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While standing outside the prison that housed Virginia's execution chamber, Gov. Ralph Northam signed legislation abolishing the death penalty in the state March 24.

And that was it, until she returned last year as the director, producer and co-writer of the documentary "The Prison Within," which looks at how restorative justice principles work with those society typically regards as the most hardened murderers.

It was during the first days of March 2020 that the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 turned up in discussions of the executive team at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington.

The Virginia General Assembly passed a final version of a bill that will abolish the death penalty in the state. There is expected to be a public signing ceremony with Gov. Ralph Northam in April.

At some of the prayer vigils for an end of the death penalty in Virginia Jan. 22 -- held in locations across the state, including sites where lynchings took place -- the names of those killed were read aloud.

The Supreme Court Jan. 14 cleared the path for the federal government to execute Corey Johnson after denying his two last-minute appeals.

Supreme Court orders Montgomery's execution despite lower court's stay.

The execution date of Lisa Montgomery, the only woman on federal death row, is currently undecided. In late December a federal judge said the Justice Department unlawfully rescheduled her execution while there had already been a stay in effect, granted because one of her attorneys tested positive for the coronavirus.

Eight Catholic bishops serving Maryland dioceses urged President Donald Trump Dec. 22 to stop the planned federal execution of Dustin Higgs, a Maryland man on death row in Indiana.

A new report Dec. 16 by the Death Penalty Information Center said the use of capital punishment reached a historic low this year in the United States even with the return of federal executions by the Trump administration. Seventeen people were executed in 2020, down from 22 in 2019. This lower figure stems in part from the coronavirus pandemic, but the report also notes that before the pandemic struck, the nation was set for a sixth straight year of lower numbers of death sentences and executions.

While in Rome for a prayer meeting for peace with Pope Francis, the Orthodox patriarch Bartholomew spoke to Vatican News Oct. 20 about his reading of Pope Francis' recent encyclical, "Fratelli Tutti, on Fraternity and Social Friendship."

Lisa Brown, the mother of federal death-row inmate Christopher Vialva, speaks during a Sept. 24, 2020, news conference near the Federal Correctional Complex in Terre Haute, Ind. Her son was executed less than eight hours later that day.

"This means that the federal government will likely execute four people using an untested lethal injection protocol ... without any real oversight from the Supreme Court," tweeted Sister Helen Prejean, a Sister of St. Joseph of Medaille.

"The federal government's decision to pursue executions is wrongheaded. It is profoundly disappointing to see our federal government take such great pains to restart executions"