Prosecutors can seek the death penalty in the case of a Fayetteville woman accused of killing two of her adopted children.
In late March, prosecutors filed a motion stating the state intended to pursue the death penalty against Avantae Deven.
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Deven is charged with murdering two of her adopted children - Blake Deven and London Deven.
Deven was in a Cumberland County courtroom Thursday for the hearing where prosecutors explained to a judge why they believed the case qualified as a capital offense. The judge ruled the state could seek the death penalty in the case.
Authorities arrested Avantae Deven in June 2024. She is also charged with two counts of concealing a death, kidnapping and child abuse.
Avantae Deven is expected to go to trial in 2027.
Avantae Deven’s alleged murders are the subject matter of the WRAL documentary “Broken: Foster Care in North Carolina.” WRAL’s documentary and coverage of the topic led North Carolina lawmakers to change state laws to provide more oversight of the state’s foster care system.
Death penalty in North Carolina
State law allows the death penalty for people convicted of first-degree murder, if a jury is unanimous that death is warranted. Only one method — lethal injection — is currently allowed for executions. Despite the legality, the practice hasn’t been used in the state since 2006.
The death penalty hasn't been repealed in North Carolina. But it also hasn't been used in almost 20 years. Some state lawmakers sought to change that.
Why have executions stopped?
A series of court cases over the course of many decades have challenged different versions of North Carolina’s death penalty laws. For instance, a 1976 U.S. Supreme Court ruling struck down a state law that imposed mandatory death sentences for murder. That 5-4 ruling said juries should be able to decide.
Watch: Retired judge explains why executions have stopped in North Carolina
WRAL News asked retired Judge Carl Fox about Deven’s case.
“Whoever the prosecutor is feels like this is a very serious and heinous case, and has decided to seek the death penalty because they have at least one aggravating factor, which is what is required to seek the death penalty,” Fox said.
However, Fox said even if Deven is convicted, her death penalty sentencing would effectively be hold.
Fox said North Carolina has more than 100 inmates on death row.
“They’re not being executed because there are all kinds of appeals about cruel and unusual punishment, about discrimination because … an overwhelmingly majority of folks on death row are African American, and most of them are on the death penalty for killing a white female,” Fox said.
Fox added, “Killing a white female is the quickest route to getting the death penalty if there is an aggravating factor.”
Fox said physicians have stopped participating in executions because:
- Someone must pronounce the person dead
- Someone has to inject the person with chemicals
“Physicians are sworn in their Hippocratic Oath to do no harm, and it's difficult for a physician to say they aren't doing any harm in participating in the execution of another human being,” Fox said.
NC lawmakers seek overhaul of child protective services
A bipartisan push in the North Carolina legislature seeks to give state officials more oversight of families that exhibit higher risk of child abuse.
Social services cases are typically handled at the local level. But deaths in recent years of children in Johnston, Nash, Cumberland, Person and Mecklenburg counites, among others, have raised questions about whether county social workers missed signs of abuse or let cases fall through the cracks.
A bipartisan push, in the form of House Bill 1144, would escalate certain families’ cases out of local oversight, and put them under the watch of a new team inside of state government. The sponsors include several lawmakers — Democrats, Republicans and the state’s only unaffiliated representative — from counties where abuse cases have drawn scrutiny after children’s deaths.
