FLORENCE, S.C.— Brandon Council, 38, convicted in the 2017 murder of two South Carolina bank employees Donna Major, 59, and Kathryn Skeen, 36, is now seeking ‘compassionate release’ after being spared the death penalty amidst the mass commutation of 37 death row inmates by outgoing President Joe Biden.
As reported by The Daily Mail, Council filed a motion Friday claiming that his accommodations in the Terre Haute Federal Prison in Indiana where he has been housed since his conviction is allegedly one of the worst on Earth and that his solitary confinement in the facility is illegal torture subjecting him to “severe, unnecessary, and unjustifiable psychological harm.”
Council’s motion obtained by the Mail continues, “The petitioner's subjection to torture is the subsequent result of the petitioner's sentence to death, however, the additional punishment of solitary confinement which is the cause of the psychological harm is in no manner statutorily authorized, mandated, or required by the petitioner's sentence to death.”
“Within the jurisdiction of the United States it is both illegal and unconstitutional to inflict or subject any person to torture as a punitive consequence for a crime a party has been duly convicted of.”
In the claim, the double-murderer argues his solitary confinement “can only be accurately construed and assimilated as an act of torture.”
In a 2022 Supreme Court Case, the justices declined to take up the appeal of Michael Johnson, who made a similar claim when he was kept in solitary confinement for approximately three years according to CNN. In so doing the court allowed the ruling of a the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals to stand which stated that solitary confinement alone and the deprivation of exercise didn’t stand up to the Eighth Amendment’s cruel and unusual punishment standard unless it was imposed for a “trivial infraction.”
Records obtained by WBTW state that Council has been held in solitary confinement since Nov. 4, 2019.
The victims' families expressed anger after the commutation of Council’s sentence with Major's daughter Heather Turner telling Fox & Friends, “I was angry. I'm still angry. I am upset that this is even happening, that one man can make this decision without even talking to the victims, without any regard for what we've been through, what we're going through, and completely hurt, frustrated and angry.”
Skeen's mother, Betty Davis, 78, spoke of both Biden and Council in comments to the Mail, “He's a low life. Both Biden and Council, they're both low lifes.” She added that Council, “deserved the sentence he got. My daughter had no choice over her fate, she didn't get to choose what he did to her.”
As reported by The Daily Mail, Council filed a motion Friday claiming that his accommodations in the Terre Haute Federal Prison in Indiana where he has been housed since his conviction is allegedly one of the worst on Earth and that his solitary confinement in the facility is illegal torture subjecting him to “severe, unnecessary, and unjustifiable psychological harm.”
NEW: Murderer who had his death sentence commuted by President Biden is now demanding he be released from prison.
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) December 30, 2024
Brandon Council was sentenced to death after killing two bank employees in 2017.
Council says *he* is the victim of "psychological harm" and is demanding a… pic.twitter.com/8zKCo8sply
Council’s motion obtained by the Mail continues, “The petitioner's subjection to torture is the subsequent result of the petitioner's sentence to death, however, the additional punishment of solitary confinement which is the cause of the psychological harm is in no manner statutorily authorized, mandated, or required by the petitioner's sentence to death.”
“Within the jurisdiction of the United States it is both illegal and unconstitutional to inflict or subject any person to torture as a punitive consequence for a crime a party has been duly convicted of.”
In the claim, the double-murderer argues his solitary confinement “can only be accurately construed and assimilated as an act of torture.”
In a 2022 Supreme Court Case, the justices declined to take up the appeal of Michael Johnson, who made a similar claim when he was kept in solitary confinement for approximately three years according to CNN. In so doing the court allowed the ruling of a the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals to stand which stated that solitary confinement alone and the deprivation of exercise didn’t stand up to the Eighth Amendment’s cruel and unusual punishment standard unless it was imposed for a “trivial infraction.”
Records obtained by WBTW state that Council has been held in solitary confinement since Nov. 4, 2019.
The victims' families expressed anger after the commutation of Council’s sentence with Major's daughter Heather Turner telling Fox & Friends, “I was angry. I'm still angry. I am upset that this is even happening, that one man can make this decision without even talking to the victims, without any regard for what we've been through, what we're going through, and completely hurt, frustrated and angry.”
Skeen's mother, Betty Davis, 78, spoke of both Biden and Council in comments to the Mail, “He's a low life. Both Biden and Council, they're both low lifes.” She added that Council, “deserved the sentence he got. My daughter had no choice over her fate, she didn't get to choose what he did to her.”
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