23 October 2021 :

Azibo Aquart, the last federal inmate on death row from Connecticut, is spared execution, sentenced instead to life in prison. Azibo Aquart, now 40 years old, Black, was 23 in 2005 when he and others in his drug crew kidnapped three people he considered rivals, wrapped them in duct tape with only their eyes and noses uncovered and beat them to death with baseball bats. He was convicted in 2011 of more than a half dozen murder, racketeering and drug crimes. He was sentenced to death a year later and imprisoned on death row at the federal penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana. A federal appeals court in New York reversed the death sentence in 2018 finding that prosecutors had improperly questioned an FBI agent during the trial. The appeals court ordered Aquart resentenced. After federal prosecutors decided against pursuing a second death sentence, U.S. Judge Janet Bond Arterton imposed the only alternative under the law, which is life in prison. She sentenced Aquart to life sentences on three of the murder counts and 40 years in three others, with another 50 years on conspiracy and drug dealing charges. The judge ordered the sentences to be imposed concurrently.

Connecticut abolished capital punishment for state crimes in 2015 and closed down the state’s death row. On the Aquart case se also HoC 17/12/2012 and 20/12/2018

https://deathpenaltynews.blogspot.com/2021/10/usa-last-federal-inmate-on-death-row.html