Pope Francis appeals for US to commute death row sentences

VATICAN CITY: Pope Francis appealed on Sunday for US authorities to commute the sentences of death row prisoners, in an unusual request during his weekly Sunday prayer in St Peter’s Square.

“Today, it comes to my heart to ask all of you to pray for the prisoners in the United States who are on death row,” the pontiff said. “Let’s pray that their sentence would be commuted (or) changed.”

Francis is a vocal advocate against the death penalty and changed the Catholic Church’s teachings in 2018 to specifically call for a ban on the practice.

But the pontiff, as leader of the 1.4-billion-member Church, usually refrains from naming specific countries that continue the practice.

There are about 2,250 prisoners on death row across the US, according to the non-profit Death Penalty Information Centre. About 40 are federal prisoners.

Some American Catholic groups have been calling on President Joe Biden to commute the federal sentences in his remaining time in office.

Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, Executive Director of the Catholic Mobilising Network (CMN), the national Catholic organisation seeking the abolition of the death penalty in the United States said: “We’re in a time-sensitive and urgent moment because the president has constitutional authority and power to take action to commute the federal death row.”