Entries tagged with “Lance Shockley”

Executions

Religion

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Feb 03, 2026

Restrictions on Spiritual Advisers in Execution Chambers Persist Despite Supreme Court Ruling

When Lance Shockley was exe­cut­ed in Missouri in October 2025, he request­ed the pres­ence of his daugh­ter, an ordained min­is­ter, in the exe­cu­tion cham­ber as his spir­i­tu­al advis­er. The Missouri Department of Corrections (MDOC) denied his request, and Mr. Shockley was exe­cut­ed. His case rep­re­sents one exam­ple of how states have applied the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 rul­ing in *Ramirez v. Collier*, a deci­sion that acknowl­edged the reli­gious rights of death-sentenced…

Dec 01, 2025

Facts About the Death Penalty – The Rarity of Clemency Grants

Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist once explained that exec­u­tive clemen­cy is intend­ed to oper­ate as the​“fail safe” of the cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem. It is the final oppor­tu­ni­ty, after all legal avenues have been exhaust­ed, for an exec­u­tive to decide whether to spare a pris­on­er from exe­cu­tion. Most grants of indi­vid­ual clemen­cy come after con­sid­er­a­tion of one or more fac­tors, includ­ing evi­dence of offi­cial mis­con­duct or oth­er unfair legal…

Upcoming Executions

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Oct 14, 2025

Missouri Governor Denies Clemency for Lance Shockley Despite Broad Bipartisan Support for Commutation of His Death Sentence

*Update: Mr. Shockley was exe­cut­ed by lethal injec­tion on October 14. He was pro­nounced dead at 6:13 p.m.* Yesterday, Missouri Governor Mike Kehoe denied clemen­cy to Lance Shockley, who is sched­uled for exe­cu­tion today at 6 p.m. However, a recent sur­vey found that Missouri vot­ers, by a bipar­ti­san two-thirds major­i­ty, would pre­fer to see Mr. Shockley’s death sen­tence com­mut­ed. Dr. Nicholas Scurich of the University of California, Irvine, found that 65% of the 440…

Executions

Botched Executions

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Oct 08, 2025

Upcoming Executions Illustrate Persistent Themes and Concerns Around the Death Penalty

**October 9, 2025 UPDATE****: On October** **9****,** **2025****, just a week before his sched­uled exe­cu­tion, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (****CCA****) grant­ed** **Robert Roberson** **a stay of exe­cu­tion and remand­ed his case to the dis­trict court for fur­ther con­sid­er­a­tion of his request for relief based upon relief offered in a sim­i­lar case,** ***Ex parte Roark******.*** **Like Mr. Roberson’s case,** ***Ex parte Roark*****, also involved a con­vic­tion based the now…

Apr 15, 2025

United States Supreme Court Denies Review for Death-Sentenced Missouri Man Whose Jury Foreman Was Removed for Bias

On March 31, the Supreme Court declined to hear the appeal of Lance Shockley of Missouri, the 36th death-sen­­tenced per­son to be denied cer­tio­rari by the Court this year. At tri­al, Mr. Shockley’s jury fore­man was removed before the sen­tenc­ing phase based on evi­dence of seri­ous bias — but Mr. Shockley’s attor­ney declined the oppor­tu­ni­ty to ques­tion the fore­man or oth­er jurors about the mis­con­duct, and his con­vic­tion, which the fore­man par­tic­i­pat­ed in, was allowed to…