Anglo-American history shows that, even before our nation’s founding, there was a special category of defendants who were to be exempt from execution: those with mental illness. Sadly, these individuals are still being put to death.

The U.S. Supreme Court declared in 1986 that “no State in the Union permits the execution of the insane,” but people with mental illness continue to be executed. In 2017, Virginia executed William Morva despite his diagnosis of delusional disorder and his long-standing psychotic delusions and bizarre behavior. Adam Ward was executed in 2016, despite a federal court recognizing that he was “afflicted with mental illness his entire life” and had been “diagnosed with bipolar disorder and placed on lithium as early as age four.”

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