CREATORS: Florida's Convoluted Death Penalty Process

 Matthew T. Mangino
CREATORS
July 29, 2025

Last week, a Florida jury deliberated for one hour and 42 minutes before recommending the death penalty for Shelby Nealy. If a state is going to have a death penalty, it would be for people like Shelby Nealy. He was already serving a 30-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to manslaughter for killing his wife, Jamie Ivancic, in January of 2018.

He then pretended to be Jamie in the months that followed, corresponding with her family through texts and social media messages before they became suspicious.

In December 2018, he went to Jamie's parents' home in Tarpon Springs, Florida, and killed her parents, Richard and Laura Ivancic, along with Jamie's brother, Nick.

What is interesting about Nealy's fate is that the jury voted 11-1 in favor of death for all three victims. The jury was not unanimous, and that is only possible in two states — Alabama and Florida.

Alabama has not required a unanimous jury decision for a death sentence since 2017. Prior to that, Alabama was the only state that allowed judges to override a jury's recommendation for a life sentence and impose a death sentence.

Between 1976 and 2017, Alabama judges overrode jury verdicts 112 times, with 91 percent of the overrides changing a verdict of life to a death sentence. Currently, Alabama allows a death sentence if at least 10 out of 12 jurors recommend death.

In Florida, the path to non-unanimous jury verdicts in death penalty cases is even more convoluted.

Across the country, 27states allow death sentences. Although the United States is considered a death penalty country, executions are rare, or non-existent, in most of the nation. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, two-thirds of U.S. states — 33 out of 50 — have either no death penalty or have not carried out an execution in at least 10 years.

Prior to 2016, Florida did not require a unanimous jury verdict to impose death. Rather, according to Taylor Evans writing in the University of Miami Law Review, a simple 7-5 majority was sufficient under state law to sentence a criminal defendant to death. Additionally, judges could override a jury's sentencing recommendation.

That changed after a Florida case made its way to the United States Supreme Court in 2017. The high Court, by an 8-1 majority, held that "(t)he Sixth Amendment requires a jury, not a judge, to find each fact necessary to impose a sentence of death. A jury's mere recommendation is not enough."

The United States Supreme Court required a unanimous jury verdict in capital sentencing. However, in 2020, the Florida Supreme Court issued a new interpretation of the law. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, the Florida Supreme Court found, "while a unanimous jury must find the existence of an aggravating factor in a capital case (which are the factors that make a first degree murder charge eligible for the death penalty), there was no requirement that the jury's recommendation for death must be unanimous."

The Florida Supreme Court decision opened the door to an even more bizarre standard. In January of 2023, only a month after three jurors declined to impose the death penalty on Nikolas Cruz, the mass shooter at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, legislation was proposed to change Florida's unanimity requirement in death penalty sentencing to a mere supermajority.

Today, a person convicted of first-degree murder in Florida, followed by a jury finding that the alleged aggravating factors have been unanimously proven, can be sentenced to death by a mere 8 votes out of 12 jurors. That is not progress and certainly not justice.

Matthew T. Mangino is of counsel with Luxenberg, Garbett, Kelly & George P.C. His book The Executioner's Toll, 2010 was released by McFarland Publishing. You can reach him at www.mattmangino.com and follow him on Twitter @MatthewTMangino

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Media challenges constitutionality of Tennessee 'police buffer zone' law

A media coalition, represented by attorneys at the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, is challenging the constitutionality of a new Tennessee law that makes it a crime to approach within 25 feet of a law enforcement officer after being told to stay back in certain situations.

In a federal lawsuit filed this week, seven news organizations — Gannett, Gray Local Media, Nashville Banner, Nexstar Media Group, Scripps Media, Tennessee Lookout, and TEGNA — argue that the law grants law enforcement officers limitless discretion to bar journalists and the public from reporting — for any reason or no reason — on protests and other newsworthy events, in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

This is the third lawsuit Reporters Committee attorneys have filed on behalf of news media coalitions challenging so-called police “buffer zone” laws. In Indiana and Louisiana, news outlets won preliminary injunctions prohibiting the states from enforcing nearly identical laws that federal district courts found to be unconstitutionally vague.

“These buffer laws jeopardize reporters’ ability to bring their communities some of the news that matters most — about crime, disaster response, police misconduct, and more,” said Reporters Committee Staff Attorney Grayson Clary, who is representing the media coalition alongside Paul McAdoo, RCFP’s Local Legal Initiative attorney for Tennessee. “When law enforcement pushes the press out of eye and earshot, it’s the public that ultimately loses out.”

Tennessee’s law, which went into effect on July 1, makes it a misdemeanor for journalists and others to approach within 25 feet of an officer while the officer is engaged in official duties at a traffic stop, the scene of an alleged crime, or “an ongoing and immediate threat to public safety” — scenarios broad enough to sweep in most of what officers do in public, from enforcing the law at a public assembly to conducting disaster response. It authorizes officers to order individuals to back up even if they don’t pose a safety risk and are not obstructing law enforcement. And it also does not require officers to accommodate the First Amendment right to report on government activity.

In its lawsuit, the media coalition notes that journalists in Tennessee routinely come into close contact with police officers during the course of their reporting, including at crime scenes and football games. But under the new law, they could be forced to move far enough away from a newsworthy event that they are unable to record audio or video, speak to sources, or simply observe an officer’s actions. 

“With the Act now in effect,” the lawsuit argues, “whenever one of Plaintiffs’ journalists is told to retreat while standing within 25 feet of law enforcement, that reporter is put to a choice between committing a crime or forgoing newsgathering.”

In addition to its First Amendment arguments, the lawsuit alleges that the buffer zone law violates the Fourteenth Amendment because it fails to specify what kinds of behavior by a journalist or other member of the public might prompt an officer to issue an order to stay back.

“This law just gives officers too much discretion to pick and choose who is and isn’t violating the law, to the point where officers are essentially writing the law themselves,” Clary said. 

In Indiana and Louisiana, the district courts focused their decisions on the Fourteenth Amendment arguments, concluding that the laws in those respective states were unconstitutionally vague. 

Both states have appealed the rulings. In Indiana, the appeal is fully briefed, and the parties are awaiting a decision in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. In Louisiana, attorneys for both sides are in the process of briefing the case in advance of oral argument, which hasn’t yet been scheduled.

Even as we await the appeals court rulings, the media coalitions’ victories at the district court level appear to be pushing lawmakers toward narrowing the scope of police buffer zone laws. In response to the district court’s opinion in Indiana, for example, state lawmakers passed a new buffer zone statute that only applies if officers in fact have reasonable grounds to believe that an individual threatens to interfere with the performance of their duties. Florida recently adopted a similarly narrower law. 

“The message is getting through,” said Clary, who has helped litigate all three media coalition lawsuits. “I still don’t think those laws are perfect. I think there’s still a risk that they’ll sweep in more legitimate speech and newsgathering than necessary in practice on the ground. But I do think it’s encouraging that outside the courtroom, there’s clearly been a shift towards a narrower and less speech suppressive version of these statutes, even if I wish states weren’t going down this road at all.”

