Oklahoma’s Upcoming Execution Spree

Despite its fraught history of botched executions, the state of Oklahoma is preparing to begin a 29 month execution spree this week. 25 dates have been set for men with severe mental illness, personal histories of childhood abuse, inadequate legal representation, or claims of innocence. Though these inmates have been deemed “the worst of the worst,” activist nun Sister Helen Prejean implores the world to look at fuller pictures of their lives, and seek out an alternative to the death penalty.

Guest: Sister Helen Prejean, anti-death penalty activist and author of Dead Man Walking, The Death of Innocents, and River of Fire.

South Carolina Legislators Approve Execution by Firing Squad

Charles Blow sits down with Roll Call columnist Mary C. Curtis on the South Carolina House, adding death by firing squad as an execution method for inmates on death row because of the lack of lethal injection drugs. “A lot of companies don’t want to be involved in this,” Curtis tells Blow on why states are running out of these lethal; injection drugs. “They gave prisoners on death row an option to do lethal injection or the electric chair since they don’t have the drugs.”