WASHINGTON (AP) – A federal prisoner who would be executed a few days before President-elect Joe Biden takes office has tested positive for coronavirus, his lawyer said Thursday.
The Bureau of Prisons notified Dustin John Higgs’ attorneys on Thursday that his client had tested positive for the virus, his attorney Devon Porter said during a court hearing Thursday afternoon.
The revelation comes amid concerns over the outbreak of a number of coronavirus cases in the federal prison system and specifically in the Terre Haute, Indiana complex, where the executions are taking place. He is the only federal death runner.
Higgs is scheduled to be executed Jan. 15, just five days before the death penalty, Joe Biden, takes possession of his opponent. Higgs is the latest of those currently scheduled to run in a series of federal executions that began in July. The Trump administration will have executed more people in a single year than any other administration in more than 130 years.
Higgs ’diagnosis marks the first known case of coronavirus in the federal death row and raises the possibility of a judge delaying his execution if his condition deteriorates. His lawyers have previously expressed concerns about the possibility that his client will contract the virus and may present complex health issues prior to execution.
The Prisons Office confirmed in a statement to The Associated Press that inmates detained in the Federal Death Corridor (known as the Special Confinement Unit) have tested positive for COVID-19.
The BOP also said a contact tracking investigation revealed that an employee working in the unit had also tested positive for the virus. It was said that the employee who had tested positive had no contact with any staff member involved in executions in November or December.
The agency declined to provide additional information or identify the number of inmates who have tested positive, but said inmates who test positive or show symptoms will be isolated.
“This is surely the result of the super-broadcast executions that the government has rushed to undertake in the midst of a global pandemic. After the two executions that took place last week and another two weeks earlier, COVID numbers at Terre Haute Federal Prison have risen sharply, “one of Higgs’ lawyers, Shawn Nolan, said in a statement. “Now our client is sick. We have asked the government to withdraw the execution date and we will ask the courts to intervene if they do not. “
As of Thursday, there were more than 300 inmates with confirmed cases of COVID-19 among FCC Terre Haute inmates. The Bureau of Prisons said “many of these inmates are asymptomatic or have mild symptoms.”
Two more executions are planned at the prison complex in the days before Higgs’ death.
Higgs was convicted of ordering the 1996 murder of three women, Tamika Black, Mishann Chinn and Tanji Jackson, at a federal wildlife center near Beltsville, Maryland. Prosecutors say Higgs and two others abducted the women after Higgs became enraged because one of the women rejected her advances at the party.
Nolan said his client did not kill anyone, that he had ineffective lawyers and that he did not deserve the death penalty. Higgs’ co-defendant, who prosecutors said carried out the murders, was not sentenced to death.