Entries tagged with “Jeff Landry”
Facts & Research
Religion
,Jan 10, 2024
Catholic Organizers See “Renewed Momentum” for Death Penalty Abolition from Pope Francis’ Teachings
In 2018, Pope Francis formally revised the Catechism of the Catholic Church — its core teachings — to oppose the death penalty. Characterizing capital punishment as “an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person,” he wrote that the Catholic Church “works with determination for its abolition worldwide.” This revision updated a 1997 Catechism edit by Pope John Paul II that permitted the death penalty in rare cases where it was deemed “the only possible way of effectively defending human…
Facts & Research
Clemency
,Nov 21, 2023
Following Series of Denials, Louisiana Board to Hold Administrative Hearings on Clemency for at Least Two Additional Death Row Prisoners
The Louisiana Board of Pardons and Committee on Parole will consider at least two additional applications for clemency on November 27, following a tumultuous year in which nearly all Louisiana death row prisoners sought clemency in response to outgoing Governor John Bel Edwards voicing his personal opposition to the death penalty. Under the Louisiana Constitution, Governor Edwards cannot grant clemency without a recommendation from the Board; he asked the Board to set hearings so that he…
Facts & Research
Clemency
,Aug 10, 2023
Governor John Bel Edwards Directs Louisiana Board to Consider Death Row Clemency Petitions and Set Hearings
On August 9th, with the use of his executive authority, Governor John Bel Edwards (pictured) asked the Board of Pardons and Committee on Parole to return the 56 clemency applications filed by death-sentenced prisoners in Louisiana to its docket for consideration and set them for hearings. The Board of Pardons will now have until January 2024, when Gov. Edwards officially leaves office, to decide whether to recommend clemency for nearly all of the state’s death row prisoners. Earlier this…
Facts & Research
Clemency
,Oct 16, 2023
Louisiana Board of Pardons and Committee on Parole Denies Clemency Hearings for Five Death-Sentenced Prisoners
On October 13, 2023, after a brief administrative hearing, the Louisiana Board of Pardons and Committee on Parole denied clemency hearings for five of the 56 death-sentenced prisoners seeking clemency before Governor John Bel Edwards leaves office in January 2024. The four-member panel split its vote on four of the five applications, with a majority denying the fifth application on the grounds that Winthrop Eaton is unlikely to be executed because he is mentally incompetent. Clifford Deruise,…
Facts & Research
Clemency
,Sep 14, 2023
Louisiana District Attorney Asks Court to Halt Death Row Clemency Hearings for Three Prisoners
On September 12, 2023, East Baton Rouge District Attorney Hillar Moore filed a request for injunctive relief, asking the 19th Judicial District Court to vacate hearings scheduled for three East Baton Rouge Parish prisoners who have requested clemency. In June 2023, 51 death-sentenced individuals filed clemency applications with the Louisiana Board of Pardons and Committee on Parole, requesting a commutation of their death sentences to life without parole. Five additional applications from…
Policy Issues
Arbitrariness
,Mental Illness
,Prosecutorial Accountability
,Race
,Clemency
,Jul 28, 2023
Louisiana Pardon Board Declines to Consider 56 Death Row Clemency Petitions Without Merits Review
On July 24, 2023, the Louisiana Board of Pardons and Parole set aside all 56 clemency applications filed by nearly every death-sentenced prisoner in Louisiana last month without reviewing the merits of a single one of them. The prisoners asked for their sentences to be commuted to life without parole, but the Board made its decision to return the applications based on an advisory, nonbinding opinion from the Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry. Attorneys for death row prisoners have…
Executions
Methods of Execution
,Apr 22, 2024
Louisiana Senate Committee Approves Legislation Supported by Jewish Community to Remove Nitrogen Hypoxia as Possible Method of Execution
On April 16, 2024, the Louisiana Senate Judiciary B Committee unanimously voted to advance a bill that would remove nitrogen hypoxia from the state’s available methods of execution. Introduced by state Senator Katrina Jackson-Andrews, Senate Bill 430 is supported by the Jews Against Gassing Coalition, an organization consisting of Jewish Louisiana residents who oppose state-sanctioned gas executions. “We recognize, of course, that the gassing of innocent victims in the Holocaust is quite…
Policy Issues
Innocence
,Prosecutorial Accountability
,Methods of Execution
,Jan 30, 2024
Louisiana Supreme Court Grants New Trial Based on Prosecutorial Misconduct while New Governor Landry Moves to Expand Methods of Execution and Restart Executions
On January 26, 2024, the Louisiana Supreme Court granted a new trial to death-sentenced prisoner Darrell Robinson based on egregious prosecutorial misconduct. The Court held that Mr. Robinson “did not receive a fair trial, or a verdict worthy of confidence.” Mr. Robinson’s quest to prove his innocence advances at the same time that Governor Jeff Landry seeks to expand the state’s methods of execution and restart executions. During a tumultuous 2023 in which outgoing Governor John Bel Edwards…
Facts & Research
Public Opinion
,Methods of Execution
,Mar 11, 2024
OP-ED: Journalist Recalls Witnessing an Execution and Describes the Importance of Media Witnesses
In May 1990, Jonathan Eig, then a reporter for The New Orleans Times-Picayune, witnessed the electric-chair-execution of Dalton Prejean at Angola State Penitentiary for the 1977 murder of a Louisiana state trooper. Mr. Eig watched Mr. Prejean’s execution through an observation window, and reported seeing “his chest heave, his fists clench and his right wrist twist outward. A spark and a puff of smoke shot from the electrode attached to his left leg.” In the years following the execution, Mr.