The Argus Leader reports, "Measure to clean up death penalty clears."
A bill that corrections department officials say will clean-up capital punishment laws passed the Senate State Affairs Committee 9-0 Wednesday.
The bill revises old laws dealing with competency hearings for death-row inmates and procedures to be used if a pregnant woman is ever on death row.
South Dakota executed convicted killer Elijah Page last summer, the first in the state since 1947, by lethal injection. Three men are under death sentences in the state prison.
Laurie Feiler, deputy secretary of corrections, said the bill assures immunity from civil or criminal liability to persons who in good faith assist in executions. It also moves from policy to law the confidentiality of the persons who actually carry out the death sentence.
"Without that, I think we'd have a very difficult time finding suitable people" to handle the executions, Feiler said.Max Gors, a former circuit judge who is a staff lawyer for the corrections department, said the liability provision was necessary because the law doesn't specifically "say that executing an inmate is an exception to the homicide law."
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