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December 3, 2008 2:19:54 AM CST

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Execution Ban Lifted, States Ready the Death Chambers

Posted May 3, 08 9:03 AM CDT in Politics 

(Newser) – States are getting ready to catch up on executions now that a Supreme Court moratorium has been lifted, the New York Times reports. At least 14 executions have been scheduled in six states in coming months. "The Supreme Court has essentially blessed their way of doing things," a legal expert said. "They’re back from vacation and ready to go to work." 

The resumption of executions is certain to put the divisive issue of capital punishment firmly back in the spotlight, with its critics having been given fresh ammunition by a recent wave of DNA exonerations. Polls show national confidence in the death penalty dropping, and juries and prosecutors have been increasingly inclined to sentence offenders to life without parole instead.

Source New York Times

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This January 1996 file photo provided by the California Department of Corrections shows the entrance to the execution chamber and the lethal injection table at California's San Quentin State Prison.   (AP Photo/California Department of Corrections)
In this November 2005 file photo, the death chamber is shown at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville, Ohio.   (AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato, File)
In this November 2005 file photo, the death chamber at the Southern Ohio Corrections Facility is seen through a glass window from the witness room in Lucasville, Ohio.   (AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato, File)
Executions are set to resume in the death chamber at the Walls Unit of the Texas Department of Corrections in Huntsville, Texas.   (AP Photo/David J. Phillip, file)
The combination of lethal injection drugs is posted on the wall in the equipment room next to the death chamber at Southern Ohio Corrections Facility in Lucasville, Ohio.   (AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato, File)
Mississippi inmate Earl Wesley Berry is expected to be executed within days now that the Supreme Court has lifted a moratorium on lethal injections.   (AP Photo/Mississippi Department of Corrections, File)
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US Supreme Court • death penalty • capital punishment • lethal injection • execution


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