Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

The Chair of Connecticut’s Judiciary Committee has called for enact­ment of death penal­ty reforms to pro­tect against wrong­ful con­vic­tions. Of the six reforms rec­om­mend­ed after a 13-month spe­cial com­mis­sion on Connecticut’s death penal­ty, only one has been enact­ed. Members of the commission noted, ​“Experiences in oth­er states through­out the coun­try sug­gest that Connecticut can­not be complacent and ​‘best prac­tices’ should be the watch­word.” Among the rec­om­men­da­tions are video taping of…

In a 7 – 2 deci­sion in Banks v. Dretke, the Supreme Court over­turned the death sen­tence of Delma Banks Jr., con­clud­ing that he was denied a fair tri­al because pros­e­cu­tors in Texas failed to dis­close key infor­ma­tion. Last year, Banks was just min­utes from his sched­uled exe­cu­tion in Texas when the Supreme Court inter­vened. Today’s deci­sion remands the case back to a low­er court so that new evi­dence may be con­sid­ered. Read DPIC’s Press Release. Also, Read the…

In a report filed by the Kansas Judicial Council Death Penalty Advisory Committee, retired Kansas Supreme Court Justice Fred N. Six not­ed that cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment cas­es pose immense bur­dens on judges. He…

The Appellate Division of New Jersey’s Superior Court ruled today that the state’s Department of Corrections (DOC) must exam­ine its lethal injec­tion exe­cu­tion pro­ce­dures before it car­ries out any death sen­tences, there­by halt­ing exe­cu­tions in the state until such a review takes place. The rul­ing notes, “[B]ecause of the patent grav­i­ty of the life and death issues impli­cat­ed by the reg­u­la­tions, we have con­clud­ed that rather than sim­ply strik­ing down those reg­u­la­tions, DOC should have…

Two new books on the death penal­ty offer read­ers an exam­i­na­tion of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment law and America’s use of this pun­ish­ment. In ​“Understanding Capital Punishment Law,” a new book pub­lished as part of the LexisNexis Understanding series, law pro­fes­sors Linda Carter and Ellen Kreitzberg offer stu­dents in cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment cours­es an overview of this com­plex area of law. The book includes a thor­ough review of con­sti­tu­tion­al law and cur­rent issues relat­ed to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the…

Hung Thanh Le, a Vietnamese for­eign nation­al, is sched­uled for exe­cu­tion on February 26^th in Oklahoma. Governor Brad Henry has so far reject­ed a unan­i­mous rec­om­men­da­tion from the Oklahoma Board of Pardon and Paroles to reduce Le’s death sen­tence to life in prison. Le’s appeal notes that he was not informed of his right to con­tact the Vietnamese con­sulate when he was arrest­ed and may have been suf­fer­ing from post-trau­­mat­ic stress dis­or­der stem­ming from the Vietnam war. Leaders of the…

Alan Gell of North Carolina became the nation’s 113^th exon­er­at­ed death row inmate today, February 18, 2004. Gell, who has main­tained his inno­cence since his 1998 con­vic­tion, was acquit­ted of all charges by a jury that delib­er­at­ed for only two and a half hours at his retri­al. In December 2002, a North Carolina judge vacat­ed Gell’s mur­der con­vic­tion and ordered a new tri­al after rul­ing that pros­e­cu­tors with­held impor­tant evi­dence that might have helped exon­er­ate Gell at his first trial.

The authors of a new study pub­lished in the Journal of Empirical Legal Studies (J. Blume, T. Eisenberg, & M. Wells, ​“Explaining Death Row’s Population and Racial Composition,” Vol. I, Issue 1, March 2004, at 165) con­clud­ed that Texas’ rep­u­ta­tion as the lead­ing death penal­ty state in the U.S. is attrib­ut­able more to its high num­ber of exe­cu­tions and the large num­ber of mur­ders in the state, rather than to its sen­tenc­ing rate. Despite lead­ing the coun­try by far in terms of number of…

Federal pros­e­cu­tors dropped charges against Darrell Rice short­ly before he was to face cap­i­tal charges for two mur­ders in Shenandoah National Park. New foren­sic evi­dence cast doubt on the case against Rice, despite the fact that Attorney General John Ashcroft had made a pub­lic announce­ment of Rice’s indict­ment employ­ing a new law in 2002. (Washington Post, Feb. 7, 2004). A fed­er­al judge threw out a jury’s (July 2003) ver­dict of guilt in the cap­i­tal case of Jay Lentz, accused of…

Federal pros­e­cu­tors dropped charges against Darrell Rice short­ly before he was to face cap­i­tal charges for two mur­ders in Shenandoah National Park. New foren­sic evi­dence cast doubt on the case against Rice, despite the fact that Attorney General John Ashcroft had made a pub­lic announce­ment of Rice’s indict­ment employ­ing a new law in 2002. (Washington Post, Feb. 7, 2004). A fed­er­al judge threw out a jury’s (July 2003) ver­dict of guilt in the cap­i­tal case of Jay Lentz, accused of…