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CREATORS: Prosecuting Parents for Unsafe Sleep Environments

Matthew T. Mangino
CREATORS
June 9, 2025

Every year in this country over 4,500 babies die of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). Children's Hospital of Philadelphia defines SIDS as "the sudden and unexplained death of an infant under one year of age." SIDS is one of the leading causes of death in babies from 1 month to 1 year of age. It seems to plague otherwise healthy infants, usually during sleep time.

Several states have infant safe sleep laws. In Pennsylvania, the legislature enacted a specific law requiring parents to follow the sleep recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP). The law provides, "Infants shall be placed in the sleeping position recommended by the AAP." In 1992, the AAP recommended, "Infants should be placed in the supine position for every sleep until the child reaches 1 year of age."

During a 2007 committee hearing on the proposed Pennsylvania legislation, Eileen Carlins, the Director of Support and Education for SIDS of Pennsylvania, told legislators, "Over and over in my job I keep hearing the same thing, they didn't know, they didn't know."

In an effort to educate new parents, the law requires hospitals, birthing centers and health care practitioners to provide educational materials, then ask the parents to sign off on a certification that they received the information.

Delaware, Michigan, New York, Ohio and Colorado have similar laws, but Pennsylvania has taken it a step further. The state is prosecuting parents for failure to provide safe sleep environments. There has been prosecution of parents in other states like Virginia and Indiana for accidental suffocations and "overlays" where a parent sleeps next to an infant and rolls onto the infant, causing death by suffocation.

According to a recent article in Spotlight PA, a nonpartisan investigative journalism website, two sets of Pennsylvania parents face felony charges after police say their infants died while in "unsafe" sleep positions.

While experts and family advocates agree babies should sleep on their backs without anything in the crib, should simply failing to follow the recommendations amount to murder-three or involuntary manslaughter?

In one case, according to newspaper reports, back in May of last year, police in Lebanon County, Pa., responded to the Penn State Health Hershey Medical Center for the death of a three-month-old infant. Police said that the child's mother, Gina Strause, found the child unresponsive inside his crib.

According to police documents, "(Gina) related she went to get the child inside his crib to feed him and that was when she observed he was cold to the touch and appeared blue and she immediately called 911 and performed CPR until EMS arrived."

Police charged Strause, 40, and her husband, David, 42, with endangering the welfare of children, involuntary manslaughter and recklessly endangering another person. According to police, Strause said she placed the child back in his crib between 1:00 a.m. and 1:30 a.m. "on a 'pillow' and he was placed on his stomach (prone)."

In a second case, 19-year-old Natalee Michele Rasmus is facing murder charges for the death of her infant in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. Rasmus is charged with third-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter and child endangerment in the death of her one-month-old daughter in October of 2022.

An autopsy determined the infant's death was caused by asphyxia due to mechanical compression.

Although parents in Pennsylvania are informed of safe sleep environments — being provided a pamphlet and signing a certification may not be enough, and certainly shouldn't be the basis for criminal charges.

An ongoing study by Johns Hopkins University is analyzing the use of an infant sleep assessment tool and motivational interviewing to enhance parent communication on safe sleep.

While the study is still recruiting participants, researchers hypothesize it will improve effective communication on sleep practices, reducing SIDS risk.

There is even research published in eBiomedicine that has identified a potential biomarker for SIDS. Yet, parents devastated by the death of an infant child face the wrath of the criminal justice system.

Nancy Maruyama, the executive director of Sudden Infant Death Services of Illinois, a nonprofit organization that educates the public about safe-sleep practices told Spotlight PA,

"To charge them criminally is a crime, because they have already suffered the worst loss."

Matthew T. Mangino is of counsel with Luxenberg, Garbett, Kelly & George P.C. His book The Executioner's Toll, 2010 was released by McFarland Publishing. You can reach him at www.mattmangino.com and follow him on Twitter @MatthewTMangino.

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Pennsylvania criminalizes poor parenting

Two sets of Pennsylvania parents face felony charges after police say their infants died in unsafe sleep positions, reported Spotlight PA.

While experts and family advocates say young babies should sleep on their backs without anything in the crib, simply failing to follow the recommendations shouldn’t amount to a crime.

In both cases, brought in the past six months, law enforcement say the parents knowingly put their children at risk. Parents from Lebanon County are accused of putting their son to sleep on his stomach with a pillow in the crib (the mother told PennLive she put her son on his back, but that he had learned how to roll over). A mother from Luzerne County, meanwhile, was charged after police say she let her daughter sleep face down in a U-shaped pillow.

Law enforcement argued in charging documents that the parents should have known better. They cited signed acknowledgements created as part of a 2010 law the state legislature passed to educate parents about Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). The law requires hospitals, birthing centers, and health care practitioners to provide educational materials, then ask the parents to certify they received them.

The statement is voluntary, and there is a box noting if parents refused to sign.

The lawmaker who championed the measure, former state Rep. Lawrence Curry (D., Montgomery), died in 2018. News reports from the time say the bill was written with input from two safe-sleep experts with Cribs for Kids, a Pittsburgh-based organization that seeks to prevent sleep-related deaths.

Neither expert was available to comment, but other people dedicated to educating parents and preventing SIDS deaths oppose bringing criminal charges against grieving parents and note that there is no law against stomach sleeping.

“To charge them criminally is a crime, because they have already suffered the worst loss,” said Nancy Maruyama, the executive director of Sudden Infant Death Services of Illinois, a nonprofit organization that educates the public about safe-sleep practices and provides support to families who have experienced the loss of an infant.

“There’s nothing else you could have done to me that would have caused any more pain than the payment I had,” said Maruyama, who lost her son in 1985. “My heart’s broken.”

Safe-sleep experts stressed that these situations are not as cut and dried as a parent should have known better.

They talked about potential contributing factors like the differences in time spent educating parents in the hospital, if someone a parent trusts tells them stomach sleeping is OK, and even images parents see online that show an infant sleeping on their stomach.

The law “says that families have to receive that education, but it doesn’t say how that education is delivered, and it doesn’t state how families’ understanding or learning is evaluated,” said Devon George, chief programs officer at Cribs for Kids. (George was not involved in the drafting of the law.)

In Lebanon County, Gina and David Strause were charged in May with involuntary manslaughter, recklessly endangering another person, and endangering the welfare of children after the death of their son Gavin. Gina Strause told PennLive she put her son on his back, but that he was able to roll over. She told the outlet she did not recall taking home safe-sleep instructions.

In Luzerne County, Natalee Rasmus was charged in December with third-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter, and endangering the welfare of children after her 1-month-old daughter, Avaya, died.

Officers say they found the baby face down in a bassinet propped up on a U-shaped pillow linked to other infant deaths.

“Yeah, she wouldn’t sleep, she’ll just scream, so she has to be like propped up,” Rasmus, who was 17 at the time her daughter was born, told the investigating officer, according to the documents.

Rasmus’ public defender did not respond to requests for comment. Neither did the district attorneys in Lebanon and Luzerne Counties.

