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OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — The newly appointed attorney general, Pam Bondi, has initiated the process to transfer a federal inmate to Oklahoma for execution, acting in accordance with President Donald Trump’s recent directive that emphasizes a more vigorous application of the death penalty.
This week, Bondi instructed the Federal Bureau of Prisons to move inmate George John Hanson, aged 60, in preparation for his execution related to the 1999 kidnapping and murder of 77-year-old Mary Bowles in Tulsa.
In her memo to the Bureau of Prisons director, Bondi asserted, “The Department of Justice has a duty to the victim, her family, and the broader public to ensure that inmate Hanson is transferred for Oklahoma to execute this rightful sentence.”
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Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond commended Bondi for her prompt decision, as he had previously requested Hanson’s transfer in hopes of aligning it with the state’s upcoming execution schedule. The next execution is set for March 20, and Drummond aims to ensure that Hanson is positioned for the subsequent execution opportunity, anticipated to occur in June.
Convicted of carjacking, kidnapping, and murdering Bowles, Hanson received the death penalty in Tulsa County after his involvement in the crime at a shopping mall where he and an accomplice abducted the victim.
Hanson, whose full name appears as John Fitzgerald Hanson in court records, has been incarcerated in a federal penitentiary in Louisiana, serving a life sentence due to multiple federal offenses, including being classified as a career criminal, all of which predate his state-level death sentence.
As of now, Hanson’s legal representatives from the federal Public Defender’s Office have not publicly addressed Bondi’s directive.
Drummond’s predecessor, John O’Connor, had previously sought to facilitate Hanson’s transfer and took legal action against the Bureau of Prisons in 2022 after they declined to release him to state authority during President Joe Biden’s term. At that time, the regional director, Heriberto Tellez, indicated that such a move did not serve the public interest, a stance that Drummond has since criticized as “appalling.”
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www.yahoo.com