Texas death-sen­tenced pris­on­er Melissa Lucio is ​“actu­al­ly inno­cent; she did not kill her [two-year-old] daugh­ter,” explained Judge Arturo Nelson in his October 16^th deci­sion, which was made pub­lic on November 14, 2024. Judge Nelson’s Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law now go to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCCA), which will make the final deci­sion about whether to over­turn Ms. Lucio’s con­vic­tion and 2008 death sen­tence. This deci­sion marks the lat­est dra­mat­ic devel­op­ment for Ms.

On Thursday, the Death Penalty Information Center (“DPI”) released a new report detail­ing the trou­bling racial his­to­ry of the fed­er­al death penal­ty. Fool’s Gold: How the Federal Death Penalty Has Perpetuated Racially Discriminatory Practices Throughout History doc­u­ments how racial dis­crim­i­na­tion has been a through­line in the appli­ca­tion of the fed­er­al death penal­ty since the 1800s. The report explains that, despite often being mis­char­ac­ter­ized as the…

U.S. mil­i­tary judge Colonel Matthew N. McCall is mov­ing ahead cau­tious­ly with sched­ul­ing the plea hear­ings in the case of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and his code­fen­dants, accused of plot­ting the September 11 ter­ror attacks. On November 10, 2024, Col. McCall instruct­ed coun­sel to agree on dates in either December 2024 or ear­ly January 2025 to hold plea hear­ings for Mr. Mohammed and his code­fen­dants, Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi. Lead pros­e­cu­tor Clayton G. Trivett, Jr. had asked Col.

On November 6, 2024, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCCA) vot­ed 6 – 3 to grant death-sen­tenced pris­on­er Randy Halprin a new tri­al. The TCCA decid­ed that the orig­i­nal tri­al judge, Vickers Cunningham, ​“was actu­al­ly biased against him at the time of tri­al because Halprin is Jewish.” The Court wrote in its rul­ing that the ​“uncon­tra­dict­ed evi­dence,” includ­ing tes­ti­mo­ny from friends and fam­i­ly of Judge Cunningham regard­ing his use of deroga­to­ry and racial slurs both gen­er­al­ly and specifically…

In the ear­ly 1990s, the case of Erik and Lyle Menendez cap­ti­vat­ed the American pub­lic, not only because of the bru­tal­i­ty of their crime but also because of the defense they pre­sent­ed. The broth­ers, age 18 and 21 at the time of the crime, were charged with first-degree mur­der with spe­cial cir­cum­stances for killing their par­ents, Jose and Kitty Menendez. These spe­cial cir­cum­stances made the crime a death-eli­gi­ble offense. Prosecutors alleged they were priv­i­leged young men act­ing out of greed,…