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Carrie Coyner, voted to approve the Senate version, 57-43. Later Monday, House Democrats and two GOP members, Del. Jill Vogel joined with Democrats in the chamber in voting for passage. The Senate approved a House bill, advancing it to Northam on a 22-16 vote. On Monday, both chambers approved separate but identical repeal bills. The state legislature and state officials have also acted in recent years to preserve Virginia’s ability to carry out executions and limit transparency around the process.Įven last year, death penalty abolition bills in the General Assembly went nowhere. This year too, lawmakers have been passing one progressive measure after another.īut the death penalty bill marks a particularly stark reversal in a state where executions proceeded in the past decade under both Republican and Democratic governors. Last year, lawmakers passed some of the region’s strictest gun laws, broadest LGBTQ protections, its highest minimum wage and some of its loosest abortion restrictions. The passage of the legislation was just the latest in a long list of sweeping policy changes enacted by Democrats, who have increasingly reshaped the Old Dominion into an outlier in the South on racial, social and economic issues. “By eliminating the death penalty, governmental, political, and moral leaders have taken a long overdue action needed to make Virginia a fairer and more just Commonwealth,” Lee said in a statement. Porter, Juniper and their families have declined to comment through their attorney, Rob Lee, executive director of the Virginia Capital Representation Resource Center. “We have five dead Virginians that this bill will make sure that their killers will not receive justice,” Bell said. Rob Bell described those killings in gruesome detail, and said Porter and Juniper would be watching the vote from prison with special interest. The repeal legislation would convert their sentences to life in prison without parole.ĭuring the debate on the House floor Monday, Republican Del. Thomas Porter was sentenced to die for the 2005 killing of a Norfolk police officer. Anthony Juniper was sentenced to death in the 2004 slayings of his ex-girlfriend, two of her children, and her brother. Only two men remain on Virginia’s death row. Republicans raised concerns about justice for victims and their family members, and said there are some crimes that are so heinous that the perpetrators deserve to be executed. It is inequitable, ineffective, and inhumane,” Northam, House Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn and Senate Majority Leader Dick Saslaw said in a joint statement after the votes. We all know the death penalty doesn’t do that. “It is vital that our criminal justice system operates fairly and punishes people equitably.
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Virginia’s new Democratic majority, in full control of the General Assembly for a second year, pushed the repeal effort, arguing that the death penalty has been applied disproportionately to people of color, the mentally ill and the indigent. “By voting for abolition, we are showing the way, that if Virginia - the state with the longest history and the most people executed - if we can do it, so can other states,” Rachel Sutphin said. Two years later, Rachel Sutphin was one of 13 family members of murder victims who sent a letter to the General Assembly asking lawmakers to abolish the death penalty. William Morva, the man convicted of killing Eric Sutphin, was executed in 2017. Eric Sutphin, was fatally shot in 2006 while working for the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office. “There’s a realization that it is time to end this outdated practice that tends to bring more harm to victims’ family members than providing us any comfort or solace,” said Rachel Sutphin, whose father, Cpl.
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Ralph Northam, who has said he will sign it into law, making Virginia the 23rd state to stop executions. The legislation repealing the death penalty now heads to Democratic Gov. (AP) - State lawmakers gave final approval Monday to legislation that will end capital punishment in Virginia, a dramatic turnaround for a state that has executed more people in its long history than any other.