Maruyama said it’s her job to use evidence-based, peer-reviewed information to educate people with a baby about safe-sleep recommendations.

“But, you know, sometimes they’re just so tired and they just want their child to sleep, and they know if they put them on their tummy, they’ll sleep,” she said.

In 1992, the American Academy of Pediatrics first recommended that infants sleep on their backs or sides. Four years later, the organization changed the recommendation to only back sleeping. Since then, SIDS rates have plummeted, although sleep-related deaths remain a leading cause of infant mortality.

That’s what prompted the 2010 law, which directed the Pennsylvania Department of Health to create and recommend safe-sleep materials.

The “information provided to parents must include risk factors associated with sudden unexpected infant death (SUID) and advise them about safe sleep practices,” a department spokesperson told Spotlight PA.

The agency provides a brochure that complies with Act 73 in hard copy and electronic format. That brochure is two pages long and repeats recommendations from the American Academy of Pediatrics that babies should not sleep with others and should sleep on their backs in an uncluttered crib.

The state also funds PA Safe Sleep, which provides birthing hospitals with services including patient education information and expert training, and safe-sleep education at the county level through children and youth agencies.

George said it’s important to question how hospitals are delivering information and evaluating what parents are learning.

But the most important question about these situations, she said, should be: “How are we helping families? How are we supporting families?”

Of the 343 infant deaths reported in Pennsylvania in 2022 (the most recent year data is available), unsafe sleep factors were present in 68 cases, according to a state report.

While education is crucial to drop the rates of these deaths, it is not enough on its own, said Michael Goodstein, a neonatologist at WellSpan hospital in York County. He is also the director of the county Cribs for Kids program and a member of an American Academy of Pediatrics subcommittee on sudden unexpected infant deaths.

A parent who watches a video with their doctor and gets all their questions on safe sleep answered versus the parent who gets a handout will have a different level of understanding on the topic, Goodstein said.

Like all experts who spoke to Spotlight PA, Goodstein said this is a complex issue that needs more attention, more awareness, and more research.

“It’s really important to follow the safe-sleep recommendations,” Goodstein said. “I’m not going to say it’s easy to do. Babies get fussy and parents are sleep deprived, and at some point, they sometimes do things that might help the baby get back to sleep faster, so that they get some sleep, but in the end, is not a safe thing to do.”

Rare charges

It’s extremely rare for parents to be charged with a crime after their infants die sleeping on their stomachs, said Daniel Nevins, who has over 20 years of experience as a criminal defense attorney.

Nevins said he couldn’t name another case off the top of his head with similar facts.

Spotlight PA identified a handful of criminal cases nationwide related to the deaths of infants sleeping in Boppy pillows, like the one police say Rasmus used. Charges have also been brought against parents who slept in the same bed as their child.

In the recent Pennsylvania cases, Nevins said the burden of proof for prosecutors is high.

To secure a conviction for involuntary manslaughter — which is punishable by up to 10 years in prison — prosecutors will have to prove that the parents acted dangerously or recklessly and that they should have known better.

For third-degree murder — which can be punished with up to 40 years in prison — prosecutors do not have to prove that the death was intentional but do have to demonstrate malice.

“The commonwealth had better think long and hard about whether or not they have enough evidence to pursue these types of charges,” Nevins said.

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Chemerinsky: Trump budget bill would limit courts' ability to hold officials in contempt

A budget bill by the U.S. House of Representatives contains a “stunning” provision that would limit federal courts’ ability to hold government officials and other litigants in contempt for disobeying their orders, according to Erwin Chemerinsky, the dean at the University of California at Berkeley School of Law, reported the ABA Journal.

The provision should be rejected as “a terrible idea,” wrote Chemerinsky, an ABA Journal contributor, at Just Security via Executive Functions.

The provision says federal courts can’t use appropriated funds to enforce a contempt citation for failing to comply with an injunction or temporary restraining order “if no security was given.”

The provision applies even to previously issued orders.

“The bill is stunning in its scope,” Chemerinsky wrote.

Security refers to a money bond that would cover potential costs and damages from a wrongly issued injunction, which is imposed pursuant to Rule 65(c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

Despite the procedural rule, federal courts rarely require security in lawsuits against government defendants challenging actions as unconstitutional, according to Chemerinsky and Samuel Bray, a professor at the Notre Dame Law School, writing at Divided Argument.

“It always has been understood that courts can choose to set the bond at zero,” Chemerinsky observed.

Failing to set a bond before a temporary restraining order or a preliminary injunction is contrary to Rule 65(c), but it doesn’t invalidate the court order, Bray said. The spending bill is broader because it would also apply to final injunctions.

The House bill failed a committee vote Friday, and it’s unclear whether the bill will pass in its current form, the Associated Press reports. Also unclear is whether the provision would survive in the U.S. Senate and whether courts would strike it down.

The budget bill provision “appears meant to spare the federal government any legal consequences for even deliberate, continuing and belligerent defiance of court orders,” wrote Walter Olson, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute, for Cato at Liberty.

“If the district judges are no longer in a position to enforce contempt orders, why even bother appealing? The feds (and others, too) could just thumb their noses at them and go on their way,” Olson wrote.

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States make it a felony to bring illegals across their borders

Alabama lawmakers have passed legislation that would make it a felony to knowingly bring someone into the state who is in the U.S. illegally, echoing similar bills nationwide that could restrict domestic travel for some immigrants, reported The Associated Press.

The legislation given final approval Wednesday protects “not only the citizens of Alabama but also the people that are immigrating here legally and doing everything the right way,” said the bill’s Republican sponsor, Sen. Wes Kitchens.

The measure carves out exemptions for medical professionals such as ambulance drivers and employees for law firms, educators, churches or charitable organizations carrying out “non-commercial” tasks. The bill also outlines a process for law enforcement to determine whether a person who is arrested is in the country legally. It now goes to Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey, who has 10 days to sign the legislation or else it fails by a pocket veto.

Alabama joins at least nine other states that have considered legislation this year that would create crimes of transporting immigrants who are unlawfully in the U.S., according to an Associated Press analysis using the bill-tracking software Plural. It’s one of many recent bills passed by conservative statehouses seeking to aid President Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigration.

Activists say Alabama could end up ensnaring people who provide transportation across state lines for essential services, such federal immigration court hearings in New Orleans and Atlanta, mandatory trips to out-of-state consulates and visits to family.

Jordan Stallworth, 38, works as a civic engagement coordinator for the Alabama Coalition for Immigrant Justice and lives in Wedowee, Alabama, a rural town of about 800 people that is just a 20-minute drive from Georgia. His wife has relatives living without legal status in both states and he often assists family members and other immigrants in the community with transportation.

Recently, he drove a family member lacking legal status to the maternity ward in Carrollton, Georgia, 35 miles (56 kilometers) away, since the local hospital doesn’t have one. Stallworth worries that similar trips will be criminalized.

“I’m not gonna sit here and somebody’s dying in front of me just to have a baby — I’m not gonna sit here and just let her die, family or not,” Stallworth said.

