti­ga­tion con­clud­ed that the killer had act­ed alone. Joseph White was con­vict­ed of the crime in 1989 and sen­tenced to life in prison, and the eye­wit­ness tes­ti­mo­ny that led to White’s con­vic­tion came from the five co-defen­dants in the case. Of them, three received sen­tences of 10 years in prison in exchange for their tes­ti­mo­ny, while anoth­er was sched­uled for release in 2009. The final defen­dant, Thomas Winslow, plead­ed no con­test to aid­ing and abet­ting first-degree mur­der and received a 50-year sentence.

In 2008, Joseph White became the first post-con­vic­tion DNA exon­er­a­tion in Nebraska’s his­to­ry when he won a his­toric legal case that over­turned his 1985 mur­der con­vic­tion. The DNA Testing Act passed by the Nebraska Legislature in 2000 allowed White’s motion for test­ing, which showed the foren­sic evi­dence found at the crime scene came from one man, and that man was not Joseph White.

Five of the six peo­ple charged in this case plead­ed to less­er charges, when they were in no way involved in the crime, in order to avoid the death penal­ty. Six inno­cent peo­ple feared being con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death, and the only per­son to main­tain his inno­cence in court was con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to life in prison.

Charles Starkweather

The Starkweather case was one of the most heav­i­ly pub­li­cized mass mur­ders in U.S. his­to­ry, draw­ing nation­al atten­tion both to Nebraska and to the psy­cho­log­i­cal issues sur­round­ing dis­af­fect­ed youth. The saga began when 19-year-old Charles Starkweather killed a gas sta­tion atten­dant in December 1957. Then, in late January 1958, Charlie and his 14-year-old girl­friend Caril Ann Fugate began an eight-day mur­der spree that start­ed with the mur­der of Caril’s fam­i­ly, and even­tu­al­ly led to ten total deaths before they were cap­tured on the high­way out­side Douglas, Wyoming. Tried and con­vict­ed of mur­der, Charles Starkweather was exe­cut­ed at the Nebraska State Penitentiary on June 25, 1959. Caril Fugate was also con­vict­ed, and her ini­tial life sen­tence was com­mut­ed to a 30 to 50 year sen­tence in 1973. In 1976, after serv­ing 18 years, Fugate was paroled and she even­tu­al­ly reset­tled in Michigan.

Notable Exonerations

William Marion was exe­cut­ed in Gage County in 1887. He was con­vict­ed on cir­cum­stan­tial evi­dence of mur­der­ing his busi­ness part­ner, John Cameron, after a man dressed in Cameron’s clothes was found dead. The tri­al was such a local sen­sa­tion that it was moved to the Opera House to accom­mo­date a larg­er audi­ence. An edi­to­r­i­al in the local news­pa­per said ​“it was because of the indig­na­tion among the peo­ple and the fact that Marion had no friends and no mon­ey, that he was select­ed to sat­is­fy the pub­lic wrath.” His ​“vic­tim” was seen alive in 1891 and a posthu­mous par­don was grant­ed in 1987, 100 years after Marion was executed.

Mead Shumway was exe­cut­ed in 1909 for crush­ing the skull of a Gage County farm­woman. Three years after the exe­cu­tion, anoth­er man alleged­ly con­fessed on his deathbed to killing the woman. However, the only evi­dence we have for the con­fes­sion is from an arti­cle in the 1919 issue of the Journal of the American Institute of Criminal Law and Criminology. Another twist to this case came when a mem­ber of Shumway’s jury com­mit­ted sui­cide soon after the con­vic­tion. The Juror was report­ed­ly despon­dent about going along with the rest of the jury and believed that Shumway was innocent.

In 2001, Jeremy Sheets was released after pros­e­cu­tors decid­ed not to retry his case. Sheets was sen­tenced to death in 1997 for the 1992 kid­nap­ping and mur­der of a young woman in Omaha. The Nebraska Supreme Court over­turned Sheets’ con­vic­tion because there was no evi­dence against him oth­er than a taped con­fes­sion by anoth­er man, Adam Barnett, who said he com­mit­ted the crime with Sheets. Barnett hung him­self before Sheets’ tri­al, so Sheets was unable to con­front his accuser and thus the tape could not be used against him.

Notable Commutations, Clemencies, and Sentence Reversals

In 1999, Jerry Simpson and Clarence Victor were tak­en off of Nebraska’s death row because their IQs were less than 70 and it is now uncon­sti­tu­tion­al to exe­cute peo­ple with developmental disabilities.

In 2000, the Nebraska Supreme Court vacat­ed the death sen­tence of Randy Reeves because the court sen­tenced him with improp­er pro­ce­dures. Reeves had been sen­tenced to death for the drug-induced mur­der of Janet Mesner and Victoria Lamm in Lincoln in 1980. Reeves was sen­tenced to two life terms instead.

In 2001, Peter Hochstein and Michael Anderson were tak­en off death row and giv­en life in prison because their sen­tenc­ing judi­cial pan­els could not reach a unan­i­mous deci­sion to impose the death sen­tence. Anderson and Hochstein were sen­tenced to death for the 1975 mur­der-for-hire of an Omaha businessman.

Milestones in Abolition/​Reinstatement

In 1979, the Nebraska Unicameral Legislature passed a bill abol­ish­ing the death penal­ty, but the bill was vetoed by Governor Charley Thone.

In 1999, the Nebraska Legislature was the first state in the nation to pass a mora­to­ri­um on car­ry­ing out the death penal­ty dur­ing a study on the fair­ness of its appli­ca­tion. The mora­to­ri­um bill was vetoed by Governor Mike Johanns. The leg­is­la­ture unan­i­mous­ly over­rode the Governor’s veto of the appro­pri­a­tions bill that fund­ed a study on the fair­ness of the death penal­ty in Nebraska.

In 2007, the Nebraska Unicameral came with­in one vote of pass­ing a repeal bill.

In 2008 the elec­tric chair was ruled uncon­sti­tu­tion­al by the Nebraska Supreme Court, cre­at­ing a de fac­to mora­to­ri­um. A bill to instate lethal injec­tion as the state’s method of exe­cu­tion was passed in 2009.

In 2015, the Nebraska Unicameral Legislature passed a bill abol­ish­ing the death penal­ty. The bill was vetoed by Governor Pete Ricketts, but the 49-mem­ber leg­is­la­ture over­rode the veto.

In 2016, Nebraska vot­ers approved a bal­lot ques­tion revers­ing the leg­is­la­ture’s repeal of the death penal­ty and restor­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the state.

Other Interesting Facts

In every ses­sion of the leg­is­la­ture since 1981, sen­a­tors have intro­duced a bill to abol­ish the DP. While there have been years in which the abo­li­tion bill has advanced out of com­mit­tee, and even one year in which it ini­tial­ly had 25 spon­sors (out of 49 sen­a­tors), Nebraska did not repeal its death penal­ty until 2015. When Nebraska repealed the death penal­ty in 2015, it became the first state with a pre­dom­i­nant­ly Republican leg­is­la­ture to do so since North Dakota abol­ished the death penal­ty in 1973.

Resources

• Nebraskans Against the Death Penalty
• Department of Corrections
• Nebraska County Attorneys Association
• Commission on Public Advocacy
• Victims’ ser­vices

Nebraska Execution Totals Since 1976