Governor sets execution date for man convicted of 1991 murders
Anti-death penalty advocates urged clemency, citing Taylor’s age when the crimes occurred and what they described as decades of change on death row.
Governor Kay Ivey on Monday set Michael Taylor’s execution by lethal injection for November 5, 2026.
Taylor was convicted in the 1991 murders of Ivan and Lucille Moore during an attempted robbery in Gadsden.
Ivey said she has no plans to grant clemency in the case.
Project Hope to Abolish the Death Penalty in Alabama urged supporters to contact Ivey’s office and ask her to commute Taylor’s sentence.
Taylor was 19 years old when the crimes were committed. Project Hope argues that the brain is not fully developed at that age and that Taylor has changed during his more than three decades on death row.
“The man the State of Alabama seeks to execute is not the chaotic, unformed young man who committed those atrocious acts,” the group said in a Facebook post. “Michael has grown into someone fundamentally different—and the evidence of that transformation is not abstract. Over decades of incarceration, he has developed a deep and abiding faith. Michael’s faith took root and grew through the people who showed up anyway: volunteer ministers and laypeople from Alabama churches who gave their time to sit with him, and fellow men on the row who walked alongside him.
“His relationship with Jesus Christ—cultivated through that community—has reshaped how he understands himself, how he treats others, and how he carries the weight of what that 19-year-old did. Michael is profoundly and genuinely remorseful. He does not minimize what happened. He grieves it.”