Federal law already makes it a crime to knowingly transport someone who is in the U.S. illegally. That law has been used in border areas against drivers picking up people who illegally cross into the U.S. But it has not historically been used for minor things like giving someone a ride to the grocery store, said Kathleen Campbell Walker, a longtime immigration attorney in El Paso, Texas.

But immigrant advocates are watching to see whether that changes under Trump.

“The likelihood of that being enforced is higher now because of the focus on removing undocumented people from the United States,” Walker said.

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Washington law requires Catholic priests to report confessions of child abuse

The secrecy of the confessional in the Roman Catholic Church is so sacrosanct that any priest who violates it is automatically excommunicated.

In Washington State, a new law requiring clergy to break the seal when child abuse has been revealed has kindled a heated battle involving the state, the Roman Catholic Church and the Justice Department, reported The New York Times.

The legislation, signed into law last week by Gov. Bob Ferguson, a Democrat, requires members of the clergy to report child abuse or neglect to authorities, even if that knowledge arises during the sacrament of confession. It has outraged many Catholics in the state, and across the country.

“This law is a clear intrusion into the practice of our Catholic faith,” said Archbishop Paul D. Etienne of Seattle. “The state is now intruding into the practice of religion, and if they’re allowed to get away with that, where do we draw the line?”

The Justice Department apparently agrees. On Monday, the department announced it was opening a civil rights investigation into the law, which it called “anti-Catholic.” The investigation will focus on the law’s “apparent conflict” with religious freedom under the First Amendment.

Clergy are considered mandated reporters in a majority of states, meaning they are legally obligated to report to authorities if they suspect a child is being abused. In most states, however, the state reserves protections for the clergy-penitent relationship. In seven states, including New Hampshire and West Virginia, there is no such exception. (In Tennessee, the privilege is denied only in cases of child sexual abuse.) It’s not clear that any priests have been prosecuted or penalized in those states over failing to report abuse that they learned about during a confession.

A similar bill in California was withdrawn by its sponsor in 2019 after a backlash, including from critics who pointed out that it would be difficult to enforce. The Vatican also appeared to weigh in, releasing a document in the run-up to the California vote emphasizing that the secrecy of confession is an “intrinsic requirement” of the sacrament.

President Trump has made “eradicating anti-Christian bias” a priority for the Justice Department. In April, Harmeet Dhillon, the head of the department’s civil rights division, rewrote a mission statement for the division to prioritize investigations into issues including anti-Christian bias and transgender women’s participation in sports, a sharp shift for an agency known for decades for its work on racial equality.

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Texas GOP push for sweeping anti-abortion law which includes century old criminal statute

In late March, women who had suffered severe pregnancy complications and were forced to leave Texas for care sat in the state Senate chamber and implored Texas lawmakers not to make such situations even worse, according to Bolts. Some had previously sued the state over its abortion bans, after being denied needed medical care in Texas. Devastating fetal diagnoses—one woman learned that the fetus was developing without a skull and would not survive, another was told that severe complications with one developing twin threatened her life and the life of her other healthy twin—left some scrambling to get over the state line. 

But instead of expanding medical exceptions to the state’s abortion bans in order to protect people in these circumstances, the women said, measures being pushed by Texas Republicans threatened to further criminalize them and their loved ones. 

The senators had been hearing testimony on abortion legislation, including a bill that purported to clarify the narrow medical exceptions in Texas abortion bans, following reports of deadly delays in care due to the vague language and penalties of up to life in prison for doctors who violate them. For weeks, that bill, Senate Bill 31, dominated advocacy efforts and headlines. This was in part because the bipartisan measure, deemed a priority bill by even the staunchest anti-abortion lawmakers, contained what some called a “Trojan Horse” provision: By including an early 20th-century, pre-Roe abortion law among the several abortion bans that SB 31 amended, critics said the bill could help resurrect the century-old abortion ban that would allow for criminalizing pregnant people seeking abortions, along with anyone who helps them get the procedure, even if it’s out of state. Eventually, the bill’s authors agreed to add language clarifying that the legislation was neutral on this issue, and it passed the Texas Senate last week. 

Yet Texas Republicans have at the same time been pushing forward another sweeping anti-abortion bill, Senate Bill 2880, which also includes language that could be used to enforce the same pre-Roe ban, often called the 1925 law. 

“This is a backdoor effort to fully reinstate the 1925 law,” Houston-area Democratic Senator Carol Alvarado said last week, just before SB 2880 also passed the full Senate. “It is a vote to criminalize women, trap them within the borders of Texas, and to threaten anyone who tries to help them, regardless of whether the abortion occurs legally in another state.” This includes situations where the pregnancy is a result of rape or incest, or where the fetus has an anomaly that means it will not survive—none of which are an exception under Texas law. 

Multiple Texas attorneys who specialize in reproductive health told Bolts that SB 2880 and its inclusion of language amending the state’s century-old abortion law could constitute an unprecedented step toward the sweeping criminalization of abortion in a state that already has some of the strictest abortion laws in the country. The measure, billed as an effort to crack down on abortion medication following an influx of the pills into the state via telemedicine, would allow anyone to sue individuals or companies who prescribe, manufacture, transport, or distribute abortion pills to a Texas resident, in exchange for a $100,000 reward. The bill would also empower people to bring wrongful death lawsuits following an abortion, and give new powers to the Texas Attorney General to enforce the state’s abortion bans, including the 1925 ban.

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SCOTUS upholds restrictions on ghost guns

The Supreme Court upheld federal restrictions aimed at curtailing access to kits that can be easily assembled into homemade, nearly untraceable firearms, a rare move by a court that has taken an expansive view of gun rights, reported The New York Times.

In a 7-to-2 decision, written by Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, one of the court’s conservatives, the justices left in place requirements enacted during the Biden administration as part of a broader effort to combat gun violence by placing restrictions on so-called ghost guns.

Justice Gorsuch included photographs, unusual in court opinions, to illustrate how one of the gun kits, Polymer80’s “Buy Build Shoot,” came with “all of the necessary components to build” a Glock-style semiautomatic weapon. He wrote that it was “so easy to assemble” that it could be put together in about 20 minutes.

“Plainly, the finished ‘Buy Build Shoot’ kit is an instrument of combat,” Justice Gorsuch wrote, adding that no one would confuse the pistol “with a tool or a toy.”

The ruling in favor of gun regulations is a departure for the court, which has shown itself to be skeptical of them — and of administrative agency power. Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr. and Clarence Thomas, both conservatives, filed dissents.

The “weapon-parts kits themselves do not meet the statutory definition of ‘firearm,’” Justice Thomas wrote, important because Congress in 1968 agreed the government could legally impose some regulations on firearms. “That should end the case.”

Legal experts said the decision was a victory for those advocating more gun regulations.

“Although this is not a Second Amendment ruling, it shows that the justices are not uniformly hostile to gun regulation,” said Adam Winkler, a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. “Ghost guns have been found in increasing numbers at crime scenes, and today’s decision should help the problem.”

