The University of Maine System chancellor has been named to an international commission seeking the end of the death penalty.
Dannel Malloy will serve on the International Commission against the Death Penalty, the university system announced Thursday morning.
The Spain-based commission works toward the abolition of the death penalty with support from its 24 member countries, including the United States.
“My position on the death penalty evolved through my experiences in the courtroom as a prosecutor and my conversations as Governor with the loved ones of those lost to the most horrific of crimes. Not only did I come to see capital punishment as cruel and inhumane, but I learned that the legal realities of the process meant the family members of murder victims were denied justice and the opportunity to begin to heal and rebuild their own lives for decades,” Malloy said in a statement. “I am incredibly honored to join the Commission and to continue to promote our most fundamental human rights, first among them the inherent right to life.”
His appointment is a recognition of Malloy’s work to end the death penalty while governor of Connecticut, where he served from 2011 to 2019.
In 2012, Malloy signed into law a bill ending the use of the death penalty. But amid political pressure and anger over the prospect that the perpetrators of the grisly Cheshire killings in 2007 would be spared, the bill didn’t overturn the capital sentences of 11 men sitting on death row, according to The New York Times.
That changed in 2015 when the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled the death penalty violated the state constitution, overturning the death sentences of those 11 men. The high court further found that the death penalty constituted cruel and unusual punishment, The New York Times reported.
Despite having the death penalty on the books until 2015, Connecticut had only executed one person since 1960.
In announcing the appointment, the UMaine System highlighted Malloy’s commitment to equity, fairness and justice as assistant district attorney in New York and as mayor of Stamford, Connecticut.
Malloy was named chancellor of Maine’s public university system in 2019.
The UMaine System said his appointment won’t interfere with his duties as chancellor and Malloy has pledged to pay out of his own pocket all costs associated with his work for the body.
Other recent appointments to the commission include former U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights and President of Chile Michelle Bachelete and former Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland Enda Kenny.
Maine abolished its death penalty in 1887. The last person put to death in Maine — 38-year-old Englishman Daniel Wilkinson — was executed in 1885.
