Mayor in Spain removes cross from convent, throws it in dump
- Jan 25, 2021
Although the Supreme Court cleared the way for the execution of Dustin Higgs Jan. 15, two justices made their objections known loud and clear in dissents that called into question the speed of these decisions and even the constitutionality of capital punishment.
After a flurry of court decisions, the Supreme Court reversed a pair of rulings from federal appeals courts that had put death-row inmate Lisa Montgomery’s execution on hold, and it denied two other last-minute requests to postpone the execution.
A joint statement from two U.S. bishops who head different committees of the U.S. bishops called for an end to the federal use of the death penalty as “long past time.”
In a Nov. 12 Facebook post, Sister Helen Prejean, a Sister of St. Joseph of Medaille and longtime death penalty opponent, said: “We must stop the execution of Lisa Montgomery. Lisa was psychotic — unable to act rationally — when she committed a terrible crime. She desperately needed psychiatric care and instead she got a death sentence. “
Eight Catholic bishops serving Maryland dioceses urged President Donald Trump Dec. 22 to stop the planned federal execution of Dustin Higgs, a Maryland man on death row in Indiana.
A new report Dec. 16 by the Death Penalty Information Center said the use of capital punishment reached a historic low this year in the United States even with the return of federal executions by the Trump administration.