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News 

Jun 082022

Tennessee Death-Row Prisoner Appeals Ruling Denying Him Relief Despite Agreement by District Attorney that He is Intellectually Disabled

A Tennessee death-row pris­on­er who coun­ty pros­e­cu­tors agree is intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled is appeal­ing a tri­al judge’s refusal to vacate his death sen­tence under a law designed to pro­vide con­demned pris­on­ers a mech­a­nism to enforce the con­sti­tu­tion­al pro­hi­bi­tion against exe­cut­ing indi­vid­u­als with intellectual…

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News 

Jun 072022

Federal Courts Deny Arizona Prisoner’s Lethal-Injection Challenge and Request to Present New Evidence of Innocence

Federal courts denied relief in two law­suits brought by Arizona death-row pris­on­er Frank Atwood, clear­ing the path for his exe­cu­tion on June 8, 2022. Atwood had sought an oppor­tu­ni­ty to present new evi­dence of his inno­cence, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reject­ed that peti­tion. The appel­late court also affirmed the Arizona fed­er­al dis­trict court’s denial of Atwood’s chal­lenge to the state’s lethal-injec­­­tion pro­ce­dure, which Atwood said would cause…

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News 

May 272022

Controversy Over Texas Executions as Houston Judge Refuses to Issue Death Warrant and Attorney General Fights Nueces County D.A.’s Effort to Withdraw Another

The fates of two men sub­ject to poten­tial­ly immi­nent exe­cu­tion in Texas hang in the bal­ance, as the state’s attor­ney gen­er­al and one local pros­e­cu­tor chal­lenge the dis­cre­tion of oth­er key offi­cials not to move for­ward with exe­cu­tions. The con­tro­ver­sy over the exe­cu­tion dates high­lights emerg­ing ten­sions between pros­e­cu­tors about enforce­ment of death sen­tences and the pro­vi­sion of fair process before…

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News 

May 252022

Legal Analysts Blast Supreme Court Ruling Denying Prisoners Who Were Incompetently Represented in State Courts Access to Federal Courts to Prove Innocence, Constitutional Violations

In an opin­ion legal experts have blast­ed as​“night­mar­ish” and​“an abom­i­na­tion,” the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled in two Arizona death penal­ty cas­es that 1990s amend­ments to the fed­er­al habeas cor­pus law per­mit state pris­on­ers who were pro­vid­ed inef­fec­tive rep­re­sen­ta­tion at tri­al and in post-con­vic­­­tion pro­ceed­ings to argue that their coun­sel were inef­fec­tive but bar them from pre­sent­ing evi­dence of their inef­fec­tive­ness that com­pe­tent lawyers had…

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