Death Penalty
5/11/2011 | Death Penalty
No more death penalty?
OneNewsNow
As California officials have halted death row executions at least until next year, a former prosecutor says the state may be considering pulling the plug on the death penalty.
The 713 inmates on California's death row have been awarded more time, thanks to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation's request to delay review of changes to lethal injection procedures. Meanwhile, Governor Jerry Brown decided last week to toss plans of building a new death row facility in San Quentin.
Even though some people believe the death penalty is proper for those who committed grotesque crimes, Carol Chase, associate dean of academics and professor of law at Pepperdine University, wonders "whether there is a less costly way to achieve that same result. Life in prison without [the] possibility of parole, if it is less expensive, may be an option that should be pursued in California," she suggests.
11/13/2007 | Death Penalty, Equal Rights, Foreign Policy, Freedom of Religion, Freedom of Speech, Gender Issues, Governmental Control, Iran, Radical Islam
Gays Deserve Torture, Death Penalty, Iranian Minister Says
The Times
Homosexuals deserve to be executed or tortured and possibly both, an Iranian leader told British MPs during a private meeting at a peace conference, The Times has learned. Mohsen Yahyavi is the highest-ranked politician to admit that Iran believes in the death penalty for homosexuality after a spate of reports that gay youths were being hanged. President Ahmadinejad, questioned by students in New York two months ago about the executions, dodged the issue by suggesting that there were no gays in his country. Britain regularly challenges Iran about its gay hangings, stonings and executions of adulterers and perceived moral criminals, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) papers show. The latest row involves a woman hanged this June in the town of Gorgan after becoming pregnant by her brother. He was absolved after expressing his remorse. Britain said that this demonstrated the unequal treatment of men and women in law and breached Iran’s pledge to restrict the death penalty to the most serious crimes. A series of reported executions of gays, including two underage boys whose public hanging was posted on the internet, has alarmed human rights campaigners.
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7/12/2007 | Death Penalty
S.D. holds first execution in decades
Yahoo News
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. - A 25-year-old man was executed by lethal injection Wednesday for the torture and slaying of a teenager who was forced to drink hydrochloric acid in a robbery. It was the state's first execution in 60 years. Elijah Page gave up his appeals and asked to die for the 2000 murder of Chester Allan Poage, 19, who was also stabbed, kicked and bashed with large rocks in a torture session at a gulch in the Black Hills that lasted two to three hours. Page, of Athens, Texas, died at 10:11 p.m. from a lethal injection administered at the South Dakota State Penitentiary. He had no last words, warden Doug Weber said.