The Biden administration in 2022 enacted rules tightening access to the weapons kits, after law enforcement agencies reported that ghost guns were exploding in popularity and being used to commit serious crimes.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives estimated that use of the gun components and kits in crime increased tenfold in the six years before the rules were adopted.

Among the regulations: requiring vendors and gun makers to be licensed to sell the kits, mandating serial numbers on the components so the weapons could be tracked and adding background checks for would-be buyers.

Steven M. Dettelbach, the former director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives who shepherded the regulation, urged the Trump administration and Congress to “fully support” the agency to implement the ghost gun regulations. With support from the administration, he said in a statement, “today’s decision can save lives.”

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Gun rights groups based their challenge to the regulations by claiming that the government had overstepped its bounds in regulating the gun kits because they did not meet the definition of firearms under the Gun Control Act of 1968.

Opponents of gun regulations argued that most people who bought the kits were hobbyists, not criminals. In legal filings, the groups argued that a majority of firearms used in crimes were traditional weapons that were manufactured professionally.

Lawyers for the government, arguing in October while President Joseph R. Biden Jr. was in office, said the guns kits should be regulated as firearms because they allowed “anyone with basic tools and access to internet video tutorials to assemble a functional firearm ‘quickly and easily’ — often, in a matter of minutes.”

During the oral argument in Bondi v. VanDerStok, No. 23-852, a majority of the justices had appeared to favor keeping the rules in place. At least two conservatives, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justice Amy Coney Barrett, raised sharp questions about arguments by the plaintiffs that the administration had overstepped its bounds.

The justices had wrestled with how best to draw analogies to the gun kits. Chief Justice Roberts seemed skeptical of attempts by the gun rights lawyers to say that people who put together the kits were similar to amateur car hobbyists, saying that the kits seemed to require much less effort to put together.

“Drilling a hole or two,” Chief Justice Roberts said, “doesn’t give the same sort of reward that you get as working on your car on the weekends.”

Justice Gorsuch returned to this point in the opinion, explaining that the gun kits could be considered weapons even though they were unfinished objects because “their intended function is clear.”

An author might ask for an opinion on her latest novel, Justice Gorsuch wrote, even though the person was referring to an unfinished draft. A friend might talk about a table he bought at IKEA, even though he had hours of assembly ahead of him.

In both cases, the justice wrote, “the intended function of the unfinished object is obvious to speaker and listener alike.”

The same, he said, was true for the ghost gun kits.

“Yes, perhaps a half-hour of work is required before anyone can fire a shot,” Justice Gorsuch wrote. “But even as sold, the kit comes with all necessary components, and its intended function as instrument of combat is obvious. Really, the kit’s name says it all: ‘Buy Build Shoot.’”

Like Justice Gorsuch, Justice Thomas also included photographs of gun kits to illustrate his point. But he came to the opposite conclusion.

Justice Thomas wrote that in his view, an object that “may readily be converted” into a gun would only qualify as a firearm if it was already a weapon.

“The ordinary meaning of ‘weapon’ does not include weapon-parts kits,” he wrote.

His point echoed a debate from the oral argument, when Justice Alito disputed the idea that the gun kits could count as firearms. Justice Alito made an analogy to cooking an omelet in his questions to the government’s lawyer.

As in, when do the components of a gun become a firearm?

“If I show you — I put out on a counter some eggs, some chopped-up ham, some chopped-up pepper and onions, is that a Western omelet?” Justice Alito asked.

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Bipartisan group of PA legislators seek to eliminate death penalty

A Lebanon County Republican State Rep. Russ Diamond has introduced legislation with bipartisan support to eliminate the death penalty in Pennsylvania, which he said aligns with "pro-life values," reported the Lebanon Daily News.

Rep. Diamond introduced HB 888, which would abolish the death penalty in the commonwealth if adopted. In a memo to the House, Diamond said that "the role of government should not be to decide who lives and who dies, but to protect and promote life wherever possible."

"As legislators, we must uphold the principle that all human life has inherent value and dignity, regardless of the circumstances," he said. "Abolishing the death penalty aligns with pro-life values by affirming that the state should not take life as punishment, even in response to the gravest of crimes."

According to the state Department of Corrections website, there are currently 94 individuals on death row in Pennsylvania. Since 1978, only three individuals have been executed in the commonwealth, all of whom waived their appeals and asked for the execution to be carried out.

Gov. Josh Shapiro has stated that he will not issue any execution warrants during his term in office, and has asked the General Assembly to abolish the death penalty. No executions in the commonwealth have been carried out since 1999.

Lebanon County District Attorney Pier Hess Graf has stated she will be seeking the death penalty for Alex Torres-Santos and Ivan Claudio-Rosero for homicide charges. Both men were allegedly involved in a triple homicide in the 400 block of N. 5th St. in 2023. The criminal trial is scheduled for later this year.

Speaking on his Substack account, Diamond said that as someone who considers himself 100% pro-life, he believes in "the sanctity of life from conception to natural death." Diamond added that being tough on crime and opposing the death penalty are not mutually exclusive.

"Since as an individual I cannot take another’s life except in the most extreme instance of self-defense, I cannot consent to grant a greater power to government and consider it just," he said. "There is no element of self-defense in executing someone already in captivity. Permanent incarceration satisfies our collective need for self-defense."

Citing the Death Penalty Information Center, Diamond said that 13 individuals who had been sentenced to death in Pennsylvania were later exonerated, including one in 2024. Diamond also pointed towards a recent survey in 2016, which said the death penalty cost taxpayers at least $816 million more than the cost of life without parole.

More than 23 states and Washington D.C. have already abolished the death penalty, with Diamond calling for Pennsylvania to follow suit "and should prioritize a consistent ethic of life in our justice system by joining them."

Diamond's bill has been co-sponsored Rep. Liz Hanbidge (D-Montgomery), Rep. Marla Brown (R-Lawrence), Rep. Ben Waxman (D-Philadelphia), Rep. Joseph D'Orsie (R-York) and Rep. Nathan Davidson (D-Cumberland and Dauphin). 

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Texas. the country's most prolific user of the death penalty, is looking to set some guide rails on executions

Texas has removed 32 people from death row based on evidence of intellectual disability since Atkins v. Virginia. Yet despite the rulings making those executions unconstitutional, no case or federal law outlines the standards states should use to determine which defendants qualify as intellectually disabled, leaving that process to state courts and appeals, reported The Texas Tribune.

Several states already have codified the exemption from death sentences for intellectually disabled inmates and created standards for determining who is eligible. Texas, however, has not codified the exemption or a process to discern who is exempt. The lack of guidance is not for a lack of trying: Texas House Rep. Senfronia Thompson, D-Houston, has been trying to push the state toward a framework for years, especially as the new administration potentially eyes rollbacks.

In multiple sessions, Thompson has filed a bill that would codify the exemption, as well as create a separate, pretrial jury hearing for those charged in capital cases to discern whether they legally qualify as intellectually disabled. After the Supreme Court ruled against Texas in 2019, the bill briefly picked up some Republican backing before failing in the Senate.

“We're not plowing new ground, because other states have done this, are doing this, and have been doing it for a while,” Thompson said. “We're trying to eliminate a patchwork situation.”

