Reuters posts, "Convicted Oregon killer seeks to lift governor's death row reprieve," by Teresa Carson. It's via the Chicago Tribune.
A convicted killer spared lethal injection when Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber stopped all executions in the state last year is challenging that reprieve, saying he doesn't want to be a pawn in the governor's campaign to repeal the death penalty.
A lawyer for Gary Haugen, whose scheduled December 6 execution was halted by Kitzhaber's moratorium, told the governor in a letter released on Wednesday that he intends to ask for a new death warrant.
"While you have every right, of course, to lead a campaign to repeal the death penalty in Oregon, Mr. Haugen should not be forced to serve as a pawn in that effort," Haugen's attorney Harrison Latto said in the letter.
The letter stopped short of saying Haugen wanted to die but said that he no longer wanted live in legal limbo under an indefinite but impermanent reprieve, uncertain of whether or when he might be put to death.
Kitzhaber said in November he would allow no more executions in Oregon on his watch because he believed the death penalty was morally wrong, in a move that marked the latest salvo in the nation's long-running battle over capital punishment.
Sixteen states and the District of Columbia have no death penalty, and there has been a gradual trend away from capital punishment in the country, with the number of executions falling slightly in recent years.
Earlier coverage from Oregon begins at the link. The article notes that there are 36 death row
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