Updated July 1, 20218:28 PM ET
Attorney General Merrick Garland has imposed a moratorium on scheduling federal executions, the Department of Justice announced on Thursday. The department will review its policies and procedures on capital punishment, following a wave of federal executions carried out under the Trump administration.
In a memo to the Justice Department, Garland justified his decision to halt the deeply controversial practice, citing factors including its capricious application and outsized impact on people of color.
“The Department of Justice must ensure that everyone in the federal criminal justice system is not only afforded the rights guaranteed by the Constitution and laws of the United States, but is also treated fairly and humanely. That obligation has special force in capital cases,” Garland said in the memo.
“Serious concerns have been raised about the continued use of the death penalty across the country, including arbitrariness in its application, disparate impact on people of color, and the troubling number of exonerations in capital and other serious cases,” he added. “Those weighty concerns deserve careful study and evaluation by lawmakers.”
Read more at https://www.npr.org/2021/07/01/1012366520/the-justice-department-is-pausing-federal-executions-after-they-resumed-under-tr.
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