Joe Biden has announced he is changing the sentences of 37 of the 40 people on death row in America to life imprisonment.
The US president made the announcement weeks before Donald Trump takes office after his victory in November’s presidential election.
President Biden‘s announcement spares the lives of people convicted of killings and those involved in deadly bank robberies or drug deals.
Only three federal inmates still face execution – Dylann Roof, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and Robert Bowers.
Roof carried out the 2015 racist killings of nine black members of Mother Emanuel AME Church in South Carolina.
Tsarnaev carried out the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings, which killed three people and injured more than 260.
Bowers killed 11 members of the congregation at Pittsburgh‘s Tree of Life Synagogue in a 2018 shooting – the deadliest antisemitic attack in the country’s history.
President Biden said his career had been dedicated to “reducing violent crime and ensuring a fair and effective justice system”.
“Today, I am commuting the sentences of 37 of the 40 individuals on federal death row to life sentences without the possibility of parole,” the president added.
“These commutations are consistent with the moratorium my administration has imposed on federal executions, in cases other than terrorism and hate-motivated mass murder.”
In his presidential campaign in 2020, his website said he would “work to pass legislation to eliminate the death penalty at the federal level”.
As president, Mr Biden said he was “more convinced than ever that we must stop the use of the death penalty at the federal level”.
He added: “In good conscience, I cannot stand back and let a new administration resume executions that I halted.”
Mr Trump has previously made calls to expand executions.
The president-elect has said those caught selling drugs should receive the death penalty “for their heinous acts”.
Campaigners had called on President Biden to make it more difficult for the incoming president to increase the use of capital punishment when he takes office on 20 January.
His announcement follows the recent pardon Mr Biden granted his son Hunter on federal gun and tax charges.
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Donnie Oliverio, a retired police officer from Ohio, whose partner was killed by one of the men whose death sentence was converted, said an execution “would have brought me no peace”.
Mr Oliverio added that the president had done what was “right” and “consistent with the faith he and I share”.