Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

A recent Harris Interactive poll of over 1,000 American adults found that the num­ber of peo­ple who oppose the death penal­ty has increased since 2003. Thirty-per­­cent (30%) of those sam­pled oppose the death penal­ty, an increase of 8 per­cent­age points in the past 5 years. The per­cent­age of respondents who ​“believe in cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment” has dropped sig­nif­i­cant­ly since 1997, when 75% sup­port­ed the death penal­ty. In 2008, that num­ber had declined to 63%, the low­est num­ber in recent years. …

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 7 – 2 on March 19 that the con­vic­tion and death sen­tence of Allen Snyder should be over­turned because the tri­al judge allowed a poten­tial juror to be reject­ed on what appeared to be racial grounds. The deci­sion, writ­ten by Justice Samuel Alito, focused on the elim­i­na­tion of an African-American man from jury pan­el. The Court reject­ed the pros­e­cu­tion’s non-racial rea­sons for strik­ing this juror: ​“The implau­si­bil­i­ty of this expla­na­tion is rein­forced by the prosecutor’s…

U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey said that he hopes that the Guantanamo pris­on­ers accused of ter­ror­ism do not receive the death penal­ty in the upcom­ing Military Commission tri­als because it would give them the mar­tyr­dom that they want. In a recent talk to British eco­nom­ic stu­dents, Mukasey said he sup­ports the death penal­ty, but, ​“In a way I kind of hope from a per­son­al stand­point … I kind of hope they don’t get it. Because many of them want to be mar­tyrs .…” Prosecuting…

On March 17, the Georgia Supreme Court vot­ed 4 – 3 against Troy Davis’ request for a new tri­al. Davis, who is on death row for the 1989 mur­der of a police offi­cer, claims he is inno­cent and that he was a vic­tim of mis­tak­en iden­ti­ty. Since his tri­al in 1991, sev­en of the wit­ness­es called by the pros­e­cu­tion have recant­ed their tes­ti­mo­ny. Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears wrote in the dis­sent­ing opin­ion that Davis should at least have a hearing because, ​“In this case, near­ly every witness who…

The Death Penalty Information Center is pleased to announce the intro­duc­tion of a new Web page on Native Americans and the death penal­ty. The page con­tains infor­ma­tion on the use of the death penal­ty against Native Americans and includes the results of an exten­sive his­tor­i­cal study con­duct­ed by David V. Baker. His research was recent­ly pub­lished in the December 2007 edi­tion of Criminal Justice Studies, and is the first of its kind. Baker report­ed 464 exe­cu­tions of Native Americans…

Family mem­bers of mur­der vic­tims tes­ti­fied before the Maryland Senate Judiciary Committee on March 6 about the painful toll the death penal­ty has tak­en on their lives, stat­ing that the resources spent on seek­ing death sen­tences could be bet­ter used else­where. ​“I’ve watched too many fam­i­lies go through this to make me believe the sys­tem will ever work,” said Kathy Garcia, whose nephew was mur­dered 20 years ago. She continued, ​“The death penal­ty divides fam­i­lies at the…

On March 7, 2008, the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals reversed the con­vic­tion and death sen­tence of Richard Taylor. The court’s rul­ing grants Taylor a new tri­al due to a vari­ety of con­sti­tu­tion­al errors at his orig­i­nal tri­al. These errors include the denial of his con­sti­tu­tion­al right to coun­sel at a pre-tri­al com­pe­ten­cy hear­ing, the fail­ure of the tri­al court to hold a com­pe­ten­cy hear­ing dur­ing the tri­al, and the fail­ure of the tri­al court to appoint advisory counsel.

Reverend Joseph B. Ingle’s book, Last Rights: Thirteen Fatal Encounters with the State’s Justice, will be re-released in May with a new intro­duc­tion by Mike Farrell (of MASH) and with its orig­i­nal for­ward by William Styron. Rev. Ingle, who has coun­seled inmates on death row for over 30 years, recounts his close rela­tion­ships with 13 of these inmates before their exe­cu­tions. Devoting a chap­ter to each one, Ingle stress­es the need to see each inmate as an indi­vid­ual. He writes, ​“The…

On Monday, April 14, 2008, Seton Hall Law School will be host­ing a con­fer­ence on the recent abo­li­tion of the death penal­ty in New Jersey. ​“Legislation, Litigation, Reflection, and Repeal: The Legislative Abolition of the Death Penalty in New Jersey” is an all-day event spon­sored by Fordham Law School, The New Jersey State Bar Association, The New York Bar Association Capital Punishment Committee, and Seton Hall Law School. Four pan­els will exam­ine New Jersey’s death penal­ty from its…

Since the fed­er­al death penal­ty was rein­stat­ed in 1988, the state of New York has been more reluc­tant to impose death sen­tences than oth­er states, accord­ing to the Federal Death Penalty Resource Counsel Project. New York fed­er­al pros­e­cu­tors have asked juries to impose death sen­tences 19 times, but in only one of those cas­es did they vote for the death penal­ty. Nationally, fed­er­al pros­e­cu­tors win death penal­ties in about 33% of cas­es. In some cas­es, fed­er­al judges in New York…