Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

On January 3, attor­neys for Robert Gattis (pic­tured) filed a clemen­cy peti­tion with the Delaware Board of Pardons, request­ing they rec­om­mend com­mut­ing his death sen­tence to life with­out parole. Gattis is sched­uled for exe­cu­tion on January 20. According to the peti­tion, details of fre­quent sex­u­al, phys­i­cal and psy­cho­log­i­cal abuse occur­ing dur­ing Gattis’s child­hood were nev­er pre­sent­ed to the jury or the judge at the time of his…

New Hampshire state rep­re­sen­ta­tive Phil Greazzo, who has pro­posed a broad expan­sion of the death penal­ty, will also offer an alter­na­tive bill to abol­ish the death penal­ty entire­ly because it is so unfair. Rep. Greazzo, a Republican, pre­vi­ous­ly intro­duced leg­is­la­tion to expand the state’s death penal­ty to include any inten­tion­al mur­der, main­tain­ing the law should pro­tect all peo­ple equal­ly. But he said he would…

On December 19, Dallas District Court Judge Teresa Hawthorne held that Texas​’s death penal­ty was uncon­sti­tu­tion­al because it could lead to death sen­tences that were arbi­trar­i­ly sought and obtained. In rul­ing in favor of a defense motion, Judge Hawthorne acknowl­edged that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals and oth­er courts have upheld the statute, but judges still have the oblig­a­tion to review the law based on its cur­rent prac­tice. The judge found parts of…

The Chief Justice of California​‘s Supreme Court, Tani Cantil-Sakauye, recent­ly called for a re-eval­u­a­­­tion of the state’s death penal­ty sys­tem, say­ing the sys­tem is not work­ing and​“not effec­tive.” In her first pub­lic com­ments on the issue since she became head of the the state’s high­est court, Justice Cantil-Sakauye point­ed to the present predica­ment for the state, say­ing the death penal­ty sys­tem need­ed​“struc­tur­al change, and we don’t have the money…

(Bureau of Justice Statistics, Capital Punishment, 2010 — Statistical Tables, December 20, 2011). For infor­ma­tion on the death penal­ty in 2011, see DPIC​’s Year End Report. See Death Row, Sentencing and…

Two for­mer Supreme Court Justices in Kentucky and the President of the American Bar Association called for a sus­pen­sion of exe­cu­tions in the state until its death penal­ty sys­tem is reformed. Writing in the Louisville Courier-Journal, the Justices stat­ed,​“The list of prob­lem­at­ic cas­es is stag­ger­ing, and review of the sys­tem is deeply trou­bling. Fairness, impar­tial­i­ty and effec­tive­ness of coun­sel have been under­mined by seri­ous flaws that…

On December 20, the European Commission announced tough new restric­tions on the export of drugs that could be used for exe­cu­tions in the United States. The EC added pen­to­bar­bi­tal and sodi­um thiopen­tal — two drugs on which almost all American exe­cu­tions cur­rent­ly depend — to its list of restrict­ed prod­ucts that are tight­ly con­trolled on the grounds that they may be used for cru­el and inhu­man treat­ment or pun­ish­ment.​“The deci­sion today contributes to…

On December 16, Marin County Superior Court Judge Faye D’Opal reject­ed California​’s new lethal injec­tion pro­to­cols because cor­rec­tions offi­cials failed to con­sid­er a one-drug exe­cu­tion method now in prac­tice in oth­er states. Judge D’Opal also crit­i­cized the state for ignor­ing require­ments of the law regard­ing the revi­sion of offi­cial pro­ce­dures. A fed­er­al court has also imposed a stay of exe­cu­tions while it is review­ing the state’s 3‑drug lethal…

On December 14, Ohio Supreme Court Justice Paul Pfeifer (pic­tured) tes­ti­fied before the state’s House Criminal Justice Committee, urg­ing law­mak­ers to over­turn the death penal­ty law he helped write as a state senator…