New Hampshire’s only inmate on death row has been granted a rare opportunity to plead his case for a life sentence before the state’s highest court.

In a brief single-page order handed down Monday, New Hampshire’s Supreme Court agreed to hear the appeal of Michael Addison, 45, who killed Manchester Officer Michael Briggs in 2006.

The decision is a surprising development in a case where the court had repeatedly denied reconsidering Addison’s death sentence, and upheld that execution was an appropriate punishment a decade prior.

But in 2019, New Hampshire lawmakers narrowly abolished the death penalty despite fears from Briggs’ family and others that doing so would result in Addison’s sentence being commuted. At the time, supporters stressed that the repeal wouldn’t apply retroactively to

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