Judge vacates death sentences of Pervis Payne, who was to be executed for a crime he says he didn't commit
CNN
A Tennessee judge this week vacated the death sentences of Pervis Payne, who has spent more than three decades on death row for two murders he says he did not commit, due to the inmate's intellectual disability.
As a result, Payne now faces two life sentences, though it remains to be decided whether he will serve them concurrently or consecutively.
"Thirty-four years of trauma and pain and fear just released themselves in that courtroom," Payne's attorney, Supervisory Assistant Federal Public Defender Kelley Henry, said in an interview Friday, describing the moments before Tuesday's hearing when Payne wept as he hugged her.
President Joe Biden is expected to announce an executive order as early as Tuesday that would effectively shut down the US-Mexico border to asylum-seekers crossing illegally when a daily threshold of crossings is exceeded – a sweeping and controversial proposal that is likely to receive fierce pushback from progressives and immigration advocates.
In the days and weeks leading up Hunter Biden’s trial on felony gun charges, President Joe Biden made little attempt to distance himself from his son. Instead, Hunter Biden was seen at the White House and in Delaware at his father’s side amid what the president’s allies acknowledge is a difficult moment for both men.