The federal death sentences for 37 inmates are commuted – prompting praise and outrage

CNN
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President Joe Biden’s announcement that he would release 37 people from federal death row drew praise from some families and deep disappointment from others.

The 37 inmates affected by the decision, whose crimes include drug-trafficking-related murders and killing prison guards or other inmates, will instead serve life sentences.

“Make no mistake: I condemn these murderers, mourn the victims of their heinous acts, and mourn all the families who have suffered unimaginable and irreparable loss,” Biden said in a statement.

“But guided by my conscience and my experience as a public defender, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, vice president and now president, I am more convinced than ever that we must stop the use of the death penalty at the federal level.” I cannot in good conscience allow that a new government resumes the executions I stopped.”

During Biden’s presidency, the Justice Department, led by Attorney General Merrick Garland, halted federal executions while officials reviewed their policies and protocols.

President-elect Donald Trump has indicated that when he takes office he will resume federal executions and expand the scope of the death penalty under federal law.

Kelley Henry is an attorney for two people whose death sentences were commuted Monday: Rejon Taylor, convicted in Tennessee in 2008 of carjacking, kidnapping and murdering an Atlanta restaurant owner, and Ricky Fackrell, who was convicted in Texas in 2018 of killing one Federal inmates. She said she felt tremendous appreciation when the news broke Monday morning.

“I figured it out when the rest of the world figured it out,” Henry said. “My co-counsel called me at 4:03 this morning and I felt absolute gratitude.”

She contacted the families of both clients this morning, she said, and there were tears of relief.

Because of their federal death sentences, none of the clients were allowed contact visits and they are in a remote prison, far from their families – meaning they have had minimal contact with their relatives over the years, Henry said. The legal team expects the Bureau of Prisons to reclassify its clients and hopes they will be housed closer to their families.

“We hope this will help them connect with their families,” Henry said. “Hopefully they will have the opportunity to enter the general population (an inmate population with fewer restrictions), participate in programs and have a life.”

There is a multi-layered process to request commutation of a sentence that requires making recommendations from a pardon attorney, a deputy attorney general, Attorney General Merrick Garland and White House counsel before reaching the president, Henry said.

“It’s not like Biden woke up this morning and just decided to do it,” she said. “It was a long process and many trials before he made this decision.”

Henry said she was familiar with the trial because she also represented Lisa Montgomery, the first woman executed by the federal government since 1953. She was executed in January 2021 after a request to then-President Trump to read her clemency request was unsuccessful.

“Today is bittersweet because if Lisa had lived eight more days, she would have been part of that group of commutations,” Henry said.

Montgomery was sentenced to death by a Missouri jury in 2008 for murdering a pregnant woman, cutting out the fetus and kidnapping her in 2004. As CNN previously reported, her defense team argued that she should have been given a competency hearing to prove her serious mental illness, which would have made her ineligible for the death penalty.

Bident’s decision could have implications not only for those whose death sentences were commuted, but for the criminal justice system as a whole, civil rights groups say.

“President Biden has taken a historic and bold step in addressing the failed death penalty in the United States – bringing us a major step closer to once again outlawing this barbaric practice,” said Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union.

While families, defense attorneys and supporters of those whose sentences were commuted Monday rejoiced, some friends and relatives of their victims expressed outrage.

The Fraternal Order of Police Capital City #9, an organization of law enforcement officers in Franklin County, Ohio, condemned Biden’s decision to commute the sentence of Daryl Lawrence, who was convicted in the 2005 killing of Officer Bryan Hurst.

“Bryan made the ultimate sacrifice, and this decision undermines the justice he rightly received for his murder,” the group said in a statement.

“The murder of Officer Hurst was not only an attack on an officer, but also an attack on the principles of law and order that protect our communities. Commuting Lawrence’s sentence disrespects the seriousness of his crime and diminishes the accountability of those who targeted the brave men and women who serve in uniform,” the statement continued.

Hurst’s widow, Marissa Gibson, said in a statement to CNN affiliate WBNS that she and her daughter were disappointed by Biden’s decision.

Lawrence “chose to choose violence. He knew the possible consequences and chose to kill anyway,” Gibson said in her statement. “I can only hope that his almost 20 years in prison have made him a changed person.”

Three men remain on federal death row

Not all prisoners awaiting execution had their sentences commuted on Monday. Three federal prisoners will still be on death row when Trump takes office in January: Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, convicted of carrying out the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing; Dylann Roof, convicted of killing nine people at a historically black church in Charleston, South Carolina in 2015; and Robert Bowers, who killed 11 worshipers at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018.

Howard Fienberg, whose mother was killed at the Tree of Life synagogue, told CNN’s MJ Lee before Biden’s decision that commuting Bowers’ sentence would be an affront to the U.S. justice system.

“Aside from us and the honor of our families, my mother, it’s also about … the jurors who have had to endure this for three months and are still able to fulfill their civic responsibility – probably the hardest responsibility some people ever have “And it’s about the police officers who put themselves in danger to save my mother and other people in the synagogue,” said Fienberg.

After Biden’s decision not to commute Bowers’ death sentence, some relatives of the Tree of Life shooting victims expressed relief, Lee said.

Given Biden’s historic decision to commute 37 death sentences, criminal justice experts will be closely watching the Trump administration’s approach to federal death row policy when he takes office next month.