Now called House Bill 688 in the 2025 legislative session, Thompson said her team estimates the cost of the pretrial hearing would be about $250,000. While the cost may seem expensive initially, Thompson stressed it could circumvent the more expensive death penalty trials, which counties would have to pay millions of dollars through the trial and appeal process.

Currently, a ruling determining a defendant is intellectually disabled is done on an “ad-hoc basis,” said Burke Butler, executive director of the Texas Defender Services. The nonprofit organization provides legal representation for death penalty defendants, having won five Supreme Court cases in its 30-year history and removing 44 defendants from death row since 2018.

Butler said HB 688 provides a streamlined process to determine a defendant's eligibility at a single point in the trial.

“This is an issue that really requires and deserves a separate hearing to determine whether someone has intellectual disability,” Butler said.

Thompson clarified HB 688 is not a statement on the ethical or financial responsibility the state has for death sentences, but a guardrail it needs to ensure it’s being constitutionally applied.

“We're not saying that because it costs X number of dollars we shouldn't do this,” Thompson said. “We're saying that if we're going to do this and that issue is raised, there should be a pre-trial hearing helped by a jury utilizing the current medical data.”

Boosting the use of lethal injections

Donald Trump’s executive order directs the attorney general to take “all necessary and lawful action” to ensure states that use lethal injection for death sentences have a sufficient supply. Many states, including Texas, that use lethal injection as a means of execution have laws in place shielding public knowledge of who supplies the drugs to states.

In the past decade, Texas has struggled to acquire and maintain adequate amounts of pentobarbital, the drug used for lethal injections, as pharmaceutical companies have stopped providing it to governments for use in executions. Officials from the Texas Department of Criminal Justice declined requests for comment on the executive order or its ability to secure lethal injection drugs.

For Texas to maintain its stock of the drug, officials turned to a variety of means, including retesting current supply for its potency to push back expiration dates. The practice resulted in multiple lawsuits from Texas inmates because of the risk of painful executions.

In 2023, an Austin judge went as far as to issue a temporary injunction hours before an execution, stating TDCJ’s use of its pentobarbital “is probably illegal to possess or administer because it is more likely than not expired.” That ruling was overturned by the Texas Criminal Court of Appeals.

Texas also has looked to local compounding pharmacies — where drugs are created on-site using necessary ingredients — to make up for the shortage. A 2024 NPR investigation found one compounding facility in San Antonio provided pentobarbital to the state from 2019 to 2023 while receiving several citations from the Texas State Board of Pharmacy for failing to maintain sterile compounding environments.

Yet even with enough of the unexpired drug available, using it may also clash with recent federal findings. Days before Trump’s inauguration, former U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland issued a memorandum suspending the federal single-drug lethal injections alongside a Department of Justice report that concluded the method likely caused painful pulmonary edema in executed individuals. Texas is one of seven states listed using the same method described in the report, which likened the sensation of induced pulmonary edema to waterboarding.

Because the memorandum affects only federal executions, states that use the single-drug protocol can still execute inmates with that method. On Feb. 5, Texas is scheduled to be the first state in the U.S. since the DOJ’s advisory was issued to execute an inmate with a single-dose lethal injection.

“Doubling down”

The only element of the executive order that directs the attorney general toward specific charges for potential defendants outlines two cases in which the death penalty should especially be sought: noncitizens illegally present in the country who commit capital crimes and anyone who kills law enforcement officials.

In Texas, capital murder is currently the only crime eligible for the death penalty, which includes the killing of police officers or firemen. Whether or not the death penalty is sought, however, is at the discretion of district attorneys, and the executive order does not require state attorneys to follow the new guidance.

A short section of the order also instructs the attorney general to accept or deny pending requests for certifications for the State Capital Counsel Mechanism Certification, for which Texas is currently the only applicant.

The certification allows states to fast-track habeas corpus petitions — which challenge the legality of an inmate’s incarceration — in capital cases, but states can only be certified if they prove they have a robust state-provided process for post-conviction representation. No state has ever received the opt-in certification, and Butler said Texas simply lacks the infrastructure to qualify.

“There are a couple of stages of proceedings in state habeas where people aren't entitled to counsel at all in Texas, and that has dire consequences for defendants in those proceedings,” Butler said.

With the state legislative session underway alongside the start of the new federal administration, much is still uncertain as to how the executive order will be received by Texas officials, but the current gaps in the state’s provisions have some worried how the two will mix.

“All of these things really point to the fact that you need a careful and comprehensive system for ensuring robust representation and ensuring that people's legal claims are addressed,” Butler said. “It's just very concerning that the administration is doubling down on the system that we know is so unjust.”

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PA prosecutors want statewide ban on machine gun conversion devises

The Pennsylvania District Attorneys Association (PDAA) called on state lawmakers to help find solutions for several public safety concerns, which includes adopting a statewide ban on machine gun conversion devices, also known as “switches.” These devices enable shooters to unload an entire magazine of bullets in a couple of seconds, reported WJET-TV in Erie, Pennsylvania. 

The PDAA says machine gun conversion devices are inexpensive, easily obtained by criminals, and can be manufactured with 3D printers.

The letter cites the March 2024 after-school shooting at a SEPTA bus stop in Northeast Philadelphia, where three teenagers used a machine gun conversion device and eight high school students were severely injured. Philadelphia Police say one of the teenage shooters had a switch on a .40 caliber handgun, which allowed him to shoot 23 rounds in less than two seconds.

While the devices are illegal under federal law, most of the gun cases in Pennsylvania are prosecuted on the county or state level. This, the PDAA argues, is why the organization is asking lawmakers to give state prosecutors “the tools they need to get these devices off the streets and stop endangering our law enforcement officers, who simply do not have the same firepower as criminals carrying these machine gun-like weapons.”

To read the full letter, click here.

Incompetent Missourian inmates wait up to 14 months for mental health treatment

In Missouri some people who are arrested and found incompetent to stand trial are ordered into mental health treatment designed to allow them to have their day in court — a process called competency restoration that generally includes therapy and medication.

However, the average time these individuals wait in jail before receiving treatment is 14 months, according to the Missouri Independent.

Efforts to remedy the problem in the 2023 legislative session, including through a pilot program and increasing outpatient competency restoration, have been slow to get off the ground. 

Greene County, which was included in the pilot program, decided not to participate. Clay County’s program was in operation for just three weeks last year before staff turnover put it on pause. 

Only three people are currently enrolled in the jail-based treatment pilot program statewide, according to Debra Walker, a spokesperson for the state's Department of Mental Health. And only one person is currently in the outpatient treatment program.

Walker said the agency is working on solutions but “none of them will impact the numbers quickly.”

Last year, Department of Mental Health Director Valerie Huhn told the House budget committee the problem would get much worse before it gets better. 

“It’s probably going to be 1,000 individuals,” Huhn said, “long before we’re at 100 individuals.”

‘Deprives them of humanity’   

Mary Fox, the director of the Missouri State Public Defender system, said the wait times for mental health treatment are the worst she’s seen. She has been going to courthouses throughout the state trying to get some of the cases dismissed.

