Death penalty

Two European non-governmental organizations (NGOs) published a report this week that found Iran conducted 1,639 executions in 2025 — an increase of 68 percent over the previous year, and the largest number of executions since 1989.

The former FedEx driver who admitted murdering a 7-year-old girl in Paradise, Texas, told investigators he “tossed” her body into the woods. 

Details have emerged in the case of a former NFL player accused of beating his girlfriend to death earlier this month.

The Afghan national charged in connection with the November 26, 2025, D.C. National Guard shooting pleaded not guilty in court Wednesday.

The Florida man who abandoned a five-year-old girl to be eaten alive by alligators in November of 1998 may again face a death sentence.

Officials are seeking the death penalty for a man accused of stabbing a woman to death outside a Dollar General store in Fruitland, Florida.

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said Thursday prosecutors will seek the death penalty against the man accused of attacking two National Guardsmen shot in the nation’s capital the day before Thanksgiving.

A Florida man has been found guilty of shooting and killing his pregnant girlfriend, who refused to get an abortion.

The court hearing for the man accused of stabbing a Ukrainian woman to death on a train in Charlotte, North Carolina, will not happen until next year.

South Carolina’s attorney general has demanded a controversial local prosecutor must seek the death penalty against the career criminal charged with killing 22-year-old Logan Federico after the suspect was allowed to roam free despite 39 previous arrests and 25 felony charges.

The execution date has been set for Christa Pike, Tennessee’s only female prisoner on death row, according to reports.

Charlie Kirk’s alleged assassin was charged with aggravated murder, felony discharge of firearm, and two counts of obstruction of justice.

President Donald Trump said Tuesday that his administration will seek the death penalty as punishment for murders committed in the nation’s capital.

Two lawmakers in Alabama want the death penalty in child rape cases after authorities arrested several people for allegedly abusing children in an “underground bunker.”

A 21-year-old woman facing the death penalty, after being charged in the January fatal shooting of a U.S. Border Patrol Agent, is seeking a six-month delay in the government’s capital punishment decision.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) on Tuesday repatriated three Americans accused of participating in a failed coup attempt against President Felix Tshisekedi in May 2024. 

Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman officially reinstated the death penalty for the most serious crimes on Tuesday — though a state moratorium imposed by California Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2019 remains in effect.

South Carolina death row inmate Brad Sigmon has chosen to die by firing squad on his execution date, March 7, 2025. 

The jailing of Axel Rudakubana, who rushed into a children’s party and tried to kill everyone inside has triggered a debate on legal reform. 

Jesuit Father James Martin asserted Tuesday that President Donald Trump is not “pro-life,” following the latter’s restoration of the death penalty on the federal level.

The rejection of Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s revocation of 9/11 plea deals represents a “devastating betrayal” of grieving families.

On Monday’s “CNN NewsNight,” CNN Legal Analyst Elliot Williams, who served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General during the Obama administration, said that while he thinks the death penalty should be abolished, President Joe Biden only commuted death sentences where the cases weren’t

President Joe Biden commuted the death sentences of 37 of 40 federal inmates on death row on Monday — including cold-blooded murderers who had killed entire families, and predators who had slaughtered innocent children.

Oklahoma has executed a man who admitted to sexually assaulting and killing a 10-year-old girl as part of a sick cannibalistic fantasy.

Texas prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for the two illegal migrants accused of raping and killing 12-year-old Jocelyn Nungaray.

Pope Francis has called on Christians to pray specifically for the inmates on death row in the United States, asking that their sentence may be commuted.

By a unanimous vote, the Texas House Judiciary and Civil Jurisprudence Committee voted to subpoena a death row inmate in an apparent effort to delay the man’s execution. The committee voted to subpoena Robert Roberson, who is scheduled to be executed on Thursday in connection to a shaken baby death.

Her campaign refused to disclose whether Kamala Harris still opposes the death penalty, the third policy dodge in three days. 

Prosecutors in the Democratic Republic of the Congo seek the death penalty for 50 alleged coup plotters, including three Americans.

South Carolina will execute its first convict in over 13 years after pharmaceutical companies resumed supplying lethal injection drugs.

Several New York Republicans are calling for the death penalty to be reinstated for the mastermind behind the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Imprisoned 9/11 terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui fears he will be executed if former President Donald Trump wins the 2024 presidential election.

A Belarusian human rights group said Friday that a German citizen has been sentenced to death for terrorism and other charges.

A Texas man convicted of abducting, sexually assaulting, and killing a woman in 2001 was executed via chemical injection on Wednesday.

Pope Francis congratulated California governor Gavin Newsom for his refusal to carry out the death penalty and for California’s leadership in fighting climate change, the governor’s office reported.