News & Developments
Sentencing Alternatives
Sep 16, 2021
NEW SCHOLARSHIP: History Says Those Left on Death Row After Capital Punishment Statutes are Struck Down or Repealed Should Not be Executed
“What should become of individuals who are awaiting execution following the repeal or judicial invalidation of capital punishment legislation?,” ask authors James R. Acker (pictured, left) and Brian W. Stull (pict…
Costs
Sep 15, 2021
Four Utah Prosecutors Urge Legislature to Repeal and Replace Death Penalty
Four Utah district attorneys, representing counties that comprise 57.5% of the state’s population, have urged the state legislature and Utah Governor Spencer Cox to enact legislation to repeal and replace Utah’s d…
Innocence
Sep 14, 2021
Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board Recommends Clemency for Julius Jones
The Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board has voted to recommend that Governor Kevin Stitt commute the death sentence imposed on Julius Jones (pictured) by an Oklahoma County jury in 1999 to a sentenc…
Innocence
Sep 13, 2021
Death-Row Exoneree Curtis Flowers Sues Mississippi Prosecutor Who Prosecuted Him Six Times
Former Mississippi death-row prisoner Curtis Flowers (pictured), who was exonerated in 2020 is suing the officials whose misconduct led to his arrest and repeated wrongful conviction. Flowers was tried six times …
Upcoming Executions
Sep 13, 2021
NEWS BRIEF: Ohio Governor Reprieves and Reschedules Four More Executions
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine (pictured) has issued reprieves further postponing four executions that had been scheduled between January and May 2022. The governor’s orders, announced September 10, 2021, rescheduled the executions for…
Death Row Overview
Sep 12, 2021
Report: After 20 Years of Decline, Spring 2021 Death-Row Population Matches Level in 1991
The number of people on death row or facing possible capital resentencing across the United States now matches a three-decade low, according to data compiled by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF) and analyzed by th…
Arbitrariness
Sep 10, 2021
California Supreme Court Upholds Death-Penalty Statute Against Challenge That Could Have Overturned Hundreds of Death Sentences
The California Supreme Court has upheld the state’s death-penalty statute against a constitutional challenge that had the potential to overturn the sentences of hundreds of people on California’s death row. In a unanimous ruling i…
Religion
Sep 09, 2021
U.S. Supreme Court Stays Texas Execution, Agrees to Review Contours of the Right to Religious Exercise in the Execution Chamber
In an after-hours order issued on September 8, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court halted Texas’s planned execution of John Henry Ramirez and agreed to review his claim that the state’s refusal to allow his pastor to “la…
Deterrence
Sep 08, 2021
Legislators Plan New Attempt to Repeal Utah Capital Punishment Law, as Prominent County Attorney Announces He Will No Longer Seek the Death Penalty
Efforts to end the death penalty in Utah edged forward on September 8, 2021 as two Republican legislators revealed plans to introduce legislation to “repeal and replace” the state’s capital punishment law and the prosecuting attor…
Religion
Sep 07, 2021
Condemned Prisoner Asks U.S. Supreme Court to Stay His Execution Unless Texas Corrections Officials Permit His Religious Advisor to ‘Lay on Hands’ While He is Being Put to Death
Texas death-row prisoner John Ramirez (pictured) is asking the United States Supreme Court to stay his September 8, 2021 execution, arguing that the state’s refusal to allow his pastor to pray out loud with him an…
