Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

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 injection procedures. In 2006, U.S. District…

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 30 years ago. Justice Pfeifer said, “The death penalty in Ohio has become what I call a death lottery,” citing factors such as the location of the crimes and the attitudes of individual county prosecutors as variables affecting whether the death penalty is pursued in a given case.

On December 15 an Illinois appellate court reversed Juan Rivera’s (pictured) conviction for a murder committed almost 20 years ago. The case is reminiscent of many in Illinois that led to the state’s abolition of the death penalty in 2011. Rivera was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for killing 11-year-old Holly Staker based on a confession after nearly 24 hours of near-constant interrogation. No physical evidence or witnesses conclusively linked him to the crime, and testing of DNA…

On December 15, the Death Penalty Information Center released its latest report, “The Death Penalty in 2011: Year End Report,” on statistics and trends in capital punishment in the past year. The report noted that new death sentences dropped to 78 in 2011, marking the first time since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976 that the country has produced less than 100 death sentences in a year. It represents a 75% decline since 1996, when there were 315 new death sentences. California, which…

North Carolina Governor Bev Perdue vetoed the bill that would have repealed the state’s Racial Justice Act that was passed in 2009. The Act allows death row inmates to appeal their death sentences based on statistical studies showing racial bias. In issuing the veto, the governor, who supports the death penalty, said, “I am vetoing Senate Bill 9 for the same reason that I signed the Racial Justice Act two years ago: it is simply unacceptable for racial prejudice to play a role in the imposition…

In a recent op-ed in Oregon’s Statesman Journal, former Texas Governor Mark White (pictured) applauded Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber’s decision to grant a reprieve to death row inmate Gary Haugen and to halt all executions in the state. Governor White wrote, “I think Kitzhaber’s decision is respectable and courageous. In Oregon, as in Texas, it is clearly within the constitutional authority of the governor to grant reprieves and commutations. With that authority comes the responsibility to…

The fourth edition of Robert Bohm’s “Deathquest: An Introduction to the Theory and Practice of Capital Punishment in the United States,” is now available through Anderson Publishing. The new edition is updated with discussion of the latest research on the effectiveness of the death penalty, the potential for discriminatory application, costs, and new data on miscarriages of justice, public opinion, and the influences of religion. This textbook includes two new chapters on legal challenges to…

On December 7, the American Bar Association released a report assessing Kentucky’s system of capital punishment and calling for a halt to executions in the state. The report was prepared by the Kentucky Assessment Team on the Death Penalty, which included law professors, former state supreme court justices, and practicing attorneys. The two-year study recommended that the state temporarily suspend executions until serious issues of fairness and accuracy are addressed. The review reported that…

According to a recent study by the Richmond Times-Dispatch, Virginia executes the highest proportion of people sentenced to death of any state in the country. Of the 149 death sentences handed down through 2010, 108 have resulted in an execution, a rate of about 72 percent. Virginia is second to Texas in the total number of executions carried out since 1976, but Texas has executed less than half of those sentenced to death. In many states, less than 1 in 10 death sentences have resulted in an…