Public defenders have identified at least 12 cases of individuals in Missouri being held longer than their maximum sentences would have been, Fox said, without receiving competency restoration.

“It's gotten so bad that people aren't getting any treatment within the time period of when their case should be over and done with,” Fox said.

One client was having paranoid delusions and called the police himself, convinced he was being watched. The police then arrested him because his license plate was expired and because he didn’t stop driving when they put on their lights. 

Fox said he’s waited in jail for longer than he would’ve for the maximum sentence on those two charges.

In a recent case filing, Fox called detention beyond the maximum sentence “unconstitutional, illegal and improper.”

Walker said the agency is “aware of such circumstances.”

“Individuals are admitted in the order in which the court order is received, and admissions are triaged based upon clinical acuity,” she said, adding that DMH is also working to provide medication and case management to individuals while in jail, through mobile teams of clinicians.

While individuals wait in jail, their mental health often deteriorates, said Annie Legomsky, who runs the state public defense system’s holistic defense services program. 

Many are placed in solitary confinement, isolated for 23 or 24 hours a day, she said, and can end up with irreparable damage.

“It just completely deprives them of humanity, and it’s the antithesis of anything you could call a therapeutic environment,” she said. “We see clients who do just really sad things like eating their own feces, having suicidal ideation and actions, who are just completely decompensating.”

And there isn’t anything those individuals can do: Their case is on hold until they’re restored to competency to stand trial, so they can’t get released after they’ve waited the maximum sentence.

“They can't do anything to, kind of, control their fate,” Legomsky said. “They're at the mercy of (the Department of Mental Health) getting them the treatment they need.” 

In states including Oklahoma, Kansas, and Washington, lawsuits filed by groups like the American Civil Liberties Union over similar wait times have succeeded, arguing the practice violates individuals’ rights to due process and the Americans with Disabilities Act. 

So far, similar litigation hasn’t been filed in Missouri. A spokesperson for the ACLU of Missouri declined to comment. 

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New gun laws take effect with the new year

Gun laws across the US states are undergoing changes in 2025, with many states strengthening gun safety laws while others have expanded the rights of firearm owners, reflecting the polarization on the issue of gun control in the country, writes Sean Nolan for Jurist.

While new laws taking effect January 1, 2025 in California, Colorado, New York, Delaware and Minnesota have focused on increasing gun control in various ways, laws in New Hampshire and Kentucky have expanded in favor of strengthening the right to own and use firearms. Legislation enacted during 2024 in South Carolina and Louisiana that legalized open carry without a permit further paints a picture of a country moving in two different directions.

In California, several laws are taking effect, including AB1483, AB1598, and AB2917. New rules include the strengthening of limitations pertaining to the purchase of handguns, including consumer warnings on firearm sales, and creating guidance for courts when considering restraining orders related to gun violence. New York has enacted a similar law to California’s, requiring consumer warnings when purchasing firearms.

Colorado’s new law requires gun owners who store their weapon in an unoccupied vehicle to do so in a locked out-of-view hard-sided container. Colorado also increased training requirements for concealed carry permits while prohibiting particular misdemeanor offenders from obtaining the permits. The new concealed carry laws will go into effect later this year in July.

Meanwhile, New Hampshire’s new gun laws for 2025 bar employers from preventing employee storage of firearms in locked vehicles, and increase privacy protections for gun owners. The new Kentucky law similarly increases privacy protections by prohibiting use of merchant category codes for firearms dealers. The codes are used to help financial institution track where a purchase is made from but do not necessarily detail what is being bought.

In 2022, President Joe Biden signed the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, which represented the first comprehensive gun reform bill undertaken by Congress in 30 years. The bill expanded background checks and restrictions on who can own a gun but fell short of the goals set by progressive lawmakers. Last year the administration issued an executive order intended to reduce gun violence, and in July the Department of Justice expanded firearms background check requirements for gun dealers.

With the pro-gun Trump administration, Republican majority Congress, and a gun rights friendly US Supreme Court, the country stands to face a potential reckoning over the widening gap in the treatment of gun violence and safety issues across the nation.

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UK lawmakers approve assisted suicide for dying or terminally ill patients

After an emotive and at times impassioned debate, Britain’s lawmakers voted to allow assisted dying for terminally ill patients in England and Wales under strict conditions, opening the way to one of the most profound social changes in the country in decades, reported The New York Times.

By 330 votes to 275, members of Parliament gave their support to a bill that would permit doctors to help some terminally ill patients to end their lives.

Friday’s vote was not the final say on the matter for Parliament, as it will now be scrutinized in parliamentary committees and amendments to the bill may be put forward. But it is a landmark political moment, setting the stage for a significant shift that some have likened to Britain’s legalization of abortion in 1967 and the abolition of the death penalty in 1969.

The new legislation would apply to a narrow group: Applicants would have to be over 18, diagnosed with a terminal illness and have been given no more than six months to live. Two doctors and a judge would be required to give their approval, and the fatal drugs would have to be self-administered.

Assisted dying is already legal in a handful of European countries, as well as in Canada, New Zealand, 10 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.

The bill debated on Friday was proposed by a Labour Party member of parliament, Kim Leadbeater, but lawmakers were given the freedom to vote with their consciences, instead of being expected to vote along a party-line, meaning the outcome was impossible to predict.

ImageKim Leadbeater in London last month. The Labour lawmaker told Parliament that her legislation addressed “one of the most significant issues of our time.”Credit...Jaimi Joy/Reuters

During almost five hours of debate on Friday in a crowded parliamentary chamber, raw divisions were revealed over an issue that transcended political affiliations.

Meg Hillier, a Labour lawmaker, said the legislation would “cross a Rubicon,” by involving the state in the death of some of those it governs. “This is a fundamental change in the relationship between the state and the citizen, and the patient and their doctor,” she said.

But Kit Malthouse, a Conservative lawmaker, argued in support of the bill, saying, “The deathbed for far too many is a place of misery, torture and degradation, a reign of blood and vomit and tears.” He added, “I see no compassion and beauty in that — only profound human suffering.”

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PA lawmaker wants mandatory death penalty for illegals who kill

 A Pennsylvania state lawmaker is proposing a bill that would implement a mandatory death penalty for “illegal aliens convicted of murder,” reported WHTM-TV in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

State Representative Eric Davanzo (R-Westmoreland) says he plans to introduce the bill while citing cases across the country where those who have entered the United States illegally have been convicted of serious crimes.

Davanzo specifically cited the case of Laken Riley, a University of Georgia student who was killed by a Venezuelan man earlier this year after he unlawfully entered the country. He also cited the search for Brazilian native Danelo Cavalcante in Pennsylvania after he escaped the Chester County prison following a conviction for killing his ex-girlfriend.

