• Sherell’s comments about hanging people in Tennessee during a debate about adding the firing squad as an execution method were widely criticized for invoking the state’s dark history of lynching and racial violence.
  • Sherrell suggested hanging people from trees on the list of possible methods of execution, which critics interpreted as a call for state-sanctioned lynchings.
  • The comments were particularly offensive because of the long history of lynching violence against black people in Tennessee and the South.
  • In a statement, Sherrell said his comments were intended to convey his belief that a just society requires capital punishment in kind for the cruelest and most heinous of crimes.

Sherell’s comments about hanging people in Tennessee during a debate about adding the firing squad as an execution method were widely criticized for invoking the state’s dark history of lynching and racial violence.

“Could I make an amendment to that that includes hanging from a tree?” representative Paul Sherrell said before calling the firing squad account “very good idea.”

Tennessee legislator Paul Sherrell has apologized for comments he made during a debate in the state’s House Criminal Justice Committee about adding the firing squad as a method of execution to Tennessee’s existing methods of lethal injection and electrocution.

Sherrell suggested hanging people from trees on the list of possible methods of execution, which critics interpreted as a call for state-sanctioned lynchings.

The comments were particularly offensive because of the long history of lynching violence against black people in Tennessee and the South, including in Sherrell’s hometown of Sparta, where a runaway enslaved person was once hanged in a local cemetery.

The Equal Justice Initiative documented at least 236 lynchings in Tennessee between 1877 and 1950.

In a statement, Sherrell said his comments were intended to convey his belief that a just society requires capital punishment in kind for the cruelest and most heinous of crimes.

“My exaggerated remarks were intended to convey my belief that for the most brutal and heinous crimes, a just society requires the death penalty in kind..“While a victim’s family cannot be restored when an execution is carried out, a lesser sentence undermines the value we place on the protection of life.”

Mr Sherrell said in a statement on Wednesday.

He added that he sincerely apologizes to anyone who may have been hurt or offended by his comments.

The history of capital punishment and racism in the United States, particularly in the South, has been extensively documented, with lynchings often taking place with the implicit or explicit approval of law enforcement officials or in front of government buildings.

Even after lynchings decreased, the death penalty fell disproportionately on black people, especially those accused of murdering white people.

According to The Independent, lynching and capital punishment share a long, racist history in the United States. Early proponents of the death penalty suggest it could be a way to satiate racist gangs calling for violence in a more controlled manner.

Black people in the United States have for years received the death penalty for certain crimes that would only put white people in jail.

Bryan Stevenson, the renowned defense of capital lawyer and founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, has called the death penalty the “stepchild of lynching.”

The Independent and the non-profit Responsible Business Initiative for Justice have launched a joint campaign to end the death penalty in the United States.

The RBIJ has attracted more than 150 well-known signatories to their Business Leaders Declaration Against the Death Penalty, including Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook and Sir Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group.