Entries by Hayley Bedard


News 

Oct 232025

Federal Judiciary Budget Crisis and Government Shutdown Ends Funding for Indigent Defendants, Raising Serious Constitutional Concerns

On October 17, 2025, the fed­er­al judi­cia­ry announced that start­ing on October 20, the branch would no longer have the funds need­ed to​“sus­tain full, paid oper­a­tions.” This lat­est devel­op­ment is a direct result of the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment shut­down that began on October 1. Until fund­ing is restored, fed­er­al judges will con­tin­ue their bench duties, but court staff may only per­form​“activ­i­ties” nec­es­sary for con­sti­tu­tion­al func­tions — all with­out pay. The current…

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News 

Oct 212025

Despite Serious Concerns about Trial’s Fairness and Anthony Boyd’s Innocence, Alabama Plans to Execute Him Using Nitrogen Gas

Anthony Boyd is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed in Alabama on October 23, 2025, for his role in the 1993 kid­nap­ping and mur­der of Gregory​“New York” Huguley. Mr. Boyd was con­vict­ed based sole­ly on eye­wit­ness tes­ti­mo­ny with no phys­i­cal evi­dence link­ing him to the crime, and he has main­tained his inno­cence. Alabama will exe­cute Mr. Boyd using nitro­gen gas, the sev­enth time state has used this con­tro­ver­sial method since January 2024, when the state exe­cut­ed Kenneth Smith in…

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News 

Oct 072025

New Evidence Revealed in Dateline” Podcast Points to Judicial Misconduct in Robert Roberson’s Case Just Days Ahead of Execution

October 9, 2025 UPDATE: On October 9, 2025, just a week before his sched­uled exe­cu­tion, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (CCA) grant­ed Robert Roberson a stay of exe­cu­tion and remand­ed his case to the dis­trict court for fur­ther con­sid­er­a­tion of his request for relief based upon relief offered in a sim­i­lar case, Ex parte Roark. Like Mr. Roberson’s case, Ex parte Roark**, also involved a con­vic­tion based the now dis­cred­it­ed​“Shaken…

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News 

Oct 022025

Pope Leo XIV Calls Support for the Death Penalty Not Really Pro-Life’

In com­ments to reporters on September 30, 2025, Pope Leo XIV said that sup­port­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment was incon­sis­tent with being pro-life. The Pope was respond­ing to ques­tions about Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich’s plan to hon­or Senator Dick Durbin for his work on immi­grant human rights issues. The announce­ment drew crit­i­cism from sev­er­al American bish­ops who object­ed based on Sen. Durbin’s sup­port for legalized abortion. Someone who says,​‘I’m against abor­tion’ but…

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News 

Oct 012025

North Carolina Legislature Passes Sweeping Criminal Law Legislation in Effort to Restart Executions

On September 23, 2025, North Carolina law­mak­ers approved and for­ward­ed to Governor Josh Stein for sig­na­ture House Bill 307 — also known as​“Iryna’s Law” — which pro­pos­es sweep­ing changes to the state’s crim­i­nal laws. HB 307 impos­es stricter pre­tri­al release con­di­tions, requires invol­un­tary men­tal health eval­u­a­tions for defen­dants under cer­tain cir­cum­stances, short­ens the time­line for cap­i­tal case appeals, and pro­vides an alter­na­tive to the cur­rent method of…

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News 

Sep 292025

Counsel Seeks to Challenge Rare Execution of 72-Year-Old Florida Prisoner on Constitutional Grounds in Florida Supreme Court

With just weeks remain­ing before his sched­uled exe­cu­tion, attor­neys for 72-year-old Samuel Lee Smithers are appeal­ing the dis­missal of their motion filed September 19, 2025, argu­ing that exe­cut­ing an elder­ly per­son vio­lates both Florida and the U.S. Constitutions’ pro­hi­bi­tion against cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment and fails to meet any valid peno­log­i­cal jus­ti­fi­ca­tion. On September 22, 2025, the Hillsborough County Circuit Court denied Mr. Smithers’ request for an…

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News 

Sep 162025

Two Scheduled Executions of People with Intellectual Disability in Florida Raise Serious Concerns

The U.S. Supreme Court’s 2002 deci­sion in Atkins v. Virginia estab­lished that the Eighth Amendment pro­hibits exe­cut­ing peo­ple with intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty. The Court lat­er clar­i­fied that rigid IQ cut­offs were not per­mis­si­ble and also required states to con­sid­er mean­ing­ful evi­dence of intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty, includ­ing sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly valid expert tes­ti­mo­ny and adap­tive func­tion­ing deficits. Despite this unequiv­o­cal constitutional protection,…

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News 

Sep 092025

Ohio Appeals Court Rules Prosecutors Cannot Use Witness Testimony in Retrial of Elwood Jones

In late August 2025, the First District Court of Appeals of Ohio ruled that Hamilton County pros­e­cu­tors can­not use pri­or wit­ness tes­ti­mo­ny in their retri­al of Elwood Jones, who was on Ohio’s death row for 27 years until he was grant­ed a new tri­al in December 2022. Mr. Jones was con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death for the mur­der of Rhoda Nathan in a Blue Ash, Ohio, hotel in 1994, despite con­sis­tent­ly main­tain­ing his inno­cence. In 2022, Hamilton County Common Pleas Court…

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News 

Sep 042025

Juror Trauma: The Added Cost of Capital Cases

When Chloe Beck was called for jury duty in ear­ly 2018, she ini­tial­ly viewed it as a poten­tial break from work. But she did not antic­i­pate that the case — involv­ing a nan­ny charged with the stab­bing deaths of two chil­dren — would have last­ing effects on her men­tal health. As an alter­nate juror in the sev­en-week tri­al, Ms. Beck was required to look at crime scene pho­tographs and hear tes­ti­mo­ny from the vic­tims’ par­ents. For Ms. Beck, the expe­ri­ence proved difficult to…

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News 

Aug 282025

Kentucky Governor Cites Constitutional Concerns with Execution Protocol and Drug Acquisition Issues in Refusal to Set Execution Date

This week we are fea­tur­ing some arti­cles from the first part of 2025 that we think are worth anoth­er look. We’ll be back with new arti­cles next week. This arti­cle orig­i­nal­ly ran on February 11, 2025. In June 2025, Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman request­ed that Governor Andy Beshear set an exe­cu­tion date for death row pris­on­er Ralph Baze. In a late June 2025 reply, Gov. Beshear declined to do so because of an April 2025 Franklin County Circuit Court ruling that…

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