NW Illinois News

State Sen. Neil Anderson (R-Moline) has filed legislation aimed at restoring the death penalty for those found guilty in the killing of first responders.

“More than a decade ago, our state senselessly abolished the death penalty across the board,” Anderson said in a post to his website. “It is important that we stand with our entire frontline community to hold fully accountable anyone who kills a first responder or peace officer.”

Senate Bill 3215 would reinstate the death penalty if a murdered first responder was a police officer, firefighter, EMT/paramedic, ambulance driver or other medical assistance or first aid personnel. The bill also covers employees of such institutions as the Department of Corrections, or any similar local correctional agency.

Anderson said having such a policy on the books strikes him as obvious.

“These are people who wake up every day to serve and protect our communities, the people on our streets, our homes and our loved ones,” he said. “We owe it to the first responder community to make sure that anyone who attacks them is held accountable to highest level possible.”

Then-Gov. George Ryan instituted the state’s moratorium on the death penalty more than two decades ago in 2000. Not long before leaving office in 2003, he also moved to clear death row, commuting the sentences of 167 inmates to life in prison.

Then-Gov. Pat Quinn abolished the death penalty in Illinois in 2011.

Along with enacting the ban, Quinn also commuted the sentences of all 15 inmates remaining on Illinois' death row, sentencing them instead to life sentences.

The last execution in Illinois took place in 1999.

In November, Anderson announced he plans to seek reelection in the newly drawn 47th District. Anderson’s declaration came less than a month after the Democratic-majority approved new maps that drew him out of the 36th District seat he’s held for two terms.

“It’s a completely new district; it’s a new challenge,” Anderson told QCTimes.com. “It's a lot bigger. I'll go from representing two counties geographically to 16. I grew up in the rural Quad-Cities. The new district is so big because it's based on population and it's a very rural district. I think I have a lot to bring to the table having grown up out in the country and on a farm."

A firefighter and paramedic in the city of Moline for the last 15 years, Anderson was first elected to the 36th state Senate district in 2014 and reelected in 2018.