Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

Texas exe­cut­ed death-row pris­on­er Billy Jack Crutsinger on September 4, 2019, despite, his cur­rent lawyers say, hav­ing pro­vid­ed him with an incom­pe­tent appeals lawyer who repeat­ed­ly filed friv­o­lous claims and cut and past­ed con­tra­dic­to­ry claims and argu­ments from pri­or clients’ court plead­ings. Crutsinger had asked the U.S. Supreme Court to halt his exe­cu­tion to review whether the tri­al court’s appoint­ment of a lawyer ​“who was not com­pe­tent to represent the…

The North Carolina Supreme Court (mem­bers pic­tured) heard argu­ments on August 26 and 27, 2019 on whether the state may retroac­tive­ly apply the leg­isla­tive repeal of its Racial Justice Act to death-row pris­on­ers who had over­turned their death sen­tences or filed claims under the act before it was…

In a year in which few states have car­ried out any exe­cu­tions, the aggres­sive exe­cu­tion prac­tices of a sin­gle state — Texas — stand in sharp con­trast. The Lone Star State has sched­uled thir­teen exe­cu­tions for the last five months of 2019, more than the rest of the coun­try com­bined. And a DPIC review of the cir­cum­stances in which the war­rants were issued rais­es trou­bling ques­tions as to whether the state is exe­cut­ing the most moral­ly cul­pa­ble indi­vid­u­als for the worst of the worst crimes or…

Thirty-sev­en years after his wrong­ful cap­i­tal pros­e­cu­tion and con­vic­tion for a mur­der he did not com­mit, a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge has set Samuel Bonner free. Citing ​“gross pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct” that he said ​“shocks the con­science,” Judge Daniel J. Lowenthal(pic­tured) on July 11, 2019 ordered Bonner released from California state…

A more than $1.6 mil­lion price tag for pros­e­cut­ing a Colorado death-penal­­ty case that the victim’s fam­i­ly opposed and that result­ed in a life sen­tence has caused some Coloradans to ques­tion whether cap­i­tal pros­e­cu­tions are worth the cost. On August 14, 2019, Miguel Contreras-Perez (pic­tured) was sen­tenced to life in prison after he plead­ed guilty to the mur­der of a cor­rec­tion­al offi­cer and the attempt­ed mur­der of anoth­er offi­cer. The sen­tence came seven years…

In the lat­est episode of Discussions with DPIC, writer/​director Chinonye Chukwu (pic­tured) speaks with DPIC Senior Director of Research and Special Projects Ngozi Ndulue about her award-win­n­ing new film Clemency. Chukwu dis­cuss­es her inspi­ra­tion for the sto­ry, the years-long process of research and immer­sion that helped her shape the nar­ra­tive, and her hopes for how this film will be…

When Oregon​’s leg­is­la­tors passed a new law lim­it­ing the scope of the state’s death penal­ty, the spon­sors of the mea­sure offered assur­ances that it would not apply retroac­tive­ly to pris­on­ers on the state’s death row. Now, a new legal opin­ion by the Oregon Department of Justice has raised ques­tions as to how retroactive ​“not retroac­tive” actu­al­ly is and whether the new law applies to legal pro­ceed­ings involv­ing cur­rent death-row pris­on­ers whose con­vic­tions or death sentences…

The tur­moil sur­round­ing Ohio​’s death penal­ty con­tin­ued to grow as pub­lic health experts crit­i­cized a legislator’s sug­ges­tion that the state use seized drugs to car­ry out exe­cu­tions and the Speaker of the Ohio House of Representatives, Larry Householder (pic­tured), expressed grow­ing doubts about cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment itself. Governor Mike DeWine joined crit­ics of the fen­tanyl pro­pos­al, declar­ing that it was ​“not an option” for resum­ing exe­cu­tions in the…

In a case that rais­es con­cerns about pro­ce­dur­al imped­i­ments that pre­vent enforce­ment of con­sti­tu­tion­al rights, Florida is prepar­ing to exe­cute a man whose claim of intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty has nev­er been reviewed by the state or fed­er­al courts. [UPDATE: Florida exe­cut­ed Gary Ray Bowles on August 22,…

With seri­ous doubts swirling as to vir­tu­al­ly every piece of foren­sic evi­dence in his case, Texas plans to exe­cute Larry Swearingen—who has always main­tained his inno­cence in the mur­der of Melissa Trotter — on August 21, 2019. His attor­neys say his con­vic­tion is ground­ed in junk sci­ence that has been repu­di­at­ed by numer­ous foren­sic experts, includ­ing false tes­ti­mo­ny regard­ing panty­hose used to stran­gle Trotter, blood found under her fin­ger­nails, and the time of…