Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

Laurence Adams, who was sen­tenced to death in Massachusetts in 1974 short­ly before the state final­ly aban­doned cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, was released on May 20 after spend­ing three decades of his life in prison. In April 2004, a judge over­turned Adams’ con­vic­tion when new evi­dence, includ­ing con­flict­ing state­ments from the state’s star wit­ness and a statement from…

An April 2004 poll of North Carolinians revealed that 63% of respon­dents sup­port a halt to exe­cu­tions while the state’s death penal­ty is stud­ied, and many respon­dents have doubts about the accu­ra­cy of the death penalty. ​“Support for the two-year sus­pen­sion of exe­cu­tions is wide­spread and cuts across all demo­graph­ic groups, regions of the state and polit­i­cal par­ty affil­i­a­tion. This is clear­ly an issue that res­onates with the peo­ple of North Carolina,” stated…

Both city vot­ers and the Bar Association of San Francisco have voiced sup­port for San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris’ deci­sion to not seek the death penal­ty in the case against David Hill, who is accused of killing city police offi­cer Isaac Espinoza. A recent poll found that 70% of respon­dents backed Harris’ deci­sion, while only 22% opposed the choice and 8% remained unde­cid­ed. The poll also found that 65% of those sur­veyed gave Harris’ over­all per­for­mance as District…

On the eve of the Kelsey Patterson’s sched­uled exe­cu­tion in Texas, the state’s Board of Pardons and Paroles vot­ed 5 – 1 to rec­om­mend that Governor Rick Perry com­mute Patterson’s death sen­tence to life in prison. In its rare rec­om­men­da­tion for clemen­cy, the Board not­ed that if Governor Perry refus­es to grant clemen­cy, Patterson, a men­tal­ly ill man who is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed on Tuesday, May 18^th, should receive a 120-day reprieve. The Board’s actions mark the first…

Just days before the sched­uled exe­cu­tion of Osvaldo Torres, a Mexican for­eign nation­al on Oklahoma’s death row, Governor Brad Henry grant­ed a request for clemen­cy in part because of a recent International Court of Justice deci­sion order­ing the United States to review the cas­es of 51 Mexican for­eign nation­als on death row because they were denied their right to seek con­sular assis­tance fol­low­ing their arrest. Henry’s announce­ment came just hours after the Oklahoma Court of…

A tele­vi­sion Mini-series based on the fic­tion nov­el​“Reversible Errors,” a best-sel­l­­ing book by award-win­n­ing author and cap­i­tal defense attor­ney Scott Turow, will air on CBS on Sunday May 23, and Tuesday May 25, 2004. The sto­ry is about a cor­po­rate lawyer whose world is turned upside-down when he is assigned to draft the final appeal of a poten­tial­ly inno­cent inmate near­ing his exe­cu­tion date. Although​“Reversible Errors” is not about an actu­al cap­i­tal case in the…

During a​“fire­side chat” with fel­low Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer and hun­dreds of lawyers and judges who prac­tice in fed­er­al courts in Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin, Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens stat­ed,​“I think this coun­try would be much bet­ter off if we did not have cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment.” Stevens not­ed that he believes the death penal­ty is con­sti­tu­tion­al, adding,​“But I real­ly think it’s a very unfor­tu­nate part of our judi­cial sys­tem and I would…

Scientists who are skep­ti­cal of Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney’s claim that DNA is​“infal­li­ble” evi­dence in a death penal­ty case have voiced con­cern about the assump­tion, not­ing that there is no way to avoid all pos­si­ble instances of human error and that the evi­dence does not always prove a person’s guilt or inno­cence. Theodore D. Kessis is the founder of Applied DNA Resources, based in Columbus, Ohio, and a fac­ul­ty mem­ber at the John Hopkins School of Public Health in…