A letter published in the Tuesday, July 7, 2020, Des Moines Register criticizes Governor Reynolds for her support of “prisoner death sentences.” First of all, there has been no death penalty in the state of Iowa since 1965. The case cited by the writer was that of Dustin Lee Honken, a drug dealer running a methamphetamine operation, who murdered two of his associates and the girlfriend of one of them and her two daughters, ages 10 and 6, in 1993.
Honken was tried and convicted in a federal court of federal crimes. If Honken is executed, it will be by the U.S. Federal government. The writer makes a false comparison between the abortion of an unborn child and the death penalty for the intentional murder of five adults and two children. Neither the State of Iowa nor the federal government has the death penalty for unborn children, who cannot commit any crimes. Christian ideals do not support the killing of children in the womb. They do, however, allow the government to impose the death penalty. Governor Reynolds has nothing to do with the death penalty or the application of it by the federal government.
