Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

On March 2, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral argu­ments in District Attorney’s Office v. Osborne con­cern­ing a defen­dan­t’s right to post-con­vic­­tion DNA test­ing. In this non-cap­i­­tal rape case, Alaska has repeat­ed­ly refused William Osborne’s request for DNA test­ing of evi­dence from the crime scene despite the fact that it would be at no cost to the State, and the fact the evi­dence could demon­strate Osborne’s inno­cence of the 1993 rape and attempt­ed mur­der for which he was convicted.

Recent devel­op­ments in Montana and New Mexico may affect the out­come of leg­isla­tive efforts to abol­ish the death penal­ty. In Montana, the Senate vot­ed 27 – 23 to end the death penal­ty in favor of life in prison with­out parole. It is the sec­ond ses­sion in a row that such a pro­pos­al has cleared the Senate. New Mexico​’s House passed a bill replac­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment with life in prison with­out parole and the bill is pend­ing in a Senate com­mit­tee. Legislatures in…

Edward Bell, a Jamaican immi­grant con­vict­ed of killing a police offi­cer, is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed in Virginia on February 19 despite a con­clu­sion by a fed­er­al District Court that his lawyers failed to present any mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence at his tri­al. Judge James Jones of the Eastern District of Virginia held that the rep­re­sen­ta­tion Bell received vio­lat­ed con­sti­tu­tion­al stan­dards. However, a new sen­tenc­ing hear­ing to explore the ample mit­i­gat­ing evidence that…

Wayne Tompkins is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed in Florida at 6 pm on February 11 despite evi­dence that he could be inno­cent. Tompkins was sen­tenced to death for a mur­der in which even the victim’s death is in ques­tion. The body used as evi­dence in the case was iden­ti­fied by par­tial den­tal records match­ing one tooth, and sev­er­al indi­vid­u­als have signed affi­davits say­ing they saw the vic­tim alive after the alleged mur­der. Gov. Crist could stay the…

Several states have recent­ly intro­duced leg­is­la­tion to abol­ish or lim­it the death penal­ty. Bills to end cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment have been intro­duced in at least eight states: Nebraska, Colorado, New Mexico, Montana, New Hampshire, Maryland, Washington, and Kansas. For some of these states, the high costs of the death penal­ty has been an impor­tant fac­tor in the leg­isla­tive debates. For exam­ple, Colorado’s bill to abol­ish the death penal­ty spec­i­fies that the mon­ey saved from not…