Update, Feb. 5: The Virginia House of Delegates voted to abolish the death penalty on Friday during a virtual session. The bill passed in the House, 57-41, with two Republicans and all Democrats voting in favor of the bill.

The Virginia State Senate already voted in favor of a similar bill this week, and Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam has expressed his support for such legislation, which puts Virginia on a clear path to becoming the first state in the South to end capital punishment.

The Senate and House bills have a few differences: the latter includes the option of sentencing life without parole for the most serious offenses, which will be discussed in committee meetings before being sent to Northam for signing.

Update, Jan. 26: The Virginia Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee on Tuesday passed a measure to abolish the death penalty on 12-4 vote. The proposal now heads to the full Senate for debate and a vote. Two bills to abolish the death penalty have been filed in the House of Delegates; neither has passed yet.

Original:

A Virginia Senate Committee on Monday approved a bill to abolish the death penalty in the commonwealth, moving forward a measure that Gov. Ralph Northam has said he would sign into law.

The Senate Judiciary Committee voted 10-4 in favor of Sen. Scott Surovell’s (D-Fairfax) bill largely along party lines, with only one Republican — Sen. Bill Stanley (R-Franklin), who co-sponsored the measure — breaking ranks.

Virginia has had the death penalty longer and has executed more people than any other state — more than 1,300 all told, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. The last executions in the commonwealth took place in 2017, and there are two people left on death row.

Speaking to lawmakers last week, Northam said the death penalty has fallen out of favor in many states and most of the world, pointing out that it has become more difficult to apply since many drug companies have refused to provide the chemicals needed for lethal injections. He also noted that it has been tied to the country’s history of racial discrimination in many criminal laws and penalties.

“A person is more than three times as likely to be sentenced to death when the victim is white, than when the victim is Black,” he said during his State of the Commonwealth Address, citing the case of Earl Washington, a Black man who spent 17 years in prison — most on death row — for the killing of a white woman he did not commit.

A number of groups — including the Virginia Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the League of Women Voters and some religious leaders — spoke in favor of outright abolition during a public hearing ahead of the vote on Monday morning. But the bill was opposed by M. Wayne Huggins, executive director of the Virginia State Police Association.

“Any person who will murder a police officer will murder any member of society and we think they ought to be dealt with the most harshly,” he said.

Democrats are pushing a number of criminal justice reforms during the 30-day legislative session that started last week in Richmond, including the restoration of voting rights for people convicted of felonies, the automatic expunging records for certain offenses, repealing mandatory minimum sentences, and legalizing marijuana.

The bill next moves to the Senate’s Finance and Appropriations Committee for consideration. It will also have to be passed in the House of Delegates, where there are two bills to abolish the death penalty — one introduced by Del. Lee Carter (D-Manassas) and the other by Del. Michael Mullin (D-Newport News).

Daniella Cheslow and Ally Schweitzer contributed to this story.