Death penalty days numbered?

Takeaways from Tallahassee, Florida Politics, 11/16/2019

	 
Old Sparky’s been mothballed for years. Is it time to repeal the death penalty entirely? Sen. Gary Farmer and Rep. Joe Geller think so.

Farmer, a Fort Lauderdale Democrat, filed legislation (SB 938) that would delete all death penalty provisions for capital felonies in Florida. That came after Geller, an Aventura Democrat, filed a similar bill (HB 6045) in the House.

Geller’s 55-page bill sifts through Florida’s statute book to pull punishment by death, and also deleting several court processes that would suddenly be unnecessary if the legislation passed. Farmer’s bill tackles the same subject throughout Florida’s legal system.

The subject has been an important matter for both men. Geller last year became the first Florida official to stand with Ron Wright, Jr., the 27th Florida death row inmate exonerated of committing a crime for which he was sentenced to die.

“Rep. Joe Geller, moved me when he took it upon himself to stand, shake my hand and hug me to apologize for what happened to me,” Wright told Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. “To hear him say ‘I’m sorry for what our state did to you’ was not just an apology for me, but a heartfelt act and expression of genuine sincerity. I held back the tears but can’t overstate the gratitude I have for his words and embracing me.”

Farmer similarly fought in the Senate last year to end executions by the state of Florida. But while sentencing reforms have found traction in the GOP-controlled legislature, efforts to end capital punishment haven’t seen serious movement in past Sessions.