Outgoing Oregon Gov commutes all 17 of state's remaining death sentences to LWOP

As detailed in this local article, "Gov. Kate Brown announced on Tuesday afternoon that she would commute the sentences of all 17 individuals on Oregon’s death row to life in prison without the possibility of parole, the latest in her end-of-term string of clemency decisions."  Here is more:

“I have long believed that justice is not advanced by taking a life, and the state should not be in the business of executing people — even if a terrible crime placed them in prison,” Brown said in a statement sent out in a press release.  “This is a value that many Oregonians share,” Brown said.  The governor also directed the Department of Corrections to dismantle the state’s death chamber.

Oregon has not executed anyone on death row for a quarter century and Brown continued the moratorium that former Gov. John Kitzhaber put in place in 2011.  Governor-elect Tina Kotek, who like Brown and Kitzhaber is a Democrat, is personally opposed to the death penalty based on her religious beliefs and said during the campaign that she would continue the moratorium.

Voters have gone back and forth on the death penalty over the years, abolishing and reinstating it repeatedly.  Voters’ most recent decision on the death penalty was in 1984, when they inserted it into the state Constitution....

In 2019, the Legislature passed a bill that limited the crimes that qualified for the death penalty by narrowing the definition of aggravated murder to killing two or more people as an act of organized terrorism; intentionally and with premeditation kilIing a child younger than 14; killing another person while locked up in jail or prison for a previous murder; or killing a police, correctional or probation officer....

Brown said in her statement Tuesday that commuting the sentences of people currently serving on Oregon’s death row was consistent with what she described as lawmakers’ “near abolition” of capital punishment.  “Unlike previous commutations I’ve granted to individuals who have demonstrated extraordinary growth and rehabilitation, this commutation is not based on any rehabilitative efforts by the individuals on death row,” Brown said.  “Instead, it reflects the recognition that the death penalty is immoral. It is an irreversible punishment that does not allow for correction; is wasteful of taxpayer dollars; does not make communities safer; and cannot be and never has been administered fairly and equitably.”

Twelve of the seventeen people on death row are white, three are Latino, one is American Indian or Alaska Native and one is Black, according to the governor’s office....

Rosemary Brewer, executive director of the Oregon Crime Victims Law Center, said it was her understanding that staff at the Oregon Department of Justice Crime Victim and Survivor Services Division had been working all day Tuesday to notify family members and had reached all of the families impacted by the death row commutations.  A spokesperson for the governor confirmed that the DOJ division handled notification. However, Brewer said the governor should have given families more advance notice of her decision.

“I think the victims should have been told about this so they had some time to prepare for it,” Brewer said.  “These are horrific cases that left completely devastated families.  They’re preparing for the holidays and all of a sudden, they see in the (newspaper) that the person who traumatized — devastated — their families had their death sentence commuted.”...

Advocates including the Oregon Justice Resource Center pushed for the governor to commute all death row sentences for years.  On Tuesday, the center’s executive director Bobbin Singh said in a statement that Brown “has made the right choice for Oregon in commuting these death sentences and dismantling the death chamber.”...

Brown’s clemency actions, which included early release for people deemed at risk of serious health impacts from COVID-19 and inmates who helped fight Oregon’s catastrophic 2020 wildfires, have freed roughly 1,000 people from state prisons.  The Oregonian/OregonLive asked Brown’s spokespeople on Friday for the total number of people for whom the governor had issued pardons and commuted sentences.  On Tuesday, press secretary Liz Merah responded that the governor has commuted the sentences of a total of 1,189 incarcerated people.

The governor also pardoned approximately 45,000 people this year for their marijuana possession convictions, although that did not result in anyone being freed from prison because no one in Oregon was incarcerated for simple possession of an ounce or less of marijuana. And she issued 77 other pardons for crimes that the governor’s office did not identify.

Oregon Senate Republican Leader Tim Knopp, R-Bend, released a statement late Tuesday asking whether the people of Oregon had voted to end the death penalty.  “I don’t recall that happening,” he said.  “This is another example of the Governor and the Democrats not abiding by the wishes of Oregonians.  Even in the final days of her term, Brown continues to disrespect victims of the most violent crimes.”

The official press release from Gov. Brown's office, titled "Governor Kate Brown Commutes Oregon's Death Row," is available at this link.