Oppose Death Penalty

[Oppose Death Penalty @OpposeDP]

https://t.co/FQoFK8osZe

[Robert Dunham @RDunhamDP]

“In capital cases, we rarely intervene to preserve life. I cannot understand the Court’s rush to extinguish it, much less in the circumstances of this case. With respect, I dissent.” — Justice Jackson, joined by Justice Sotomayor @uscedp @TexDefender @TCADPdotORG @UNHumanRights

[Robert Dunham @RDunhamDP]

“Today, the Court finds itself unable to tolerate even a brief delay. ... [T]he Court grants emergency relief to ensure that Texas’s current inclination (that it must execute Busby tonight) wins out over its former one (that it could not execute Busby at all). ...

[Robert Dunham @RDunhamDP]

“This was a modest, responsible step taken to allow that court to determine whether Busby is entitled to habeas relief before it is too late. ...

[Robert Dunham @RDunhamDP]

“After the Texas courts refused, Texas changed its mind, opting to proceed with the execution it once tried to abandon. The Fifth Circuit then temporarily stayed the execution. ...

[Robert Dunham @RDunhamDP]

From Justice Jackson dissent: “Edward Busby’s expert concluded that Busby is intellectually disabled. Texas’s expert agreed. Recognizing the constitutional implications of that assessment, Texas joined Busby in asking the Texas courts to find Busby ineligible for execution. ...

[Robert Dunham @RDunhamDP]

After 9 death warrants and three last meals, an Oklahoma County trial court has issued an order authorizing Richard Glossip's release on bail. https://t.co/swltu4uvMk @RealRichGlossip @dknightlaw @OKCADP @CCATDP @WTIUSA @innocence @uscedp

[Scott Greenfield @ScottGreenfield]

This is why the death penalty is wrong. It's not that some defendants don't "deserve" it, whatever that means, but that the system is too untrustworthy, too subject to error, to take the life of a human being.

[Oppose Death Penalty @OpposeDP]

Rocky Myers is off death row. But he is still in prison. His conviction stands. DA Scott Anderson has the power to change that. Go to https://t.co/QYsr9CGUyG and tell him it's time. #Justice4RockyMyers #FreeRockyMyers #TheKlanDefense #AlabamaJustice

[Attika @Attika_t]

#Alabama

Stop Execution of #JefferyLee ( See my Twitter)

Execution by nitrogen hypoxia.

Contact Governor Kay Ivey.

334-242-7100

https://t.co/7tZx84UBQZ

Talking points: https://t.co/6JXmy7L0iS

Execution : June 11, 2026

@GovernorKayIvey

[Oppose Death Penalty @OpposeDP]

https://t.co/izgj7fJQd8

[Attika @Attika_t]

#Alabama

Stop Execution of #JefferyLee ( See my Twitter)

Execution by nitrogen hypoxia.

Contact Governor Kay Ivey.

334-242-7100

https://t.co/7tZx84UBQZ

Talking points: https://t.co/6JXmy7L0iS

Execution : June 11, 2026

@GovernorKayIvey

[Oppose Death Penalty @OpposeDP]

Your support got Rocky off death row. Now finish the fight. DA Scott Anderson has opposed the petition to vacate the conviction. Rocky Myers should not be in prison at all.

Go to https://t.co/QYsr9CGUyG and make your voice heard.

#Justice4RockyMyers #FreeRockyMyers

[Death Penalty Action @DeathPenaltyAct]

Supreme Court analysis: Sonia Sotomayor warns that Texas may execute an innocent man. https://t.co/2p8VmvNlLz #FreeRodneyReed

[Death Penalty Action @DeathPenaltyAct]

🚨 Is Florida about to kill an innocent man?

That prospect may be an all too disturbing reality given that Florida leads the country in number of death row exonorations. James Duckett may be next...⏳

"Florida, don't risk killing another innocent man!" @fadporg
🖋️ https://t.co/xuERRhZ6f0

[Karine Omry @KarineOmry]

I remember #EricKing executed by the state of Arizona on March 29, 2011. Mr. King maintained his innocence from day one. He was sentenced to death although no physical evidence existed and 2 witnesses who testified against him changed their stories.
#EndTheDeathPenalty

[Lee Hedgepeth @lee_hedgepeth]

The day before Alabama had been scheduled to suffocate him, I sat down with Sonny Burton inside Holman Correctional Facility, where death row is housed. Take a moment to read and share what he had to say. Full story: https://t.co/5t5RlYlZ0H

[FADP @FADPorg]

Statement on the Execution of Michael King

STARKE, Fla. — Tonight, on the Feast of St. Patrick, during the Lenten Season, We the People of the State of Florida, executed devout Catholic Michael King.

