Entries by Death Penalty Information Center
News
Nov 18, 2009
Death Sentences Declining in Texas
Death sentences have dropped significantly over the last few years in Texas according to a study by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. The number of death sentences is at a 35-year low as prosecutors have pushed for fewer death sentences and juries have become less willing to impose them. Since 2005, defendants may receive a sentence of life without parole instead of the death penalty. Before this change, the only alternative to the…
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Nov 17, 2009
Supreme Court Decides One Capital Case and Agrees to Hear Another
On November 16, the United States Supreme Court accepted for review and handed down a per curiam decision in Wong v. Belmontes (No. 08 – 1263). The Court reinstated Fernando Belmontes’ death sentence and overturned the decision of the Ninth Circuit granting relief because of ineffectiveness of counsel. Belmontes was sentenced to death for murdering a woman during a robbery in 1981 in California. The appeals court…
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News
Nov 16, 2009
NEW VOICES: Washington State Law Enforcement Officials Express Doubts About Death Penalty
Walla Walla County (Washington) Sheriff Mike Humphreys said the death penalty does not deter homicides, and it may be time for the public to reconsider the law:“At the time, (perpetrators do not) think about [the death penalty]. They don’t believe they’re going to get caught. And if they do get caught, there are a lot of court proceedings making it likely (execution is) not going to happen.… It’s costing us this much money. Let the people…
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Nov 15, 2009
DPIC’s Report on Costs and Police Views Subject of Bob Edwards Interview
The Bob Edwards on Sirius XM Radio recently explored the high costs of the death penalty and the views of the country’s police chiefs as discussed in DPIC’s latest report, “Smart on Crime: Reconsidering the Death Penalty in a Time of Economic Crisis.” Edwards is the former host of National Public Radio’s“Morning Edition.” He interviewed DPIC’s Executive Director Richard Dieter on…
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News
Nov 13, 2009
Ohio Proposes Major Change to Its Execution Process
On November 13, Ohio announced that it was adopting a single-drug protocol for lethal injection, making it the first state to embrace this change. Ohio will inject inmates with a large dose of an anesthetic, thiopental sodium, which is supposed to both render the inmate unconscious and eventually cause death. The state also said it will employ a back-up method of execution involving the injection of two anesthetic drugs into the muscle of the…
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News
Nov 12, 2009
NEW VOICES: Former Kentucky Officials Rethinking the Wisdom of High Death Penalty Expenditures
The former director of Kentucky’s courts recently recommended that the state stop wasting money on the death penalty and direct those resources where they are needed more.“We’ve got a system in Kentucky where there’s not enough money for public advocates, for prosecutors, for drug courts, family courts, for juvenile services, for rehabilitation programs, and we’re using the money we have in a way I think is unwise,” said Jason Nemes, former director of…
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Nov 11, 2009
U.S. Supreme Court Restores Death Sentence for Ohio Inmate
On November 9, the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari in the case of Bobby v. Van Hook (No. 09 – 144) and issued a per curiam opinion overturning a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, which had granted Robert Van Hook a new sentencing hearing based on ineffectiveness of counsel. Van Hook had been convicted and sentenced to death for a murder committed in 1985 following an encounter in a bar. The Supreme Court held…
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Nov 10, 2009
The Death Penalty in the State of Washington
The Walla-Walla Union Bulletin is focusing on the state’s death penalty in a 4‑part series entitled, “Executing Justice.” The series examines issues such as the costs of the death penalty, arbitrariness, and the appeals process. Washington currently has eight men on death row, and has not had an execution since 2001. In almost 30 years, there has been only one non-consensual execution. Four defendants have been executed since the death…
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News
Nov 06, 2009
STUDIES: Disparate Administration of the Military Death Penalty
A recent study of the military death penalty by Professor David Baldus revealed disparities depending on whether the victim in the underlying crime was also a member of the military or was a civilian. The paper was co-authored by Professors Catherine Grosso and George Woodworth and will be published by the Michigan Journal of Law Reform. The authors note that despite a 1984 executive order that“defined death eligible murder in…
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News
Nov 05, 2009
LAW REVIEWS: The Past, Present, and Future of the Death Penalty
The Tennessee Law Review recently published a compilation of articles and essays from its colloquium, “The Past, Present, and Future of the Death Penalty,” held in February 2009. Contributors focused on issues that have influenced capital punishment throughout the course of history. An article by Hugo Adam Bedau, a prominent death penalty scholar, addresses the issues of innocence and racial bias in the…
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