Originally posted by the Voice of America.
Voice of America content is produced by the Voice of America,
a United States federal government-sponsored entity, and is in
the public domain.


US Carries Out First Post-Election Execution in 130 Years

Masood Farivar

   WASHINGTON - When convicted murderer Orlando Hall was executed at a
   federal prison complex in Indiana on Nov. 19, it marked the first time
   in more than a century that a federal execution was carried out in the
   remaining months of an outgoing U.S. president's term following an
   election.

   But this will not be the only execution during the final weeks of
   President Donald Trump's term. Five other federal inmates condemned to
   death, including the only woman currently on the federal death row, are
   scheduled to be executed over the next two months. The last is slated
   to take place just five days before Trump leaves office on January 20.

   The last post-election federal execution took place in 1889 during the
   final months of Grover Cleveland's first presidency, according to the
   Death Penalty Information Center. Traditionally, outgoing presidents
   have left final pending decisions on executions to their successors.

   If all five planned executions proceed, a total of 13 federal prisoners
   will have been executed by lethal injection between July 2020 and
   January 2021, concluding shortly before President-elect Joe Biden is
   inaugurated on January 20. The 10 federal executions in 2020 are more
   than any previous year in the 20th or 21st centuries, according to the
   Death Penalty Information Center.

   Most executions in the United States take place at the state level.
   Last year alone, there were 22 state executions, compared with three
   federal executions in the previous 34 years.

   On Friday, the Justice Department announced plans for three executions,
   highlighting the shockingly brutal nature of the murders committed by
   those scheduled to die.

   They include Alfred Bourgeois, who abused and beat to death his
   21/2-year-old daughter in 2002; Cory Johnson, a former member of a
   Richmond, Virginia, gang convicted of murdering seven people in 1992;
   and Dustin John Higgs, who was sentenced to death for kidnapping and
   murdering three women in 1996.

   The scheduled executions are part of a wave that began in July, when
   the Justice Department resumed capital punishment after a 17-year
   hiatus. They come as public support for the death penalty has slipped
   to historically low levels and as an increasing number of states have
   abandoned the practice.

.