U.S. executes man for role in three 1996 murders
WASHINGTON
The Trump administration executed Dustin Higgs early Saturday for his part in a triple murder in 1996, marking the 13th and final scheduled federal execution under President Donald Trump.
Aided by a conservative majority on the Supreme Court, Trump revived federal capital punishment in July after a 17-year hiatus, a stark contrast with the waning public support during that period for the death penalty.
Higgs could be the last person put to death by the federal government for some time. President-elect Joe Biden, who will be inaugurated Wednesday, has said he is opposed to the death penalty and has pledged that he will work to pass legislation ending capital punishment at the federal level.
In 2019, the attorney general at the time, William Barr, announced the Trump administration’s intention to resume executions of federal death row inmates using the lethal injection of a single drug, pentobarbital. Legal challenges briefly blocked those efforts.
In June, the Supreme Court cleared the way for the government to proceed, and the administration moved quickly to execute more than a dozen prisoners, sometimes scheduling two, three or even four at a time. Twice, the government carried out three executions in less than a week.
Higgs was pronounced dead at 1:23 a.m. at the federal correctional complex in Terre Haute, Indiana, in accordance with the nine capital sentences recommended by a federal jury, according to the Bureau of Prisons.
On Friday night, the Supreme Court voted 6-3 to clear the way for Higgs’ execution to proceed, with members of the more liberal wing dissenting. In a scathing written dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor accused the court of repeatedly sidestepping “its usual deliberative processes, often at the government’s request,” allowing the Trump administration to proceed “with an unprecedented, breakneck timetable of executions.”
“This is not justice,” she wrote. “After waiting almost two decades to resume federal executions, the government should have proceeded with some measure of restraint to ensure it did so lawfully. When it did not, this court should have. It has not.”
The Justice Department also finalized a rule last year that would allow the government to use alternate methods of execution, including death by electrocution or firing squad.
Higgs’ execution was the third in four days, after the administration executed
Lisa Montgomery, the only woman on federal death row, on Wednesday and Corey Johnson on Thursday.
Higgs’ case stemmed from an evening in 1996 when he and two other men drove from Higgs’ apartment in Laurel, Maryland, to Washington, the Justice Department said. They picked up three women – Tamika Black, Mishann Chinn and Tanji Jackson – and, after stopping at a liquor store, returned to Higgs’ apartment to drink alcohol and listen to music. Early the next day, Higgs and Jackson began to argue, prompting Jackson to grab a knife. One of the men, Willis Haynes, broke up the fight.
Still angered, Jackson left the apartment with the other women, making a threat as she exited, and appeared to take note of Higgs’ license plate, according to a court filing from the Justice Department. Higgs grabbed a firearm from a drawer, and the three men met up with the women outside. The women got in the men’s car, apparently promised that they would be driven home, but instead, Higgs drove to a secluded area in the Patuxent Research Refuge, which is federal property.
Higgs’ defense team disputes what happened next. The Justice Department said Higgs ordered the women out of the vehicle, gave the gun to Haynes and instructed him to kill them. Haynes then fatally shot each of the women. Higgs’ lawyers argued that the evidence supporting the theory that Higgs ordered the killings was dubious.