News

The Oregon Supreme Court, for the third time in two decades, has overturned a death sentence against Robert Paul Langley Jr. for a murder committed in 1987. The decision announced Thursday sent the case back to Marion County Circuit Court for further proceedings. District Attorney Walt Beglau has not announced whether he will seek the death penalty for Langley. Because four of the sitting justices have worked for the Oregon Department of Justice, which represents the state in death-penalty cases, they did not take part in Thursday’s decision. The three remaining justices were joined by a retired justice and a Court of Appeals judge to decide the case.

A U.S. judge on Tuesday barred U.S. authorities from importing an anesthesia drug used in carrying out death sentences because the Food and Drug Administration never approved the drug for use in the United States, and he ordered supplies be confiscated. A group of death row inmates had sued the FDA last year over improperly allowing shipments into the country of sodium thiopental, a sedative used as the first of three drugs administered in carrying out executions.

We believed the Briggs initiative — the death penalty measure we wrote in 1977 — would bring greater justice. We were wrong.

In 1977, my dad, former state Sen. John Briggs, my brother-in-law and I got together to discuss California's death penalty. We agreed it was ineffective and decided a ballot initiative was needed to expand the number of murder categories eligible for capital punishment. We felt such changes would give prosecutors better tools for meting out just punishments, and that a broadened statute would serve as a warning to all California evildoers that the state would deliver swift and final justice.

Gov. Kitzhaber has invited Oregonians into thoughtful conversation. The hiatus in executions gives us time to talk and listen to each other. Disapproving reaction focuses on two concerns. One is gubernatorial powers in our democracy. The other is the death penalty. Support for the death penalty seems to be based primarily (and circularly) on the fact that Oregonians support it, and beliefs that it provides just deserts for the heinous crimes of remorseless killers, it keeps us safe , and it comforts victims' families. These positions reveal legitimate desires to prohibit murder, uphold democracy, foster public safety, and vindicate the suffering of survivors of those lost to violence.

Last week, Oregon’s governor, John Kitzhaber, took a stance for life. He refused to sign the death warrant for Gary Haugin and then he went further. He said no to any more executions on his watch. He’d allowed two executions to proceed in his earlier terms as governor, but as he said: