Death penalty headlines

In addition to considering the death penalty angle on the Virginia election results, consider these other notable capital punishment news items this morning:

• This article in USA Today reports: “America’s Roman Catholic bishops and their flock of 65 million are in new accord on a hot-button social issue: opposition to the death penalty. The U.S Conference of Catholic Bishops will roll out a banner statement for the national “Catholic Campaign to End the Use of the Death Penalty” at the semi-annual gathering of nearly 300 bishops beginning Monday in Washington, D.C.”

• This article in the Los Angeles Times reports: “Attorneys for four-time convicted murderer Stanley “Tookie” Williams asked Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Tuesday to grant clemency to the co-founder of the Crips, who became an anti-gang activist years after he went to death row in 1981.  Williams, 51, is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection at San Quentin State Prison on Dec. 13, unless Schwarzenegger commutes his death sentence to a term of life in prison without the possibility of parole.”

And, not to be overlooked, the Birmingham News is continuing to produce incredible death penalty copy as part of its series of its week-long editorial series entitled “Choosing Life in a Death Penalty State.”  (The paper’s remarkable death penalty conversion was first discussed here.)