Entries by Death Penalty Information Center

A broad bi-par­ti­san coali­tion of House and Senate law­mak­ers has intro­duced leg­is­la­tion to estab­lish a five-year, $1 bil­lion ini­tia­tive to ensure DNA test­ing for death row inmates who claim inno­cence. The ​“Advancing Justice Through DNA Technology Bill,” sup­port­ed by House Judiciary Chairman F. James Sensenbrenner and Senate Judiciary Chairman Orrin Hatch, includes an Innocence Protection Act (IPA) pro­vi­sion aimed at reduc­ing the risk of wrong­ful con­vic­tions. Under this por­tion of the bill, all…

By a vote of 4 – 3, the Florida Supreme Court has set aside an October 1^st dead­line for inmates to request DNA test­ing of evi­dence that could prove their inno­cence. The jus­tices sus­pend­ed the dead­line while they con­sid­er the inmates’ chal­lenge to the rule’s con­sti­tu­tion­al­i­ty. Arguments in the case are slat­ed for November 7, 2003. According to the law that estab­lished the dead­line, if inmates con­vict­ed pri­or to 2001 fail to file for test­ing before October 1, 2003, DNA evi­dence in their cases may…

A recent North Carolina pub­lic opin­ion poll con­duct­ed for The News & Observer found that only 49% of vot­ers polled approve of exe­cu­tions for those con­vict­ed of first-degree mur­der while 42% favor life in prison with­out parole as the pun­ish­ment. Nine per­cent were unsure. The same poll reg­is­tered 40% of respon­dents in sup­port of a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions and 53% in oppo­si­tion to halt­ing exe­cu­tions for two years while the state stud­ies and fix­es pos­si­ble flaws in its death penalty system.

The Philadelphia law firm of Morgan Lewis recent­ly cel­e­brat­ed the exon­er­a­tion of John Thompson, who spent 18 years on Louisiana’s death row before two of the fir­m’s part­ners helped to win his free­dom. Firm part­ners J. Gordon Cooney Jr. and Michael L. Banks pro­vid­ed Thompson with pro bono ser­vices that cost the firm $1.7 mil­lion in legal work and expens­es over a 15-year peri­od and involved 90 lawyers and sup­port staff. According to the city’s bar asso­ci­a­tion, there is a mas­sive need for…

Former FBI Director William Sessions recent­ly called on pros­e­cu­tors and law enforce­ment offi­cials to sup­port broad­er access to DNA test­ing to address grow­ing con­cerns about inno­cence. Sessions’ com­ments in an op-ed in The Washington Post came just weeks after Kirk Bloodsworth, the nation’s first death row inmate to be freed based on DNA test­ing, was informed that Baltimore County author­i­ties had genet­i­cal­ly linked anoth­er sus­pect to the crime using DNA evi­dence. Sessions…

Eight years after the death penal­ty was rein­stat­ed in New York, the num­ber of death sen­tences sought by pros­e­cu­tors has sharply declined. According to the New York Capital Defender Office, the num­ber of death penal­ty notices filed has dropped from a record-high 14 in 1998 to just two so far in 2003. Howard R. Relin, a long-time dis­trict attor­ney in Rochester and death penal­ty sup­port­er, noted: ​“D.A.‘s are being more and more care­ful in mak­ing that deter­mi­na­tion. There’s a sense of realism…

After U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft autho­rized a fed­er­al death penal­ty pros­e­cu­tion against two Massachusetts men accused of a gang mur­der, the local Suffolk County District Attorney, Daniel F. Conley, object­ed to using cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment to end urban vio­lence, stating, ​“I do not believe the death penal­ty is a deter­rent or appro­pri­ate pun­ish­ment for inner-city homi­cide. The death penal­ty runs counter to the strate­gies for pre­vent­ing and pros­e­cut­ing urban crime — which include…

The Washington Post recent­ly respond­ed to Judge Jane Marum Roush’s deci­sion allow­ing Virginia to seek the death penal­ty for Lee Boyd Malvo despite treaties for­bid­ding such a sen­tence for juve­niles. The paper’s edi­to­r­i­al not­ed that while the judge’s deci­sion may be legal­ly cor­rect, it ​“does not ren­der Virginia’s (juve­nile death penal­ty) pol­i­cy any less abhor­rent.” The edi­to­r­i­al went on to…

In an effort to pre­vent wrong­ful con­vic­tions and ensure accu­rate eye­wit­ness iden­ti­fi­ca­tion, the North Carolina Actual Innocence Commission has rec­om­mend­ed new pro­ce­dures for state law enforce­ment agen­cies. The com­mis­sion was formed by state Supreme Court Justice Beverly Lake and is com­prised of judges, police, pros­e­cu­tors, defense attor­neys and oth­ers. Among the rec­om­men­da­tions were pol­i­cy changes requir­ing police to show eye­wit­ness­es line­up par­tic­i­pants one at a time in live lineups or…

An August 2003 Charlotte Observer/​NBC‑6 poll revealed that near­ly half of those sur­veyed in North and South Carolina say the states should pause exe­cu­tions until the death penal­ty sys­tem is deemed fair. Of the 908 respon­dents, 48% voiced sup­port for a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions and 41% were opposed. While men were about equal­ly split on the ques­tion, 50% of women favored a mora­to­ri­um and 35% opposed it. Among African American respon­dents, 67% favored a mora­to­ri­um, while 42% of white respondents…