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First federal execution in 37 years set for Nov. 15

From Terry Frieden
CNN Producer

WASHINGTON -- The first federal execution in nearly four decades is set for November 15.

The U.S. Bureau of Prisons announced Friday it will execute convicted murderer David Paul Hammer by lethal injection at the never-before-used federal death chamber at Terre Haute, Indiana.

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The Bureau of Prisons said it received an order from a federal judge in Pennsylvania to execute Hammer, 41, who has repeatedly said he wants the sentence carried out promptly.

A federal appeals court agreed last month to dismiss an appeal of Hammer's sentence filed against his wishes by death penalty opponents.

Hammer was convicted in Oklahoma of kidnapping, attempted murder, armed robbery and prison escape. He murdered another inmate at the U.S. Penitentiary at Allenwood, Pennsylvania. Hammer pleaded guilty to that killing in 1996.

Hammer's execution might be the first of several federal death sentences carried out in the next few years.

Currently, 19 inmates await execution on federal death row at the Terre Haute penitentiary. Several are nearing the end of their court appeals.

The execution of another of the condemned men -- convicted drug kingpin and murderer Juan Raul Garza -- is set for Dec. 12.

The last person executed by the federal government was Victor Feguer, who was hanged at the Iowa State Penitentiary in 1963 after his conviction for kidnapping and killing a doctor.

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U.S. Department of Justice
Cornell Legal Information Institute
Supreme Court Historical Society
Death Penalty Information Center
Focus on the Death Penalty -- University of Alaska, Anchorage

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