Pa. Department of Corrections signs notice of execution for convicted cop killer Eric Frein

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(Harry Fisher/Allentown Morning Call/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)

PENNSYLVANIA - Pennsylvania Department of Corrections Secretary John Wetzel signed a notice of execution setting June 22, 2020, for the execution of convicted cop killer Eric Frein.

Frein was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of a Pennsylvania State Police Cpl. Bryon Dickson II during an ambush attack of the Blooming Grove barracks in northeastern Pennsylvania in 2014.

After the ambush, Frein led authorities on a 48-day manhunt through the rugged Pocono Mountains before U.S. marshals caught him at an abandoned airplane hangar. The area was briefly transformed, with heavily armed federal agents and police from several states patrolling streets, combing forests and cordoning off neighborhoods. Frein was convicted in 2017.

According to the Department of Corrections, the law provides that when the governor does not sign a warrant of execution within the specified time period, the secretary of corrections has 30 days within which to issue a notice of execution. They added the General Assembly has yet to address the inadequacies in the death penalty system as detailed in the Joint State Government Commission report issued in 2018.

Gov. Tom Wolf issues temporary reprieves if a warrant reaches his desk without further appeals but they are not yet at that point in this case the department said Monday.

Pennsylvania State Troopers Association (PSTA) President David Kennedy issued the following statement:

“Eric Frein ambushed unsuspecting troopers in the dark at their barracks, murdering one and seriously injuring another. His death sentence has been upheld by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. There is no question in anyone’s mind that he committed these horrific crimes. One trooper’s children are growing up without their father, and another is living with serious injuries for the rest of his life. Gov. Tom Wolf should sign this coward’s death warrant and end his life.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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