Missouri executed Lance Collin Shockley despite widespread pleas for clemency and questions about his guilt, with advocates and faith leaders urging Governor Mike Kehoe to stop the execution until untested DNA evidence could be examined.
Sister Helen Prejean, author of Dead Man Walking, urged California Governor Gavin Newsom to commute all 565 death sentences in the state, citing racial injustice and the potential for rehabilitation of those on death row.
Sister Helen Prejean, a long-time anti-death penalty advocate, believes Ohio is on the verge of abolishing capital punishment due to growing support for repeal and the state’s own capital punishment task force calling the death penalty “more complex, more subject to constant change, and fraught with more mistakes”.