“At a time when the Federal government has demonstrated an unmistakable aversion to countering this ever-increasing surge in illegal immigration and some district attorneys of this Commonwealth refuse to honor Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s detainers, drastic measures are needed to deter violent crime and illegal migration, promote justice for victims and their families, and ensure uniformity in punishment,” said Davanzo in a memo to House members. “I believe that any individual who unlawfully enters this country and commits a murder should face the most severe consequences under our laws. This legislation demonstrates that the House of Representatives is, unlike the Federal Government, willing to protect its citizens and ensure justice for victims.”

In Pennsylvania, the death penalty can only be applied in cases where a defendant is found guilty of first-degree murder if aggravating factors are present in the conviction.

Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro said last year we would block the death penalty during his administration and called for the practice to be abolished.

“The Commonwealth shouldn’t be in the business of putting people to death. Period,” said Shapiro in 2023.

Attorney General-elect Dave Sunday said during his 2024 campaign that he would seek the death penalty.

Since 1976, three people have been executed by lethal injection in Pennsylvania with the last being in 1999, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections. There are currently 95 people sitting on Pennsylvania’s death row, the most recent being added in May 2023.

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Pennsylvania one of 13 states that doesn't compensate the wrongfully convicted

 In 1987, Alfredo Domenech was accused of murder, and in 1988 he was sentenced to life in prison. He served 18 years of that sentence before his trial was reopened and the charges were dismissed.

“I still feel like it was yesterday, and every morning I wake up and feel like it’s the same day, like I never came from that moment,” Domenech said Tuesday on the steps of the Capitol in Harrisburg. “I’m still stuck in the past. We need compensation to start moving on.”

Domenech was at the Capitol along with a coalition of other exonerees and advocates — the It Could Happen to You coalition — asking lawmakers to pass a bill that would grant state compensation for the wrongfully convicted.

Pennsylvania is one of 13 states that does not have a program to compensate people who serve time in prison on wrongful convictions, reported The Pennsylvania Capital-Star.

“Some of those folks lose decades of their lives behind prison bars, missing out on milestones and memories with their loved ones and friends, and losing out on meaningful work opportunities,” Sen. Camera Bartolotta (R-Washington) the only lawmaker at the press conference with Domenech. “Our time to act is right now.”

Though the exonerees received a private audience with House Speaker Joanna McClinton (D-Philadelphia), they acknowledged it would be an uphill battle. 

Bills that would create compensation for the wrongfully convicted have been introduced in previous sessions, but never passed.

Jeffrey Deskovic described the difficulty of reentering society after a wrongful conviction. After serving 16 years for murder, he was exonerated following DNA testing. 

“I was always passed over for gainful employment,” Deskovic said. “It felt like employers always wanted someone who had job experience. They didn’t have any patience for on-the-job training.”

But fortunately for Deskovic, he was living in New York, one of 37 states, along with Washington, D.C. with programs that provide compensation for the wrongfully convicted. 

Still, it took five years for him to see those funds, and in that time he saw how difficult it would be for others who didn’t receive some form of payment.

After he was compensated, Deskovic got a masters degree from the John Jay College of Criminal Justice and started a nonprofit, the Jeffrey Deskovic Foundation, to help other exonerees.

“There’s no amount of money that’s worth being wrongfully imprisoned, yet compensation is an indispensable tool in terms of putting your life back together,” Deskovic said. 

Teri Himebaugh, executive director of the Philadelphia-based Police Transparency Project, said that, in some cases, Pennsylvania’s lack of compensation can actually cost taxpayers. 

Since 2016, she said, 49 defendants have been exonerated just in Philadelphia. With no wrongful conviction compensation law, some of those defendants have gone on to sue the city.

Since 1992, Philadelphia has paid out over $60 million in civil settlements.

“All in all, it is not just an ethical and responsible thing to do to offer compensation,” Himebaugh said. “It is a financially stable and responsible thing to do as well.”

The group is asking for a law that would allow wrongfully convicted people to get $100,000 per year served on death row, $75,000 per year served not on death row, and $50,000 per year of time on parole.

Last year, a bill that would have done just that was introduced by Rep. Regina Young (D-Philadelphia). It was reported out of committee, but tabled before a final vote on the floor.

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Maine enacts three-day waiting period to by a gun

With eleventh hour guidance from the state, Maine gun retailers began requiring a three-day wait period for gun purchases under one of the new safety laws adopted following the state’s deadliest mass shooting, reported The Associated Press.

Maine joined a dozen other states with similar laws, requiring that buyers wait 72 hours to complete a purchase and retrieve a weapon. The law is among several gun-related bills adopted after an Army reservist killed 18 people and injured 13 others on Oct. 25, 2023, in Lewiston.

The new law wouldn’t have prevented the tragedy — the gunman bought the rifle legally months earlier — but this milestone was celebrated by gun safety advocates who believe it will prevent gun deaths by providing a cooling-off period for people intent on buying a gun to do harm to others or themselves.

“These new laws will certainly save lives, both here in Maine and throughout the nation,” said Nacole Palmer, executive director of the Maine Gun Safety Coalition.

Gun store owners complained about the guidance, released just Tuesday, and the loss of sales to out-of-state visitors during Maine’s busy summer tourism season. They also said the waiting period will take a toll on gun shows.

In Kittery, Dave Labbe from the Kittery Trading Post said there would be close to zero completed rifle sales at its main store beginning Friday as customers subject to the waiting period will have to return to pick up their firearms. He is worried shoppers won’t buy guns because the waiting period requires them to make an extra trip to the store.

“You can imagine how I feel,” he said.

Unlike other Maine dealers, Kittery Trading Post’s out-of-state buyers of rifles and shotguns have the option to move those sales to its New Hampshire facility to complete a same-day purchase. But that increases business costs and inconveniences customers. In some cases, the customer may prefer to ship the firearm to a dealer in their home state, Labbe said.

At the store on Friday, shoppers poured inside on a rainy day to make purchases of clothing and outdoor gear, but foot traffic in the gun department appeared to be slower than usual. A sign overhead alerted buyers to the new law.

Some retailers claimed the guidance was late and vague.

“It’s as clear as mud,” said Laura Whitcomb from Gun Owners of Maine. She noted that gray areas include the legal definition for the “agreement” that must be reached to trigger the waiting period.

Critics of the law have vowed to sue. They contend it harms only law-abiding citizens while doing nothing to stop criminals from accessing weapons illegally. They also contend people who intend to harm themselves will find another way to do so if they are unable to purchase a gun on the spot. Violating the law is a civil infraction with a fine of $200 to $500 for a first offense and $500 to $1,000 for subsequent violations.

The waiting period law went into effect without the signature of Democratic Gov. Janet Mills. It was one of a series of bills adopted after the mass killings at a bowling alley and a bar and grill in Lewiston.

Mills told lawmakers during her State of the State address that doing nothing was not an option after the tragedy.

The laws bolstered the state’s “yellow flag” law allowing weapons to be taken from someone in a psychiatric crisis, criminalized the transfer of guns to prohibited people and required background checks for people who advertise a gun for sale on Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace or elsewhere.

Maine is a state with a long hunting tradition and the bills drew opposition from Republicans who accused Democrats, who control both legislative chambers, of using the tragedy to advance proposals, some of which had previously been defeated.

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