US Justice Department announces 13th and final federal execution under Trump admin

On January 15, the Trump administration carried out its 13th and final federal execution of prisoner Dustin Higgs, accused of killing three women in Maryland in 1996. The US government’s execution, which came in a span of six months, was pronounced by the federal court just four days ahead of president-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration. Biden, a staunch opposer of the death penalty, had earlier told the press during his campaign rallies that he will ‘progressively’ work to end Capital punishment, which, sitting president trump strongly supports.  

According to sources of Associated Press, Justice Sonya Sotomayor called the federal execution an “unprecedented rush,” adding that  “after waiting almost two decades to resume federal executions, the Government should have proceeded with some measure of restraint to ensure it did so lawfully.”

Higgs was sentenced in 2000 for accompanying two other men who murdered 3 women in cold blood, with Willis Haynes, one of the men that pulled the trigger. The federal penitentiary in Terre Haute, Ind., pronounced Higgs guilty of charges—first-degree premeditated murder, three counts of first-degree felony murder, and three counts of kidnapping that led to death.

The Trump administration's Justice Department said in a statement that it will announce federal executions in the closing days of Trump's Presidency as the exercise has been in place for over 17 years since President Franklin Delano Roosevelt assumed office. However, the Death Penalty Information Center's Robert Dunham, in a statement to NPR, condemned the executions by Trump Justice Department during a transition period. 

[Dustin Higgs at the Federal Prison in Terre Haute. Credit: AP]

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Attorney calls death penalty 'cruel'

In a statement to AP, an attorney for Higgs, Shawn Nolan defended Higgs as  “a fine man, a terrific father, brother, and nephew” who “spent decades on death row in solitary confinement helping others around him, while working tirelessly to fight his unjust convictions.” Nolan told prosecutors that “there was no reason to kill him, particularly during the pandemic and when he, himself, was sick with Covid that he contracted because of these irresponsible, super-spreader executions.” The attorney argued that the death penalty for Higgs immediately after his recovery from COVID-19 was ‘cruel’ 

The Democrat senate meanwhile, introduced a bill to abolish federal capital punishment this week. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Illinois, the incoming chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Rep. Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass., the proposed legislation, cited by agency npr, to end health penalties at the federal level. Dems pushed to re-sentence the federal inmates that were pronounced death for their crimes. Democrats urged that Congress must act immediately, arguing that the State-sanctioned ‘murder’ wasn’t synonymous with serving justice.

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