Michael was executed tonight for the 2008 murder of Denise Amber Lee, a devoted wife, loving mother, and valued member of her community. Her death devastated her family, shocked communities across the country, and also exposed serious failures in the emergency response system that allowed for five people, including Denise herself, to call 911 before help was coordinated and emergency vehicles were dispatched. We grieve for Denise and for everyone whose lives were forever changed by her death.

In the years since, Denise’s family has worked tirelessly to improve 911 training and accountability so that those failures are never repeated. That work, and her legacy, is where real justice lives.

Instead, the State of Florida chose more violence as its version of “justice.”

Michael’s single, albeit devastating, act of violence must be considered in the context of a traumatic and life-altering traumatic brain injury he experienced at six years old. His 11 year old brother was driving a snowmobile, pulling young Michael, who was in a sled, downhill behind him. They lost control. Michael slammed into a wooden pole head-on, and was immediately knocked unconscious. His brother carried his limp body as Michael bled from his head, nose and mouth. His teeth were broken and loose, his face mangled. He sustained damage to his developing frontal lobe, the part of the brain responsible for decision making and impulse control.

After the accident, Michael suffered chronic nosebleeds, fell behind in school, repeated grades, and suffered from hallucinations — seeing and hearing things that weren’t there. He believed people were out to get him and developed severe phobias. Michael’s family watched for decades as the boy they loved changed. They lost the child they once knew. When he was arrested, convicted, and condemned to die, they lost him again.

Michael has transformed while on death row. As many people with brain damage find, the predictability and structure of prison was helpful. Those who knew and loved Michael described him as sincere, devout, and steady in his Catholic faith. Faith that helped him regulate his life in ways that had never been possible after his childhood brain injury. He prayed with others and offered comfort to the other men facing the same isolation and despair that defines death row.

Michael’s time on death row demonstrates something the death penalty fails to reckon with: the human capacity for change and redemption. That people are defined by more than their single aberrant act.

Further, in a cruel twist of irony, Michael was born with double pneumonia, struggling to breathe. Tonight, Florida executed him using a lethal injection protocol that autopsy records show causes flash pulmonary edema — a death that mirrors drowning. Worse, because Florida uses a paralytic, his struggles to breathe would have been completely masked.

Michael asked for basic transparency about how the State planned to carry out his execution, The State refused. Incredibly the State did not dispute Michael’s claims that the heavily redacted drug logs do in fact demonstrate the State has used expired drugs and given inadequate doses. Instead, State officials give the repeated and robotic assertion that they are presumed to follow their protocol. 32 executions in, it is long past time to test that presumption with transparency.

What a different story this could have been, had this tragedy ended decades ago with a life without parole sentence. Denise Lee’s family could have continued the incredible work to honor her memory by fighting for reform to keep others safe. Importantly, they could have done so without the painful reminder of the single worst day in their lives as this case wound through the court system towards Michael’s eventual execution. Society would have remained safe, and Floridians would not have to question whether their government was torturing its citizens and calling it punishment.

Instead, tonight, a new family grieves. A mother lost her son, siblings lost their brother, and a child lost their father. More violence and loss is never real justice.
https://t.co/s64P4TqbkN

[Oppose Death Penalty @OpposeDP]

If our justice system is supposed to measure culpability fairly, brain damage should matter. Instead, we are preparing to execute two men whose brains were already injured long before their cases ever reached a courtroom.

Justice should be smarter than this.

[Oppose Death Penalty @OpposeDP]

Two men the state is moving toward executing—Michael King in Florida and Jeffery Lee in Alabama—share something that should matter far more than it seems to in death penalty cases: both have documented traumatic brain injuries.

[Oppose Death Penalty @OpposeDP]

We recognize this in medicine, in neuroscience, and in everyday life. Yet when it comes to the death penalty, those realities often fade into the background.