Entries by Hayley Bedard

James Broadnax, a Texas death-sentenced prisoner, is scheduled to be executed on April 30, 2026. He was convicted in 2009 by a Dallas County jury for the murders of two music producers, Stephen Swan and Matthew Butler, who were shot and killed outside their recording studio in 2008. On March 19, 2026, a little more than a month before his scheduled execution, attorneys for Mr. Broadnax filed a new appeal and a sworn affidavit from his codefendant and cousin Demarius Cummings, in which Mr.

On March 12, 2026, a diverse group of voices filed amicus curiae briefs in support of Charles Flores (pictured), a Texas death-sentenced prisoner, urging the U.S. Supreme Court to review his case. Mr. Flores has spent more than 25 years on death row for a murder he maintains he did not commit. His conviction relied on the testimony of a neighbor who identified him — for the first time, at trial — only after being hypnotized by police. The briefs were filed by a coalition including the entertainers…

On March 2, 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review Alabama’s appeal of a ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit that reversed and remanded Michael Sockwell’s case on the grounds that the trial prosecutor violated his constitutional rights by intentionally removing Black jurors. The Court’s denial of review clears a path for Mr. Sockwell to receive a new trial, some 36 years after a judge first sentenced him to death. A November 2025 federal court ruling ordered…

A March 9, 2026, competency hearing for Andre Thomas, a death-sentenced prisoner in Texas, has been postponed to an unspecified date because of concerns that Mr. Thomas is too mentally ill to be transported to his competency hearing and he could not be re-examined by the State’s expert. Mr. Thomas was scheduled to be executed in April 2023; however, his execution date was withdrawn in March 2023, citing concerns with his severe mental illness (SMI) and competency to face execution. “In my…

UPDATE: On March 10, 2026, two days ahead of his scheduled execution, Governor Kay Ivey granted clemency for Charles “Sonny” Burton, commuting his death sentence to a sentence of life without parole. In a statement, Gov. Ivey said, “I cannot proceed in good conscience with the execution of Mr. Burton under such disparate circumstances. I believe it would be unjust for one participant in this crime to be executed while the participant who pulled the trigger was not.” In response to the…

The federal government says it plans to transfer “almost all” former federal death row prisoners whose sentences were commuted by President Biden to the nation’s most notorious and restrictive prison within the next several weeks, according to a court filing dated February 4, 2026. In a two-page notice filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, the Justice Department informed Judge Timothy J. Kelly that the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) intends to move the prisoners from the…

Among the more than 100 million Americans watching the Super Bowl on Sunday, Charles Flores (pictured) watched from a 9‑by-12-foot cell in Livingston, Texas, marking his 27^th Super Bowl on death row for a crime he has maintained he did not commit. In a podcast interview with Pablo Torre, a journalist and sportswriter, Mr. Flores sat down at the Polunsky Unit in Livingston to discuss his love of the Dallas Cowboys, watching the Super Bowl on death row, the intricacies of his fight to prove his…

When Lance Shockley was executed in Missouri in October 2025, he requested the presence of his daughter, an ordained minister, in the execution chamber as his spiritual adviser. The Missouri Department of Corrections (MDOC) denied his request, and Mr. Shockley was executed. His case represents one example of how states have applied the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling in Ramirez v. Collier, a decision that acknowledged the religious rights of death-sentenced prisoners at the time of their…