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Opinion: President Biden should commute federal death sentences

File photo/Michael Conroy/The Associated Press / This Aug. 26, 2020 file photo shows the federal prison complex in Terre Haute, Ind. Rejon Taylor hoped the election of Joe Biden, the first U.S. president to campaign on a pledge to end the death penalty, would mean a more sympathetic look at his claims that racial bias and other trial errors landed him on federal death row in Terre Haute, Ind. An Associated Press review of dozens of legal filings shows that President Biden's Justice Department is fighting just as vigorously as Donald Trump's did to uphold death row inmates' sentences, despite Biden's opposition to capital punishment.
File photo/Michael Conroy/The Associated Press / This Aug. 26, 2020 file photo shows the federal prison complex in Terre Haute, Ind. Rejon Taylor hoped the election of Joe Biden, the first U.S. president to campaign on a pledge to end the death penalty, would mean a more sympathetic look at his claims that racial bias and other trial errors landed him on federal death row in Terre Haute, Ind. An Associated Press review of dozens of legal filings shows that President Biden's Justice Department is fighting just as vigorously as Donald Trump's did to uphold death row inmates' sentences, despite Biden's opposition to capital punishment. File photo/Michael Conroy/The Associated Press / This Aug. 26, 2020 file photo shows the federal prison complex in Terre Haute, Ind. Rejon Taylor hoped the election of Joe Biden, the first U.S. president to campaign on a pledge to end the death penalty, would mean a more sympathetic look at his claims that racial bias and other trial errors landed him on federal death row in Terre Haute, Ind. An Associated Press review of dozens of legal filings shows that President Biden's Justice Department is fighting just as vigorously as Donald Trump's did to uphold death row inmates' sentences, despite Biden's opposition to capital punishment.

By Ben Sessoms 5 min read

In 2003, Rejon Taylor made a grave mistake, one that cost the life of an innocent man and one that may cost him his.

Taylor, when he was just 18, shot and killed Atlanta restaurant owner Guy Luck near Chattanooga after, Taylor’s lawyers say, discharging “his gun in a panic” in a robbery attempt by the defendant.

Following his guilty conviction, Taylor was sentenced to death in 2008. After failed appeals, Taylor sits on federal death row in Terre Haute, Indiana, awaiting execution.

While there have been no federal executions during President Joe Biden’s term, as he put a stay on them shortly after entering office in 2021, they are expected to resume when President-elect Donald Trump returns to the White House.

Late during Trump’s first term, there were 13 federal executions, an unprecedented number in modern history. Since 1976, just three other people have been killed for crimes by the federal government.