WA Senate Votes To Abolish Death Penalty

OLYMPIA, WA - In a historic vote, the state Senate on Wednesday approved a measure that would abolish the state's death penalty. Republicans and Democrats voted in favor of the measure, which passed 26 to 22.

The bill now goes to the state House. Gov. Jay Inslee placed a moratorium on the death penalty in 2014, but state law still allows for death sentences.

"I'm here to ask for mercy literally for the worst among us," Federal Way Republican Senator Mark Miloscia said during the vote Wednesday.

Senate Bill 6052 would replace the death penalty with life in prison for aggravated first-degree murder convictions. State Sen. Steve O'Ban, R-Lakewood, tried to amend the bill to keep the death penalty for those convicted of killing a police officer - but that measure failed.

In Washington, prisoners are executed either by lethal injection or hanging. The last person executed in the state was Cal Coburn Brown, who raped and killed a Burien woman in 1991.

Caption: Nancy Nelson, right, and Mary Pat Treuthart, left, both of Spokane, Wash., protest in a fenced protest area outside the Washington State Penitentiary, Thursday, Sept. 9, 2010, in Walla Walla, Wash. Cal Coburn Brown is scheduled to be executed after midnight for the 1991 murder of Seattle-area woman.

Photo by Ted S. Warren/Associated Press