Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

As the last act of its leg­isla­tive ses­sion, the Florida Senate passed a bill allow­ing the state to com­pen­sate James Richardson, who had been wrong­ful­ly sen­tenced to death and incar­cer­at­ed for 21 years. In 1967, Richardson, who is black, was con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death by an all-white jury for the mur­der of his sev­en chil­dren. Many years lat­er, a for­mer babysit­ter con­fessed to the crime, prompt­ing an inves­ti­ga­tion that revealed that wit­ness­es had been…

A recent New York Times edi­to­r­i­al described the ​“hor­rif­ic scene” of Clayton Lockett’s botched exe­cu­tion and called on Oklahoma to “[fol­low] oth­er gov­er­nors and leg­is­la­tures in ban­ning exe­cu­tions, rec­og­niz­ing that the American admin­is­tra­tion of death does not func­tion.” The edi­tors not­ed the Oklahoma Supreme Court’s tem­po­rary halt to the exe­cu­tion and point­ed to polit­i­cal pres­sure as a pos­si­ble expla­na­tion for why the Court then…

On May 7, the Constitution Project released a new report, Irreversible Error, call­ing for reforms in many aspects of the death penal­ty sys­tem. The Project’s Death Penalty Committee, which con­sists of renowned experts on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, made sug­ges­tions for reduc­ing the risk of exe­cut­ing the inno­cent and improv­ing the fair­ness of cap­i­tal cas­es from arrest and inter­ro­ga­tion, through pros­e­cu­tion and appeals, to the execution…

A recent sur­vey by the Kinder Institute of Houston, Texas, found that more than two-thirds (69%) of area res­i­dents pre­ferred alter­na­tive sen­tences over the death penal­ty, and that num­ber is grow­ing as the pop­u­la­tion becomes more diverse. The sur­vey asked whether per­sons con­vict­ed of first-degree mur­der should receive a death sen­tence, life in prison with­out parole, or life with the pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole after 25 years. Only 28% of respon­dents chose the death…

President Obama has ordered Attorney General Eric Holder to review the appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty in the U.S. fol­low­ing the failed exe­cu­tion of Clayton Lockett in Oklahoma on April 29. The President not­ed con­cerns about inno­cence and racial bias: ​“In the appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty in this coun­try, we have seen sig­nif­i­cant prob­lems — racial bias, uneven appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty, you know, sit­u­a­tions in which there were…

On April 30 Ohio Governor John Kasich com­mut­ed the death sen­tence of Arthur Tyler to life in prison with­out the pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole. The deci­sion fol­lowed a rec­om­men­da­tion for clemen­cy from Cuyahoga County pros­e­cu­tor Tim McGinty. Following a hear­ing on the case, the Ohio Parole Board rec­om­mend­ed com­mu­ta­tion of Tyler’s sen­tence to life with parole: six of the eleven mem­bers rec­om­mend­ed imme­di­ate parole eli­gi­bil­i­ty for Tyler, and the…

Randy Workman (pic­tured) is a for­mer war­den of the Oklahoma State Penitentiary, where he over­saw 32 exe­cu­tions. In a recent inter­view, he was crit­i­cal of many aspects of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. He said the death penal­ty failed the vic­tims’ fam­i­lies and wasted money: ​“We spend mil­lions of dol­lars on these cas­es and going through the process and the end result is the fam­i­ly, do they feel vin­di­cat­ed? I’d say 90% of the time the…

On April 29, Oklahoma inmate Clayton Lockett died of a heart attack approx­i­mate­ly 40 min­utes after the state began admin­is­ter­ing a new lethal injection…

Three for­mer Chief Justices of the Oregon Supreme Court have recent­ly called for an end to the death penal­ty in their state. Retired Chief Justice Wallace P. Carson, Jr. (l.), was the most recent Justice to call for a change: ​“In my opin­ion, the excep­tion­al cost of death penal­ty cas­es and the seem­ing­ly hap­haz­ard selec­tion of which cas­es deserve the death penal­ty out­weigh any per­ceived pub­lic ben­e­fit of this sanc­tion,” Carson said. ​“The fair­ly recent addition…

On April 28 a study pub­lished in the pres­tigous Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences indi­cat­ed that far more inno­cent peo­ple have been sen­tenced to death than those found through the legal process. According to the study, many inno­cent defen­dants are prob­a­bly not being iden­ti­fied because they were tak­en off death row and giv­en a less­er sen­tence. The rate of exon­er­a­tions for those sen­tenced to death would be over twice as high if all cas­es were given the…