FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 8, 2025
Contact: Noel Nickle, (828) 775-9912
RALEIGH — The North Carolina House of Representatives considered a long list of bills before yesterday’s “crossover” deadline. House Bill 270, which sought to add electrocution and firing squad as authorized methods of execution alongside lethal injection, was not on the list, and therefore will not advance to the next legislative session.
HB 270 was previously heard in two House Standing Committees. Opponents of the bill cited the harmful impact of executions on prison staff, including serious mental and physical health symptoms, and noted HB 270 would only cause further harm to corrections officers by requiring them to carry out gruesome execution methods. They also questioned the viability of adopting these execution methods. The last time electrocution was used as a means of execution in North Carolina was nearly ninety years ago. No one has been executed in the state using the firing squad.
House State and Local Government Committee members considering the bill received statements from North Carolinians who opposed the bill despite having suffered the loss of a family member to murder. On Tuesday, a committee member read aloud the statement of Jean Parks, whose sister, Elizabeth Parks Rosenberg, was killed in Raleigh 50 years ago the same date. Hearing this, Parks said, “I’m gratified my words made an impression. I know many other family members of murder victims who agree that executions, by any method, do not bring healing for us or justice for our loved ones.”
Legislators also received hundreds of letters from North Carolinians who opposed the bill.
“We’re grateful our lawmakers listened to their constituents and realized just how harmful House Bill 270 would be,” said Noel Nickle, Executive Director of the North Carolina Coalition for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. “Our Coalition partners were also united in opposing this bill, including The Rev. Dr. Jennifer Copeland of the North Carolina Council of Churches and Deacon Josh Klickman of Catholics for Abolition in North Carolina. They reminded committee members that these horrific methods of execution will only lead to more violence.”
One hundred twenty-one people remain on North Carolina’s death row, but the last execution occurred nearly 19 years ago. Executions are on hold while the courts decide how to apply the NC Racial Justice Act to all death sentences. A ruling issued in February 2025 found there was race discrimination in a capital case and cited examples of race discrimination from death penalty cases throughout the state. That decision under the Racial Justice Act is now on appeal.
###
The N.C. Coalition for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (NCCADP.org) is a grassroots collective of 23 partner organizations committed to ending the death penalty and creating a new vision of justice in North Carolina. Contact Noel Nickle at noel@nccadp.org or (828) 775-9912.
