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May 1, 2020

Though delaying a number of executions, COVID-19 takes the life of death row prisoner in Arizona

As reported in this Fox New piece, "Arizona inmate on death row for murder and kidnapping convictions died Thursday from the coronavirus, according to a report." Here is more:

Alfonso Salazar, 56, had been hospitalized since April 21. He was being housed at the Florence prison, located about 60 miles southeast of Phoenix. Dale Baich, a federal public defender whose office represented him in an appeal, called the prison's medical care "poor" and said it is the "subject of ongoing litigation."

Salazar was sentenced to death in 1988 after he, along with another man, were convicted of murdering 83-year-old Tucson resident, Sara Kaplan two years earlier. She was found beaten and strangled by a telephone cord, according to Phoenix's KJZZ radio station. They entered her home by prying open metal security bars from a window, the station added.

He's the first death row inmate in Arizona to die of coronavirus complications, and the third inmate in the state to die from the virus. At least seven other death row prisoners have tested positive for the coronavirus, Baich said.

One of the ill inmates said he and the others are being isolated in a dirty, cockroach-infested building. The Florence facility accounts for 35 of the 50 coronavirus cases in state prisons.

As detailed in this posts linked below, a few persons on death row are still alive because of the coronavirus as more than a half-dozen executions have been postponed nationwide. But this story from Arizona is the first report I have seen of a person on death row being among the prisoners to die because of COVID-19.

Some prior related capital COVID posts:

May 1, 2020 at 08:56 AM | Permalink

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