Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

Long-time death penal­ty schol­ar Hugo Adam Bedau died on August 13, 2012 . Dr. Bedau had been the Austin B. Fletcher Professor of Philosophy at Tufts University, and is best known for his work on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Dr. Bedau fre­quent­ly tes­ti­fied about the death penal­ty before the U.S. Congress and many state leg­is­la­tures. He authored sev­er­al books about the death penal­ty, includ­ing The Death Penalty in America (1964; 4^th edi­tion, 1997), The…

Death penal­ty cas­es cost more than ordi­nary cas­es because all the lawyers, judges, and oth­er per­son­nel will put more hours into prepar­ing, try­ing, and review­ing the issues, giv­en that a life is at stake. Jack D’Aurora (pic­tured) of the Behal Law Group, writ­ing in The Columbus Dispatch, described the time put in by just one fed­er­al judge in Ohio review­ing a cap­i­tal case towards the end of its appeal, includ­ing the lethal injection process:…

On August 8, Governor Tom Corbett of Pennsylvania signed an exe­cu­tion war­rant for Terrance Williams for the 1984 mur­der of Amos Norwood. The exe­cu­tion was set for October 3. Although Gov. Corbett has signed 15 pre­vi­ous death war­rants, all of those dates have been stayed because the defen­dant had not com­plet­ed the ordi­nary appeals process. Williams’ death sen­tence and con­vic­tion, how­ev­er, were affirmed by the fed­er­al Court of Appeals and…

A new study con­duct­ed by law pro­fes­sors Justin Marceau (left) and Sam Kamin (mid­dle) of the University of Denver and Wanda Foglia (right) of Rowan University found that the death penal­ty in Colorado is applied so rarely as to ren­der the sys­tem uncon­sti­tu­tion­al. The authors con­clud­ed that Colorado’s death penal­ty law is applic­a­ble to almost all first-degree mur­ders, but is imposed so infre­quent­ly that it…

Carlos Moreno, who served as a Justice on California’s Supreme Court for near­ly a decade and upheld more than 200 death sen­tences, now sup­ports a bal­lot mea­sure to replace the death penal­ty with a sen­tence of life with­out parole because the sys­tem is bro­ken and unlike­ly to be fixed. Justice Moreno said that as long as cap­i­tal defen­dants are​“enti­tled to a fair tri­al and decent legal rep­re­sen­ta­tion, there’s no way the…

On August 3, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) of the Organization of American States (OAS), which includes the U.S., called for a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions in the region and released a report review­ing key areas of con­cern about the death penal­ty. The report made a series of rec­om­men­da­tions for mem­ber States, includ­ing: — States should refrain from any mea­sure that would expand the appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty or reintroduce…

Use of the death penal­ty in California has declined in recent years. There have been no exe­cu­tions in six years, and the num­ber of death sen­tences in 2011 dropped sharply from pre­vi­ous years. District Attorney Mark Peterson of Contra Costa County said his office tries to be smart on crime rather than auto­mat­i­cal­ly seek­ing death.​“People here want us to be tough on crime, but they want us to be smart on crime,” he said.​“Even though we might personally believe…

On August 1, Delma Banks Jr., one of the longest serv­ing inmates in Texas death-penal­­­ty his­to­ry, received a life sen­tence and will be eli­gi­ble for parole in 2024 under a plea agree­ment with pros­e­cu­tors. Banks was con­vict­ed by an all-white jury of a 1980 mur­der, but there were no wit­ness­es to the killing and no phys­i­cal evi­dence link­ing Banks to it. The prosecution’s case relied large­ly on the tes­ti­mo­ny of two infor­mants, both…

Joseph Ard, who spent 11 years on South Carolina​’s death row and a total of 19 years in con­fine­ment, was freed from prison on July 31. Ard was sen­tenced to death for the 1993 shoot­ing of his preg­nant girl­friend. After his con­vic­tion, new lawyers unearthed evi­dence that cor­rob­o­rat­ed Ard’s claim that the shoot­ing was acci­den­tal, result­ing from a strug­gle with his girl­friend over a gun. Ard was grant­ed a re-tri­al in 2007, and his lawyers presented…

Ronald Smith (pic­tured) is one of two Canadian cit­i­zens on death row in the United States. Smith is fac­ing exe­cu­tion in Montana for the kid­nap­ping and mur­der of two mem­bers of the Blackfeet Nation thir­ty years ago. Smith’s co-defen­­­dant, Rodney Munro, plead­ed guilty to aggra­vat­ed kid­nap­ping and was returned to Canada and released from jail in 1998. Munro cred­its Smith for sav­ing his life, say­ing that he was giv­en a plea deal and released…