President Joe Biden commuted on Monday the executions of 37 inmates on federal death row, turning their sentences into life without parole instead.
The White House said in a statement the president "believes that America must stop the use of the death penalty at the federal level, except in cases of terrorism and hate-motivated mass murder – which is why today's actions apply to all but those cases."
There are three inmates who are not reached by Biden's clemency. They are: Dylann Roof, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and Robert Bowers.
Dylann Roof
Currently 30 years old, Roof was sentenced to death for opening fire and killing nine people at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina in 2015. He was convicted in January 2017 of 33 federal charges, including hate crimes. He revealed his goal in a manifesto where he expressed his disdained for several ethnicities.
Roof did not express remorse over his actions during the trial, telling the jury "I felt I had to do it and I still feel I had to do it." He had also told police he wanted to start a race war and almost did not go through with the shooting because people in the Bible study group he attended were extremely nice to him.
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev
One of the two brothers who perpetrated the Boston Marathon bombing in 2013, he was sentenced to death in 2015 for the killing of two people. Overall, three were killed in the attack and over 250 were injured. Along with his brother Tamerlan he planted pressure cooker bombs near the finish line of the race, detonating it as participants reached the area.
While a manhunt for them was ongoing, they killed MIT Police Officer Sean Collier to steal his weapon. Dzhokhar was injured during an ensuing shootout with police, while Tamerlan was killed. Dzhokhar was found days later hiding in a boat. He then revealed in an interrogation that they also planned to detonate explosives in Times Square, in New York City.
Robert Bowers
Bowers was sentenced to death last year for killing 11 people ats the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018. He entered the building with multiple firearms, including an AR-15 rifle, and opened fire on worshippers. He also injured multiple police officers who responded to the episode and tried to rescue victims who had survived.
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