It appears that the Senate debate on the bill is beginning now.
As noted earlier, NCADP is live-tweeting from the Illinois Capitol. Audio of the Senate session is being webcast.
"Illinois death penalty ban a step closer to governor's desk," is the title of a post by Todd Wilson and Ray Long for the Chicago Tribune.
A measure to abolish the death penalty in Illinois is a step closer to Gov. Pat Quinn's desk as supporters push to pass the measure in the waning hours of the General Assembly’s lame-duck session.
The ban on executions won approval today in the Senate Judiciary Committee 7-4, clearing the path for a vote by the full Senate. The measure passed the House last week.
The action comes 10 years after then-Gov. George Ryan placed a moratorium on the death penalty in Illinois following revelations that several people sent to Death Row were later exonerated.
Quinn has not said whether he would sign the ban, but during last year's campaign said the moratorium should stay in place to see whether reforms have worked.
Gordon “Randy” Steidl, who spent 17 years in prison, including 12 on Death Row, after he was wrongfully convicted of a 1986 double-murder, pleaded with the committee to end a death penalty system in Illinois that could have had him executed.
"How can you possibly give the power of life and death to a prosecutor, who even if he does everything correctly, there's still that possibility that you’re going to strap an innocent person to a gurney?” Steidl said. “And we know we have in this country, we know we have executed innocent people in the past. The problem is, after they’re executed, the state no longer cares. The evidence is there, we have an alternative, and that's life without parole and we do not risk the possiibility of executing an innocent person. Because you know sooner or later if we have this system we will."
The panel voted in favor of the proposal despite concerns raised by opponents who cited the need for the death penalty to be in place. They pointed to the shooting of a congresswoman in Arizona over the weekend and murder of six people, including a federal judge and a 9-year-old girl. The vote in Springfield also comes against the backdrop of six Chicago policemen killed over the last year.
Earlier coverage begins with "Crunch Day in Illinois."
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