United States: White supremacist Daniel Lee, first federal executed in 17 years

Suspended since 2003, executions of people sentenced to death by federal courts are again practiced in the United States.

This Tuesday, at 8:07 a.m., Daniel Lee, 47, died of a lethal injection at Terre Haute prison in Indiana. "You kill an innocent man," said the man before he died, according to an Indianapolis Star reporter who attended the execution. The man was convicted in 1999 of the murder of a couple and their 8-year-old girl in Arkansas during a robbery intended to finance a white supremacist group. The accused repeated that he and his co-accused were in another part of the country at the time of the murders.

A year after requesting it, Donald Trump therefore obtained the return of this practice. And this despite the multiple remedies attempted by the family of the prisoner but also of the victims.

What is the federal death penalty?

Reinstated in 1988, the federal death penalty has the specificity of being effective throughout the United States, unlike the death penalty, whether in force or not, in the 50 states. It only concerns federal crimes such as first degree murder, espionage or even war crimes.

In 2003, she was dismissed due to multiple controversies over the method of execution. It then consisted in successively injecting three drugs into the bodies of sentenced prisoners. The protocol had been challenged in court for violating the eighth amendment to the United States' constitution, which prohibits the government from imposing "cruel and unusual" punishments. It was also decried for having caused several failures, causing the agony and the suffering of the prisoners.

Daniel Lewis Lee was found guilty of the murder of three members of the same family in 1999 in Terre Haute federal prison in Indiana.  

Starting in 2012, a new lethal injection device was introduced in Texas based on sodium pentobarbital. It has since become widespread across the country. According to an eyewitness to the Indianapolis Star, "It took two or three minutes after the drug was administered for Lee to die. He did not seem to be suffering. His lips moved as if he were making bubbles, but nothing came out. At one point, he lifted his head slightly and then put it down. ”

Death penalty on the decline in the United States

Donald Trump, who is seeking re-election in 2020, regularly calls for an increased use of capital punishment, particularly for police killers or to fight drug trafficking. However, the death penalty is declining in the United States, where only a handful of states still use it.

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Two other federal executions are scheduled this week, and a fourth at the end of August. The justice ministry has repeatedly invoked justice for the murder victims to highlight the need for speedy execution for the four men who are expected to die this summer.