Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

The book In Sweet Company: Conversations With Extraordinary Women About Living a Spiritual Life by Margaret Wolff fea­tures Sister Helen Prejean as one of 14 women whose spir­i­tu­al beliefs have served as the com­pass for their deci­­sion-mak­ing and life’s work. Prejean, author of the Pulitzer Prize-nominated book ​“Dead Man Walking” and the newly released ​“The Death of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Executions,” has been an advi­sor to those on death row and an advocate against…

In her new book, The Death of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Executions, Sister Helen Prejean uses her per­son­al expe­ri­ences as a coun­selor to those on death row to explore the issue of inno­cence and the like­li­hood of exe­cut­ing a wrong­ly con­vict­ed per­son. The book also traces the his­tor­i­cal and legal under­pin­nings of the death penal­ty in the U.S. Prejean, who authored the #1 New York Times bestseller ​“Dead Man Walking,” begins her new book by focus­ing on the…

A new report by the ACLU’s Capital Punishment Project dis­cuss­es the United States’ posi­tion on the death penal­ty in the face of inter­na­tion­al con­cerns regard­ing this prac­tice. The report, How the Death Penalty Weakens U.S. International Interests, notes that many oth­er nations are mov­ing toward abo­li­tion of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment and are crit­i­cal of spe­cif­ic aspects of the death penal­ty in the U.S. Among the top­ics fea­tured in this resource are the ongo­ing inter­na­tion­al efforts to abolish…

The December 2004 issue of the American Psychological Association Journal, Psychology, Public Policy, & Law, con­tains arti­cles devot­ed to impor­tant and emerg­ing top­ics relat­ed to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Craig Haney, Richard Wiener, James Acker, and Charles Lanier are among the issue’s con­tribut­ing writ­ers who pro­vide expert analy­sis in areas such as cap­i­tal sen­tenc­ing, the U.S. Supreme Court’s deci­­sion-mak­ing, pub­lic opin­ion, vic­tim impact state­ments, mora­to­ri­um efforts, inno­cence, and other…

The Death Penalty Information Center’s 2004 Year End Report not­ing the declines in death sen­tences, exe­cu­tions, and the num­ber of peo­ple on death row was cov­ered by about 200 news out­lets through­out the U.S. and over­seas. Some news­pa­pers took the occa­sion to edi­to­ri­al­ize about the state of the death penal­ty: Detroit Free Press The death penal­ty, thank­ful­ly, is mak­ing its own slow demise in the United States. Given the legal, moral and eco­nom­ic prob­lems with the death penal­ty, all 38…

Capital Consequences: Families of the Condemned Tell Their Stories is a new book by Rachel King of the ACLU​’s Capital Punishment Project. The book focus­es on the impact that the death penal­ty has on the fam­i­lies of those who have been con­demned to die. King, who also wrote ​“Don’t Kill in Our Names: Families of Murder Victims Speak Out Against the Death Penalty,” describes these indi­vid­u­als as the unseen vic­tims of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment and high­lights the expe­ri­ence of having loved…

A&E tele­vi­sion host and well-known inves­tiga­tive jour­nal­ist Bill Kurtis chron­i­cles his jour­ney from death penal­ty sup­port­er to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment oppo­nent in his new­ly released book, The Death Penalty on Trial: Crisis in American Justice. In an inter­view with the Kansas City Star, Kurtis stated, ​“Look, I was for the death penal­ty, but look­ing at these cas­es and the rapid­ly increas­ing num­ber of exon­er­a­tions, there are just too many possibilities for…

Premeditated: Meditations on Capital Punishment, Recent Works by Malaquias Montoya is a new art exhi­bi­tion cat­a­logue fea­tur­ing recent­ly cre­at­ed silkscreen images, paint­ings, and relat­ed research deal­ing with the death penal­ty and pris­ons. The works fea­tured in this book are part of a col­lec­tion of art that is cur­rent­ly tour­ing the United States. Montoya has lec­tured and taught at numer­ous uni­ver­si­ties and col­leges in the San Francisco Bay Area, includ­ing Stanford, UC Berkeley and UC Davis.

While applaud­ing a life-sen­­tence plea bar­gain arranged by Palm Beach County’s State Attorney in an espe­cial­ly heinous mur­der, the Palm Beach Post said the state had ​“forfeit[ed] the moral stand­ing to exe­cute any­one else.” The State Attorney said that he agreed to let the defen­dant plead guilty to killing 5 peo­ple because the life-with­­out-parole sent­nece will bring final­i­ty. The Post noted: ​“The state saves not only the cost of a tri­al; the vic­tims’ rel­a­tives — who supported…