Trump wants prosecutors to seek the death penalty for murder cases in Washington, D.C., but local laws abolished it in 1981.
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said on Tuesday he wants prosecutors to pursue the death penalty in murder cases in Washington, D.C. But that idea runs headfirst into the city’s local laws, which abolished capital punishment more than 40 years ago.
“If somebody kills somebody in Washington, D.C., in the capital … we are going to be seeking the death penalty. That’s a very strong preventative,” Trump said during a Cabinet meeting.
What DC Law Says
The DC Council abolished the death penalty in 1981. A decade later, in 1992, city residents rejected a referendum that would have reinstated it. Law experts agree that means in D.C. Superior Court, where most local murder cases are prosecuted, capital punishment is off the table.
Where Federal Law Could Come In
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for D.C. occupies a unique role: it prosecutes both local and federal cases in the District. U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro said her office would “absolutely” follow the president’s direction when possible, but noted that any death penalty decision must still go through a Justice Department review process and ultimately be signed off by the Attorney General.
That means the death penalty could only realistically be applied in D.C. through federal charges — for example, in terrorism cases, killings of federal officials, or other crimes that fall under federal jurisdiction.
“The public is seeing that Washington has been far too violent,” Pirro said. “We will use all legal sanctions and sentences as called for by law.”
Pirro did acknowledge that even if a federal jury in D.C. convicted a suspect of murder, it might not be easy to get that same D.C.-based jury to sign off on a death penalty sentence.
“We are the ones who take these cases to court, and the burden is on us to prove these cases, and we welcome that burden beyond a reasonable doubt,” she said. “Sometimes the jury will buy it, sometimes they won’t-so be it. That’s the way the process works.”
With capital punishment long opposed by city lawmakers and voters, reinstating it for local D.C. cases would almost certainly require an act of Congress, according to a Georgetown Law expert.
“There is no way to bring a death penalty case in DC, at the moment at least, that isn’t in federal court,” Vida Johnson from Georgetown University Law School said.
Even then, juries drawn from District residents may be reluctant to return death sentences.
Bottom Line
Trump’s announcement signals a tougher rhetorical stance on crime in the nation’s capital. But unless cases can be charged federally, the death penalty remains barred in D.C. murder trials — and any change would trigger a new clash between federal authority and the city’s long-standing local laws.