Louisiana has not executed anyone since 2010 but Governor Jeff Landry will push for legislators to find new ways to carry out executions in next month’s special session. Landry says the session will focus on crime and highlight the suffering of victims’ families whose killers remain on death row.
“This crime session is going to be victim oriented not criminal oriented. It’s about the rights of the victims not the rights of the criminals.”
The state has had trouble obtaining the drugs to carry out executions.
Landry says Florida, Texas, Oklahoma, and Alabama have continued capital punishment despite a shortage of drugs by pharmaceutical companies. He says death penalty cases can be lengthy and cost the state millions.
“I think the special session is going to address the flaws and tighten up the laws so that they look more like Texas and Arkansas – states that have successfully fulfilled their obligations to victims.”
Alabama became the first state to use nitrogen gas as a new method to execute a death-row prisoner last week.
Landry says there are families across the state that have suffered tremendously from the loss of a loved as a result of crime. He says the state has promised those families justice.
“They have a contract with the state of Louisiana for the justice that they start and we are going to live up to our contracts.”
The state currently has 59 people on death row.
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