![]() “Brandon’s execution is a stain on America’s criminal justice system. “Tonight, those of us who love Brandon Bernard-and we are many-are full of righteous anger and deep sadness,” Bernard’s attorney Robert Own said in a statement Thursday night. Supreme Court denied a petition for a stay Thursday evening, clearing the path for Bernard’s execution to move forward, a decision Justice Breyer and Justice Kagan disagreed with and Justice Sotomayor dissented. 10 at the Federal Correctional Complex in Terre Haute, Ind., despite vocal pushback from several high profile figures and advocates. 6 on procedural grounds the defense appealed the motion to a higher court, which rejected the motion on Thursday five to four.Ĭourtesy of Attorneys for Brandon Bernardīrandon Bernard was executed Dec. Texas law requires defendants receive 90 days notice of their execution, yet Bernard was only given 55 days, and Bourgeois was given 21 days, his team says. Federal Death Penalty Act that says the federal government must adhere to the law of the state where the sentence was imposed: Texas in both cases. The swiftness of the scheduling of these executions was the basis of a lawsuit filed jointly by both Bernard and Bourgeois’s legal team, who pointed to the provision of the U.S. Supreme Court asking that his execution be stayed so a lower court can hold a new hearing on the evidence of his disability.īourgeois’s legal team has also filed for a petition clemency from President Trump this week. His legal team has filed a petition before the U.S. 6, and Bourgeois’s new execution date was set on Nov. However, that ruling was overturned by the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals on Oct. Virginia that executing someone with intellectual disabilities violates their constitutional protection against cruel and unusual punishment.) (The Supreme Court ruled in 2002 in Atkins v. 13, 2020, but the execution was first stayed in November 2019 and then stayed again by a federal judge in March, who argued that his legal team presented compelling evidence that Bourgeois has an intellectual disability under current legal standards. In an unprecedented move, the Administration is now speeding up its pace of executions further still, scheduling five more (including Bernard and Bourgeois) in December and January before President-Elect Joe Biden-who has pledged to end the use of federal death penalty-takes office.īourgeois was originally scheduled to be executed on Jan. 19-the first people executed under a lame duck president in over 100 years. 31 after both her attorneys contracted COVID-19.Īfter a 17-year hiatus, the Trump Administration resumed federal executions in July, and has since executed nine individuals, including Bernard on Dec. ![]() 8, but a judge stayed her execution until Dec. ![]() Fifty-six-year-old Alfred Bourgeois is scheduled to be executed Friday, bringing the total number of people executed by the federal government since July up to 10-the highest in a single year since 1896.Ī third defendant, Lisa Montgomery, had been scheduled to be executed on Dec. Department of Justice executed 40-year-old Brandon Bernard Thursday evening, despite vocal pushback from numerous advocates and high-profile figures. ![]()
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