Death row: Joe Biden gives life in prison to 37 inmates [Video]

WASHINGTON –

U.S. President Joe Biden announced on Monday that he is commuting the sentences of 37 of the 40 people on federal death row, converting their punishments to life imprisonment just weeks before president-elect Donald Trump, an outspoken proponent of expanding capital punishment, takes office.

The move spares the lives of people convicted in killings, including the slayings of police and military officers, people on federal land and those involved in deadly bank robberies or drug deals, as well as the killings of guards or prisoners in federal facilities.

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It means just three federal inmates are still facing execution. They are Dylann Roof, who carried out the 2015 racist slayings of nine Black members of Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina; …