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WASHINGTON (AP) – A federal prisoner who is due to be executed just days before President-elect Joe Biden takes office has tested positive for coronavirus, his lawyer said Thursday.
The Bureau of Prisons informed lawyers for Dustin John Higgs on Thursday that their client had tested positive for the virus, his lawyer Devon Porter said in a hearing Thursday afternoon.
The revelation comes amid concern over the exploding number of coronavirus cases in the federal prison system and in particular at the Terre Haute complex in Indiana where executions are taking place. It is the only federal death row.
Higgs is due to be executed on January 15, just five days before the inauguration of death penalty opponent Joe Biden. Higgs is the latest of those currently slated for execution in a series of federal executions that began in July. The Trump administration will have executed more people in a single year than any other administration in more than 130 years.
Higgs’ diagnosis marks the first known case of coronavirus on federal death row and raises the possibility that his execution could be delayed by a judge if his condition deteriorates. His lawyers have previously expressed concerns that their client could contract the virus and may present with complex health issues prior to execution.
The Bureau of Prisons confirmed in a statement to The Associated Press that inmates held on federal death row – known as the Special Confinement Unit – have tested positive for COVID-19.
The BOP also said that a contact tracing investigation found that an employee working in the unit also tested positive for the virus. He said the employee who tested positive had no contact with staff members involved in executions in November or December.
The agency declined to provide further information or identify the number of inmates who tested positive, but said inmates who tested positive or are showing symptoms will be placed in segregation.
“This is surely the result of the super-spreading executions that the government rushed to undertake in the midst of a global pandemic. Following the two executions that took place last week and another two weeks before, COVID numbers at Terre Haute federal prison have increased dramatically, ”one of Higgs’ attorneys Shawn Nolan said in a statement. . “Now our client is sick. We have asked the government to remove the execution date and we will ask the courts to intervene if they do not.
As of Thursday, there were more than 300 inmates with confirmed cases of COVID-19 among inmates at FCC Terre Haute. The Bureau of Prisons said that “many of these inmates are asymptomatic or have mild symptoms.”
Two more executions are planned in the prison complex in the days leading up to Higgs’ killing.
Higgs was convicted of ordering the 1996 murders of three women, Tamika Black, Mishann Chinn, and Tanji Jackson, at a Federal Wildlife Center near Beltsville, Maryland. Prosecutors say Higgs and two others abducted the women after Higgs became enraged because one of the women rejected his advances at the party.
Nolan said his client didn’t kill anyone, had inefficient lawyers and didn’t deserve the death penalty. Higgs’ co-accused, who prosecutors say committed the murders, has not been sentenced to death.
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