Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

Bobby James Moore (pic­tured) faces exe­cu­tion in Texas after the state’s Court of Criminal Appeals reject­ed his claim of intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty in September 2015, say­ing he failed to meet Texas’​“Briseño fac­tors” (named after the Texas court deci­sion that announced them), an unsci­en­tif­ic sev­en-pronged test which a judge based on the char­ac­ter Lennie Smalls from John Steinbeck’s​“Of Mice and Men.” In doing so, the appeals…

The high cost of cap­i­tal tri­als has put the death penal­ty under scruti­ny in Arizona and Colorado. In Mohave County, Arizona, where two cap­i­tal cas­es have already cost about $239,000 this fis­cal year, County Supervisors have been told that the defense costs for try­ing these two cas­es and pur­su­ing three oth­er cap­i­tal cas­es that are cur­rent­ly on appeal will be $380,000 this fis­cal year, with com­pa­ra­ble costs expected for…

Leonard Edloe (pic­tured), President of the American Pharmacists Association Foundation has urged Virginia law­mak­ers to reject Governor Terry McAuliffe’s pro­pos­al to con­ceal the iden­ti­ty of the state’s exe­cu­tion drug sup­pli­ers, say­ing that the plan​“under­mines every­thing our pro­fes­sion stands for, and is actu­al­ly against the law.” In an op-ed in The Virginian-Pilot on the eve of a veto ses­sion in which the…

On April 13, the Tennessee House of Representatives joined the Tennessee Senate in unan­i­mous­ly approv­ing a bill that would man­date the preser­va­tion of bio­log­i­cal evi­dence in cas­es involv­ing a death sen­tence. The House vot­ed 94 – 0 in favor of the bill after the Senate had passed the bill on April 4 by a 31 – 0 vote. If the gov­er­nor signs the bill, such evi­dence must be held until the defen­dant is exe­cut­ed, dies, or is released from…

California death row pris­on­er Kevin Cooper (pic­tured), whose inno­cence claims recent­ly spurred the American Bar Association to call for a reprieve, recent­ly authored an arti­cle describ­ing what is was like for him to expe­ri­ence near­ly being exe­cut­ed on February 10, 2004. Cooper described the days lead­ing up to his sched­uled exe­cu­tion, which includ­ed round-the-clock mon­i­tor­ing, med­ical exams, and meetings…

UPDATE: The Supreme Court dock­et indi­cates that its con­fer­enc­ing of Mr. Buck’s case, orig­i­nal­ly set for April 22, has been resched­uled. The Court is now sched­uled to con­sid­er­ing the case on April 29. PREVIOUSLY: On April 22, the U.S. Supreme Court is sched­uled to con­fer on whether to review the case of Duane Buck (pic­tured), who was sen­tenced to death in Harris County, Texas after a psy­chol­o­gist tes­ti­fied that he posed an increased risk…

The Oklahoma Department of Corrections knew it had used an unau­tho­rized drug in the exe­cu­tion of Charles Warner near­ly six months before it almost repeat­ed the mis­take in the abort­ed exe­cu­tion of Richard Glossip. Oklahoma exe­cut­ed Warner on January…

Texas State Comptroller Glenn Hegar has reject­ed an appli­ca­tion for com­pen­sa­tion filed by death-row exoneree Alfred DeWayne Brown, assert­ing that the court pro­ceed­ings lead­ing to his release did not con­sti­tute a deter­mi­na­tion that he was​“actu­al­ly inno­cent.” Brown had applied for approx­i­mate­ly $1.9 mil­lion in cash and annu­ity pay­ments under Texas’ exon­er­a­tion com­pen­sa­tion law. Harris County pros­e­cu­tors dismissed charges…

Georgia is prepar­ing to exe­cute Kenneth Fults (pic­tured) on April 12, fol­low­ing the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles denial of his clemen­cy appli­ca­tion. Fults’ cur­rent lawyers pre­sent­ed evi­dence to the Board that Fults is intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled and​“func­tions in the low­est 1 per­cent of the pop­u­la­tion.” They also argued that Fults’ tri­al lawyer failed to present this evi­dence to the jury, as well as exten­sive evidence that…

Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe reject­ed a bill that would have employed the elec­tric chair as the state’s method of exe­cu­tion if lethal injec­tion drugs are unavail­able. Instead, he offered amend­ments that would per­mit the Commonwealth’s Department of Corrections to enter into con­fi­den­tial con­tracts to obtain exe­cu­tion drugs from com­pound­ing phar­ma­cies, whose iden­ti­ties would be con­cealed from the pub­lic. His…