Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

In his final arti­cle for 2006, colum­nist Richard Cohen chose to highlight the ​“mad­ness of the death penal­ty” and to draw atten­tion to the exe­cu­tion of those with men­tal ill­ness. Cohen used the case of Gregory Thompson, a severe­ly men­tal­ly ill Tennessee death row inmate, to illus­trate some of the broad­er prob­lems with the death penal­ty. Thompson is delu­sion­al, para­noid, schiz­o­phrenic, and depressed. He takes 12 pills every day and receives twice-mon­th­­ly anti-psy­­chot­ic injec­tions. Cohen notes…

The lat­est edi­tion of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund’s ​“Death Row, USA” reports that the num­ber of peo­ple on death row in the United States has con­tin­ued to decline, falling to 3,344 as of October 1, 2006. The size of death row has been declin­ing since 2000 after 25 years of steady increas­es. For the first time in many years, Florida (398) sur­passed Texas (392) in the size of its deathrow. California (657) con­tin­ued to have the largest death…

Following an announce­ment that pros­e­cu­tors would not seek the death penal­ty for Naveed Haq, who is accused of killing one woman and wound­ing five oth­ers at the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, two of Haq’s vic­tims said they sup­port­ed the deci­sion to seek a life sentence. ​“The death penal­ty most like­ly pro­mul­gates fur­ther vio­lence and revenge,” said Cheryl Stumbo, who was wound­ed in the attack. King County Prosecutor Norm Maleng clas­si­fied it as ​“one of the most seri­ous crimes that has…

Maryland​’s high­est court has ruled that the state’s adop­tion of its lethal injec­tion pro­to­cols is sub­ject to the state’s Administrative Procedures Act, and it halt­ed all exe­cu­tions until the pro­to­cols are prop­er­ly reviewed. This deci­sion may require prison offi­cials to con­duct hear­ings on the lethal injec­tion pro­ce­dures in a forum open to the pub­lic for com­ment. The Maryland Court of Appeals rul­ing comes just days after exe­cu­tions in California and Florida were halted…

New polling results released by the University of Kentucky Survey Center reveal that Kentuckians over­whelm­ing­ly choose alter­na­tives over the death penal­ty as the most appro­pri­ate pun­ish­ment for those con­vict­ed of aggra­vat­ed mur­der. When asked to select the most appro­pri­ate sen­tenc­ing option from choic­es cur­rent­ly avail­able to Kentucky jurors serv­ing in cap­i­tal mur­der tri­als, 67% select­ed sen­tences oth­er than the death penal­ty. The first choice among respon­dents was life without parole.

Commenting on the recent halt­ing of exe­cu­tions over the lethal injec­tion con­tro­ver­sy and DPIC’s Year End Report, the Boston Globe raised the question of ​“whether exe­cu­tion by any method is right.” Their edi­to­r­i­al con­clud­ed that “[t]his hit-and-miss sys­tem offers no pro­tec­tion for soci­ety,” and stat­ed that a life-with­­out parole alternative would ​“pro­tect soci­ety while allow­ing for redress if a pris­on­er could show he was wrong­ly con­vict­ed. A ban on exe­cu­tions would spare judges and…

The rul­ing from U.S. District Court Judge Jeremy Fogel (pic­tured) on Friday, December 15, appears intend­ed to spur California pub­lic offi­cials to mod­i­fy the cur­rent sys­tem of putting inmates to death. Judge Fogel’s order was not a final deci­sion, but rather a ​“Memorandum of Intended Decision: Request for Response from Defendants.” The defen­dants in this case are the cor­rec­tions offi­cials of the state, includ­ing, ulti­mate­ly, the gov­er­nor, Arnold Schwarzenegger. Judge Fogel makes clear that…

Florida​’s gov­er­nor halt­ed all exe­cu­tions in the state until a com­mis­sion can inves­ti­gate and report what went wrong with the lethal injec­tion of Angel Nieves Diaz on December 13. Gov. Jeb Bush issued an exec­u­tive order announc­ing a pan­el of experts to make rec­om­men­da­tions for changes to the process and said that no death war­rants will be signed until mod­i­fi­ca­tions are adopt­ed. Diaz’s exe­cu­tion took more than twice as long as nor­mal and required two rounds of the lethal…

DPIC’s 12^th annu­al Year End Report was released on December 14 and reveals a broad decline in the use of the death penal­ty in the U.S. based on a num­ber of fac­tors: the pub­lic now favors life with­out parole over the death penal­ty; the num­ber of exe­cu­tions has dropped to the fewest in a decade, in part because of chal­lenges to the lethal injec­tion process; and the annu­al num­ber of death sen­tences is now at a 30-year low. The report notes that var­i­ous states have put a hold on all…