Shapiro announces shift on death penalty, won't sign execution orders

Gov. Josh Shapiro vowed Thursday not to sign any execution orders over the next four years, continuing the death penalty moratorium that his predecessor Tom Wolf formally signed eight years ago, and urged state lawmakers to abolish the death penalty "once and for all."

"The system is fallible, and the outcome is irreversible," Shapiro said from a lectern at the Mosaic Community Church in Philadelphia. "I have painstakingly considered every aspect of Pennsylvania's capital sentencing system, reflected on my own conscience and weighed the tremendous responsibilities that I have as governor. I'm here today in this church, in this place where we hug and we talk and we challenge one another, to tell you that I will not sign any execution warrants during my time as governor of the commonwealth. When an execution warrant comes to my desk, I will sign a reprieve."

Pennsylvania has only carried out three executions since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, the last coming in 1999.

Shapiro, the state's former attorney general, noted that his position on the death penalty has evolved.

"When I assumed office as attorney general, I believed that the death penalty should be reserved for the most heinous of cases, that it indeed was a just punishment for those specific crimes," Shapiro said. "However, when the first capital case came to my desk in the Attorney General's Office, I found myself repeatedly refusing to seek the death penalty on those cases.

"When my son asked me why it was OK to kill someone who killed someone else, I couldn't look him in the eye and answer that question," he continued.

Shapiro acknowledged having publicly called for the execution of Robert Gregory Bowers after Bowers allegedly opened fire inside the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, killing 11 people and wounding six in 2018. His case is expected to go to trial this year.

"Over time, my thoughts on this issue have evolved," he said. "I've spoken to a lot of victims, to families, to advocates, to community leaders, and to my son. I listened to the families of those 11 people who were slain at Tree of Life. And I was truly moved by their courage and by their grace. You see, they told me, and they told the world that even after all the pain and anguish, they did not want that killer to be put to death."

By the time Shapiro reaches the final year of his first term, the death penalty will have been legal in Pennsylvania for 50 years after its reinstatement.

Shapiro called on lawmakers to change that. Pennsylvania, he said, should join the 25 other states that have abolished the death penalty.

State Sen. Nikil Saval, D-Philadelphia, lauded Shapiro for his decision and said he will work with both parties to bring a bill to the governor's desk.

"There are many instances in which our criminal justice system falls short, but perhaps none is more stark than in our commonwealth's use of capital punishment, a racist, classist, cruel, and utterly useless institution," Saval told the audience of parishioners, lawmakers and anti-death penalty activists who gathered at the church. "A sentence of death has more to do with where a defendant lives, what they look like, and what resources they have at their disposal than it does with a crime that they have committed."

Republican Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman called the decision "a rash approach to an issue of this magnitude" given that state lawmakers to learn about Shapiro's shift "only minutes before it was announced on Twitter."

"Any changes to close access to an element of punishment must appropriately consider the families of murder victims and the critical perspective of law enforcement," Pittman wrote in a statement. "Protecting our society while implementing meaningful criminal justice reforms have been ongoing priorities for the Senate Republican Caucus, and we will continue to engage in criminal justice reform discussions this session. Without question, the legal and ethical aspects of the death penalty warrant careful examination before being used.”

Republican state Sen. Lisa Baker, chair of the Judiciary Committee, said in a statement that significant reform is needed in several areas of the criminal justice system, but too often the debate leads to "accusations" of who is hard or soft on crime. Baker said any reform needs "reason, balance, compromise, and consensus building across party lines and between branches of government."

Baker appeared to criticize Shapiro's announcement, saying that any public official who "issue(s) 'I will always' or 'I will never' statements contribute to the hardening of views, rather than providing helpful clarity, making it more difficult to move toward responsible resolution.”

“To achieve substantial pieces of corrective legislation, we must reconcile the public demands for tougher justice in the wake of violent crimes with expert analyses that reveal laws and policies are having unintended consequences, to the detriment of effective enforcement and efficient utilization of resources.  This conflict is always evident during debates about the death penalty, a much studied and passionately argued subject."

This article originally appeared on Bucks County Courier Times: Shapiro won't sign execution warrants, asks lawmakers to overturn death penalty