Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

According to Governor Mike Braun (pictured), Indiana has depleted the supply of pentobarbital it uses in its lethal injection executions. Given that the last of the doses purchased in December 2024 expired and went unused, Gov. Braun does not intend to renew the state’s supply. According to earlier reporting by the Indiana Capital Chronicle, the Indiana Department of Correction (IDC) spent $900,000 on pentobarbital in late 2024 in preparation for the execution of Joseph Corcoran. Gov. Braun…

On June 6, 2025, District Judge Matthew Bates issued a ruling finding Utah death-sentenced prisoner Ralph Menzies mentally competent to be executed despite concerns presented by Mr. Menzies’ attorneys about his vascular dementia. In his ruling, Judge Bates agreed that Mr. Menzies suffers from vascular dementia but said Mr. Menzies had failed to show “by a preponderance of the evidence that his mental condition prevents him from reaching a rational understanding of the punishment or the State’s…

On May 29, 2025, Fulton County Superior Court Judge Shukura Ingram ruled that Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr must abide by a 2021 agreement reached with attorneys for nine individuals currently on Georgia’s death row that bars their executions until COVID-19 vaccines are available to everyone. In 2021, the state agreed to halt executions until vaccines were available to all members of the public. In her ruling, Judge Ingram noted that the vaccine is not approved for children under six…

Sonia “Sunny” Jacobs, a former death row prisoner whose story of wrongful conviction was featured in the off-Broadway play “The Exonerated” and who became a prominent advocate for formerly incarcerated prisoners, died in a house fire, along with her caregiver, in County Galway, Ireland, on June 3, 2025. Ms. Jacobs was convicted and sentenced to death in 1976 for the murders of two law enforcement officers at a Florida rest stop. She and Jesse Tafero, the father of one of her children, were…

Scott Panetti died on Texas’ death row at the end of May 2025 after 30 years in prison. He became well-known for the role his case played in clarifying the legal standard for determining when defendants are competent to face execution — precedent that continues to shape court decisions nationwide. Mr. Panetti’s severe mental illness manifested in his late teens, leading to more than a dozen psychiatric hospitalizations through the 1980s and early 1990s. His documented conditions included…

On May 1, Jeffrey Hutchinson, a Gulf War veteran, was executed in Florida for the murders of his girlfriend and her three young children. As he fought behind enemy lines in some of the most dangerous regions on earth, bombs rattled and nerve gas corroded his brain, causing permanent damage that would contribute to the tragedy just a few years later. “His mind was a casualty, just like any limb lost in combat,” a group of 129 military veterans wrote in a letter urging Gov. Ron DeSantis to halt…

In this month’s podcast episode of 12:01 The Death Penalty in Context, DPI’s Managing Director Anne Holsinger speaks with Corinna Barrett Lain, the S.D. Roberts & Sandra Moore Professor of Law at the University of Richmond School of Law and author of the recently published book, Secrets of the Killing State: The Untold Story of Lethal Injection. Ms. Lain’s new book challenges a widely held assumption that lethal injection is a painless, regulated, and medically-sound process. Drawing on…

In commemoration of the 20^th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark decision ending the juvenile death penalty, the Death Penalty Information Center (DPI) has released a new report: Immature Minds in a “Maturing Society”: Roper v. Simmons at 20, detailing the growing support for the idea that individuals ages 18, 19, and 20 should receive the same age-appropriate considerations that juveniles now receive in death penalty cases. The report also reveals troubling new data about racial…

In this month’s podcast episode of *12:01: The Death Penalty* *in Context*, DPI’s Managing Director Anne Holsinger speaks with Professors Craig Haney and Frank Baumgartner, and DPI’s Staff Attorney Leah Roemer about the legacy of the US Supreme Court’s decision in *Roper v. Simmons* and the legal and scientific landscape surrounding the use of the death penalty for young adults ages 18 – 20. Professors Baumgartner and Haney, along with fellow researcher Karen Steele,…