Diocese says end death penalty

Episcopalians urge state to act

The Episcopal Diocese representing central North Carolina approved a resolution Saturday calling on the governor and the General Assembly to abolish the state's use of the death penalty.

"Imposing the death penalty precludes people coming to reconciliation seeking forgiveness," Hal T. Hayek, chairman of the convention's faith and morals committee, said after the vote.

The resolution asks state leaders "to commute the sentences of those already sentenced to die at the hands of the State."

An amendment that called for commuting all death row sentences to life in prison without parole was defeated, Hayek said.

The vote among about 600 delegates was "overwhelmingly" in favor of the resolution, he said, adding that delegates voted by holding up a colored card.

Delegates want state leaders to take up the proposal during the next legislative session that begins in May.

"We don't want [the resolution] to just sit out there; we want them to step up to the plate now," Hayek said.

A 20-member state House Select Study Committee is examining the fairness of North Carolina's death penalty.

House Speaker Jim Black, D-Mecklenburg, created the committee when a bill seeking a two-year moratorium on carrying out executions during a death penalty study failed to reach a vote last year.

In 2003, the state Senate became the first legislative body in the South to approve such a moratorium.

Another resolution passed during the diocese's annual convention affirms the denomination's "solidarity with all who suffer and with all Christians in all places who are persecuted because of their faith," in particular Uganda, it said.