US Supreme Court Decides to Resume Death Penalty Executions

[Asia Economy Reporter Sung Kiho] The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that executions may proceed.

On the 14th (local time), the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the previous day's ruling by the Washington DC Federal District Court that had stayed executions of inmates, and decided to carry out executions at the federal level for the first time in 17 years since 2003, according to local media reports.

The Washington DC Federal District Court had ordered a stay of execution just hours before the scheduled execution of death row inmate Daniel Lewis Lee, who is incarcerated at the Terre Haute Federal Penitentiary in Indiana. However, the specific timing of the execution has not been disclosed.

The Federal District Court had announced it would stay four executions scheduled for July and August, including Lee's. This was due to legal challenges arguing that the lethal injection method proposed by the Department of Justice last year violated the Eighth Amendment's prohibition against "cruel and unusual punishments," and that executions should be postponed until these legal disputes are resolved.

In response, the Department of Justice immediately appealed to the Federal Court of Appeals, insisting that executions must proceed.

Lee was convicted of murdering a firearms dealer and his entire family, including his 8-year-old daughter, in Arkansas in 1996.