Virginia Becomes the First Southern State to
Abolish the Death Penalty As VADP Completes Its
30-Year Mission
Draft 2021-03-01
Richmond, Virginia --- There is no longer a death row
in Virginia. The state, which infamously led the nation
in executions over its four-hundred-year history, has
rejected capital punishment, the first Southern state to
take that step. Governor Ralph Northam signed death
penalty repeal legislation on TK.
Two prisoners who had been on death row, will now
serve life sentences in the general inmate population.
The last inmate put to death was William Morva in
2017. No death sentences have been handed down in
Virginia since 2011.
Virginia was the first in the nation to hold an execution
when in 1608 Captain George Kendall was killed for
spying. Over the intervening four centuries, no other
state recorded more executions, some 1,300. In the
modern era, following the resumption in 1976 after a
Supreme Court ruling, only Texas’ 570 killings exceed
Virginia’s toll of 113.
The effort to overturn the death penalty was led by
Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty with
principal assistance from the Virginia Interfaith Center
for Public Policy.
“Today’s signature on legislation by Governor Northam
is the culmination of a six-year campaign of mobilizing
a wide array of voices for death penalty abolition,
including murder victim family members, Democrats,
Republicans, Libertarians, prosecutors, faith leaders,
and mental health advocates” said VADP Executive
Director Michael Stone.
“The tireless work of VADP Field Director Dale
Brumfield in speaking to audiences large and small
across the Commonwealth played an essential role in
this final victory. His work and that of our coalition
partners - Virginia Interfaith Center for Public Policy,
Virginia Catholic Conference, and ACLU of Virginia -
generated widespread public support for this bold step
toward the humane reform of our legal justice system.”
Virginia’s abolishment of the death penalty marks
another step in the slowing nationally of the
irreversible punishment. Now, 23 states are death
penalty-free. In the last decade seven states
relinquished the death penalty. The latest Gallup poll
says most Americans say life in prison is a better
punishment for murder than the death penalty.
Of all the defects — racism, financial burdens placed
on local and state governments, and the randomness of
who receives a capital charge — the death penalty
also carries the risk of horrific error, executing an
innocent person. Since 1973, 185 men and women who
had been wrongly convicted and sentenced to death in
the United States have been exonerated.
The Virginia accomplishment was widely applauded
and received recognition from a number of prominent
abolition figures.
In a Washington Post op-ed prior to the legislation’s
passage, Virginia Senator Tim Kaine wrote: “I believe
Virginia’s-soon-to-be-finalized decision to abandon the
death penalty — thanks to great leadership by
advocates, bipartisan legislators, Gov. Ralph Northam
and everyday citizens — stands as a singular
achievement marking a repudiation of racism and a
commitment to justice.”
Sister Helen Prejean, the internationally respected
anti-death penalty activist said: “The Virginia abolition
achievement is a moment worth celebrating. It is part
of the national movement toward complete rejection of
capital punishment in this country. Congratulations to
VADP for helping change the hearts and minds of the
Virginia public.”
Abraham Bonowitz, director of Death Penalty Action
said: “Once again Virginia is in the vanguard as the
first former confederate state to abolish the death
penalty. Most people won’t know that VADP was the
first state abolitionist group to change its name in
order to build bridges and open doors with the positive
name, ‘for alternatives to the death penalty.’ This
nomenclature was instrumental in shifting the
conversation to allow conservative and progressives to
find common ground with deeper conversation, and
eventually arrive where we are today.”
Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty began
working to overturn state-sponsored killing in 1991,
originally under the name Virginians Against State
Killing. It became VADP in 1994. Today, the nonprofit
organization has some three thousand members, from
43 states and 5 foreign countries.
Michael Stone joined the organization in January 2015.
Prior to that assignment he was a field organizer for
the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty,
and director of the Office of Justice and Peace at the
Catholic Diocese of Richmond.
VADP board president is Kristina Leslie, an assistant
federal public defender in the Department of Justice.
Formerly, she worked with the capital defender office
in Northern Virginia, representing those charged with
capital murder at the trial level.
