Jul 01, 2024

DPI Report — Lethal Election: How the U.S. Electoral Process Increases the Arbitrariness of the Death Penalty

Electoral pol­i­tics dis­tort the fair­ness and accu­ra­cy of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, as evi­denced by new data and analy­sis on appel­late rul­ings and clemen­cy decisions

DPI REPORTS

May 14, 2024

Broken Promises: How a History of Racial Violence and Bias Shaped Ohio’s Death Penalty

In January 2024, Ohio law­mak­ers announced plans to expand the use of the death penal­ty to per­mit exe­cu­tions with nitro­gen gas, as Alabama had just done a week ear­li­er. But at the same time the Attorney General and the Ohio Prosecuting Attorneys Association are cham­pi­oning this leg­is­la­tion, a bipar­ti­san group of state leg­is­la­tors has intro­duced a bill to abol­ish the death penal­ty based on ​“sig­nif­i­cant con­cerns on who is sen­tenced to death and how that sen­tence is car­ried out.”

DPI REPORTS

Dec 01, 2023

The Death Penalty in 2023: Year End Report

Only 5 states car­ried out exe­cu­tions and 7 states imposed new death sen­tences in 2023, as more Americans say the death penal­ty is applied unfair­ly, rather than fairly.

DPI REPORTS

Dec 01, 2023

DPI Report — Compromised Justice: How A Legacy of Racial Violence Informs Missouri’s Death Penalty Today

Missouri is one of a hand­ful of states that has con­sis­tent­ly exe­cut­ed peo­ple in the last five years. Understanding the his­tor­i­cal appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty in Missouri helps our under­stand­ing of how cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment is used today.

DEATH PENALTY CENSUS

Aug 29, 2024

New Resource: Updated Death Penalty Census

DPI’s data­base of more than 9,800 death sen­tences imposed between the Supreme Court rul­ing strik­ing down U.S. death penal­ty laws in 1972 and January 1, 2024 details the sys­temic arbi­trari­ness, bias, and error of the mod­ern U.S. death penalty.

DPI REPORTS

Jun 22, 2023

DPI Report — Doomed to Repeat: The Legacy of Race in Tennessee’s Contemporary Death Penalty

The his­tor­i­cal use of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in Tennessee shows a clear con­nec­tion between the extra­ju­di­cial lynch­ings of the 1800s and 1900s and the state sanc­tioned death penal­ty prac­tices of today.