US executes man after death penalty against victim’s family

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American Joe Nathan James Jr., 49, sentenced to death for the murder of Faith Hall, his ex-girlfriend, was executed in Alabama on Thursday night (28) with a lethal injection. The victim’s family, however, tried to prevent this from happening.

Hall’s daughters, who were 6 and 3 when their mother was murdered, said they would have preferred James to have been sentenced to life in prison without parole. The death penalty, they said, would go against the mother’s profile, which favored forgiveness.

“We don’t think the execution is necessary because it won’t bring our mother back,” Terrlyn Hall told CNN affiliate WBMA. “I don’t want to go through with it; we are not God,” she said. Her sister Toni told CBS that “an eye for an eye was never a good premise.”

Helvetius Hall, the victim’s brother, also publicly pressed for a prison sentence instead of death. Faith was shot to death in 1994. Joe Nathan James Jr. killed her after she ended their relationship.

James’ defense tried to appeal to the US Supreme Court to prevent his execution, following the wishes of the victim’s family. “Victims and their families are the most important thing in our justice system and they deserve to be heard about the pity of those who raped them,” one of James’ lawyers said during an appeal.

In a statement, Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said justice had been served. “Joe James was sentenced to death for the atrocious act he committed three decades ago: the cold-blooded murder of an innocent young mother,” he said.

According to CNN, a Jefferson County jury found James guilty of the murder and awarded the death penalty in 1996, but the Alabama Court of Appeals overturned the conviction.

Before the retrial, James’ defense reached a plea deal in which he would receive life in prison in exchange for a guilty plea. He, however, refused the deal.

A new trial was held three years later, in 1999, when the jury again sentenced the American to death. In 2020, the US Court of Appeals upheld the conviction, and on Tuesday (26), a motion to stay the execution was also denied.

James is the eighth inmate executed this year in the United States, and the state of Alabama currently has 166 people sentenced to death awaiting execution.

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