Entries tagged with “Mark Lawlor

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Mar 18, 2020

Virginia Death Row Shrinks to 2 as Prosecutor Drops Death Penalty Against Mark Lawlor

Virginias death row shrank to just two pris­on­ers on March 12 as recent­ly elect­ed Fairfax County, Virginia Commonwealth’s Attorney Steve T. Descano agreed to a deal to resen­tence for­mer death-row pris­on­er Mark Lawlor (pic­tured) to life with­out parole. Lawlor was sen­tenced to death in 2011 for the mur­der of Genevieve Orange. No one has been sen­tenced to death in Virginia…

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Dec 03, 2018

Unanimous Federal Appeals Court Orders New Sentencing for Virginia Death-Row Prisoner

A three-judge pan­el of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit has unan­i­mous­ly over­turned the death sen­tence imposed on Virginia death-row pris­on­er Mark E. Lawlor in 2011, rul­ing that the tri­al court had uncon­sti­tu­tion­al­ly pre­vent­ed Lawlor from pre­sent­ing expert men­tal health tes­ti­mo­ny that he posed a low risk of vio­lence in prison if the jury spared his life. On November 27, 2018, the court reversed a deci­sion of a Virginia federal district…