Greg Abbott backs "expedited executions" for mass shooters after Odessa shootingGov. Greg Abbott tweeted on Monday night that Texas is "working on a legislative package" and that "expedited executions for mass murderers would be a nice addition." by Alex Samuels and Jolie McCullough Sept. 3, 2019 Updated: 10:23 AM
After the second Texas mass shooting in a month, Gov. Greg Abbott tweeted Monday night that "we're working on a legislative package right now" and that "expedited executions for mass murderers would be a nice addition."
Details, however, were scarce. A spokesman for Abbott said Tuesday morning that he hadn't spoken to the governor since the tweet was posted and had no more immediate information. The Legislature doesn't convene again until 2021. Abbott would need to call a special session to pass legislation before then — a move he showed reluctance to make after a mass shooting in El Paso last month.
Abbott's tweet linked to an article in The Blaze on the U.S. Department of Justice drafting legislation to speed up executions of people who commit mass murder; that article attributed the news to Bloomberg. In Texas, the average time spent on death row is almost 11 years, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. The more than 200 people currently on death row have been there an average of nearly 16 years.
Of Texas' four high-profile mass shootings in the last two years, two of the shooters were killed in the immediate aftermath of their attacks. The Odessa and Midland shooting ended when police shot and killed the gunman, and the Sutherland Springs gunman in 2017 killed himself after leaving the church where he killed 26 people. The Sutherland Springs shooter was also shot by bystander who saw him leaving the church.
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https://www.texastribune.org/2019/09/03/greg-abbott-mass-shooting-expedited-execution/
