Pittsburgh synagogue shooter can face death penalty, federal grand jury rules
The shooter behind the deadly 2018 antisemitic attack that killed 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue may face the death penalty, a federal grand jury concluded on Thursday.
The verdict, five years after the devastating mass shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue, now means the court will sentence Robert Bowers either to life imprisonment or death by capital punishment. Federal prosecutors argued that Bowers, who had spent months planning the attack and has since said he regretted not killing more people, met the standard that he had an intent to kill.
In 2018, Bowers, who espoused antisemitic views online ahead of the shooting, sprayed bullets from an AR-15 rifle and other weapons into the synagogue just as Sabbath worship began, killing members of three congregations and marking what would become the deadliest antisemitic attack in US history.
In recent years, researchers have found that antisemitic attacks have been on the rise across the United States, with such hate crimes rising in major cities such as New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.
Attorneys representing Bowers argued that prosecutors could not firmly determine he had an intent to kill because Bowers suffered from mental illness, stating that Bowers, who expressed anti-Jewish hate on social media before the attack, held a delusional belief that he could stop a genocide of white people by killing Jews who help immigrants.
During the penalty phase, which began in June, mental health experts for both sides disagreed on whether Bowers suffered from schizophrenia, delusions or brain disorders that played a role in the rampage.
That month, Bowers was convicted on 63 criminal counts, including hate crimes resulting in death and obstruction of the free exercise of religion resulting in death. Federal prosecutors refused to accept a guilty plea Bowers’ attorneys offered in exchange for a life sentence.
Prosecutors must now share traumatic testimony from the families of those killed and injured by Bowers in the shooting that will influence whether the jury unanimously agrees on the death penalty. The jury will also hear evidence indicating other aggravating factors such as how religious hate influenced Bowers’ actions. At the scene in 2018, Bowers told police that “all these Jews need to die”.
Bowers’ defense attorneys will also share testimony from relatives and other mitigating factors that show why the jury should not sentence him to death. Jurors will have to agree unanimously that the aggravating factors outweigh the mitigating ones. If they do not, Bowers will receive a life sentence without parole.
If the jury sides with federal prosecutors and puts Bowers on death row, he would be the first person to receive the death penalty under President Joe Biden. During his presidential campaign in 2020, Biden pledged to abolish use of the death penalty at the federal level and to work with states to end the practice. Yet his administration has taken no action to do that and instead has fought to uphold death sentences.