Gallup Poll — For First Time, Majority of Americans Prefer Life Sentence To Capital Punishment

Arbitrariness

Dec 10, 2019

Texas is prepar­ing to exe­cute Travis Runnels (pic­tured) on December 11, 2019 based on the ​“expert” tes­ti­mo­ny of a pros­e­cu­tion inves­ti­ga­tor whose false depic­tion of prison con­di­tions has helped to put fif­teen defen…

United States Supreme Court

Dec 07, 2019

The United States Supreme Court has denied an appli­ca­tion by the U.S. Department of Justice to lift a fed­er­al court injunc­tion block­ing the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment from car­ry­ing out four exe­cu­tions sched­uled for December 2019 and January 2020. The Cour…

Innocence

Dec 06, 2019

A fed­er­al appeals court has reversed the con­vic­tion of Arizona death-row pris­on­er Barry Jones (pic­tured) based on med­ical evi­dence sug­gest­ing that he may not have com­mit­ted the mur­der for which he was sen­tenced to…

Arbitrariness

Dec 05, 2019

The state of Tennessee exe­cut­ed Lee Hall (pic­tured) on December 5, 2019, with­out pro­vid­ing him judi­cial review of a legal claim that led the state’s courts to over­turn the con­vic­tion of a for­mer death-row prisoner…

Mental Illness

Dec 04, 2019

Lawyers for fed­er­al death-row pris­on­er Wesley Purkey, who is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed on December 13, 2019, say he is incom­pe­tent to be exe­cut­ed because he has Alzheimer’s dis­ease, schiz­o­phre­nia, and trau­mat­ic brain injuries that …

Upcoming Executions

Dec 03, 2019

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has asked the United States Supreme Court to…

Victims' Families

Dec 02, 2019

Saying that ​“Virginia’s death penal­ty fails vic­tims’ fam­i­lies,” 13 fam­i­ly mem­bers of Virginia homi­cide vic­tims — includ­ing the daugh­ter of a sheriff’s deputy whose assailant was exe­cut­ed — have called on Virginia leg­is­la­tors to abol­ish cap­i­tal punishm…

Dec 02, 2019

DPIC Analysis: With the U.S. Supreme Court’s February 6 rul­ing deny­ing the Department of Justice’s appli­ca­tion to vacate the fed­er­al-exe­cu­tion injunc­tions, more death war­rants will have been blocked by sta…

Arbitrariness

Nov 27, 2019

In a depar­ture from its pri­or edi­to­r­i­al stand, the Orlando Sentinel pub­lished an edi­to­r­i­al on November 22, 2019 call­ing for Florida to abol­ish the death penal­ty. Describing the state’s cap­i­tal-pun­ish­ment sys­tem as a ​“hope­less quag­mire of …

Innocence

Nov 26, 2019

Popular cul­ture has the poten­tial to change social atti­tudes, and actors in two eager­ly antic­i­pat­ed movies focus­ing on the death penal­ty are hop­ing that their films will do just that. In recent inter­views about their roles in the dra­mas Just M…