18 February 2010 :

The Senate Courts of Justice Committee heard testimony against three death penalty bills from Jerry Givens, who was Virginia's chief executioner from 1982 through 1999 and presided over 62 executions. He told legislators he came to realize that neither he nor they should have the right to decide who lives or dies. “The people who pass these bills, they don’t have to do it. The people who do the executions, they’re the ones who suffer through it.”