Death Row

Conditions on Death Row

Death-row prisoners are typically incarcerated in solitary confinement, subject to much more deprivation and harsher conditions than other prisoners. As a result, many experience declining mental health.

Overview 
 

As the time between sen­tenc­ing and exe­cu­tion in the U.S. has length­ened from a few years to decades, the con­di­tions of con­fine­ment for death row inmates have come under clos­er scruti­ny. Some Supreme Court Justices have raised con­sti­tu­tion­al con­cerns about the phys­i­cal and psy­cho­log­i­cal effects of being held for exten­sive time in soli­tary con­fine­ment, sep­a­rate from chal­lenges to the death penal­ty itself. Many legal experts in the U.S. and else­where have con­clud­ed that this pro­longed iso­la­tion is a form of cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment, com­pa­ra­ble to torture.

Many death row inmates suf­fer from men­tal ill­ness, and the iso­la­tion on death row often exac­er­bates their con­di­tion. Older inmates also suf­fer from increas­ing phys­i­cal dis­abil­i­ties, ren­der­ing their ulti­mate exe­cu­tion a par­tic­u­lar­ly demeaning action.

At Issue 
 

The issue of exten­sive time on death row presents a dilem­ma: If death penal­ty appeals are rushed through the sys­tem, it might lessen the time spent on death row, but more inno­cent peo­ple will be exe­cut­ed and grave injus­tices will remain undis­cov­ered. A thor­ough review of each case, with an open­ness to retri­al upon the emer­gence of new evi­dence, has the side effect of keep­ing inmates in degrad­ing con­di­tions for twen­ty years or more. This inher­ent ten­sion alone could lead to the end of the death penalty.

What DPIC Offers 
 

DPIC pro­vides sum­maries of the con­di­tions and rules gov­ern­ing inmates on death row in each state. It also tracks the amount of time that inmates spend under these con­di­tions. Finally, DPIC col­lects the impor­tant court deci­sions relat­ed to this issue.

News & Developments

News

Dec 05, 2024

Hidden Casualties: Executions Harm Mental Health of Prison Staff

In March, Oklahoma offi­cials asked the state’s high court to increase the time between exe­cu­tions from 60 to 90 days, cit­ing the ​“last­ing trau­ma” and ​“psy­cho­log­i­cal toll” of exe­cu­tions on cor­rec­tions offi­cers. But Judge Gary Lumpkin dis­missed these con­cerns, telling offi­cials that prison staff need­ed to ​“suck it up” and ​“man up.” A few weeks lat­er, Brian Dorsey was exe­cut­ed in Missouri after the gov­er­nor ignored the pleas of an unprece­dent­ed 72 cor­rec­tions offi­cers to grant him clemen­cy. ​“We…

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News

Oct 24, 2024

New Analysis: Death-Sentenced Prisoners ​“Volunteer” for Execution at Ten Times Civilian Suicide Rate

Derrick Dearman first told his moth­er that he want­ed to die when he was four years old. On October 17, he was exe­cut­ed by the state of Alabama, becom­ing the 20th per­son exe­cut­ed in the United States this year and the 165th in the mod­ern era to ​“vol­un­teer” for death. A new analy­sis by the Death Penalty Information Center shows that despite falling rates of death sen­tences, exe­cu­tions, and pub­lic sup­port for the death penal­ty, the num­ber of death-sen­tenced pris­on­ers waiv­ing their appeals and…

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News

Sep 30, 2024

Rulings for Two Death-Sentenced Prisoners Recognize Devastating Harm Caused by Solitary Confinement

Scientists and oth­er experts are unan­i­mous in their con­clu­sion that indef­i­nite or pro­longed soli­tary con­fine­ment caus­es seri­ous harm, and the United Nations says it amounts to tor­ture — yet most death-sen­tenced peo­ple in America are con­fined to these extreme con­di­tions of iso­la­tion and depri­va­tion for years. As of 2020, a dozen states rou­tine­ly kept death-sen­tenced pris­on­ers in sin­gle cells for at least twen­ty-two hours a day with lit­tle-to-no human con­tact. Two recent devel­op­ments in capital…

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News

Jun 27, 2024

Discussions with DPIC Podcast: Attorney Jessica Sutton on the Unique Challenges of LGBTQ+ Capital Defendants

In this month’s episode of Discussions with DPIC, Managing Director Anne Holsinger speaks with Jessica Sutton, prin­ci­pal attor­ney with Phillips Black, a non­prof­it pub­lic inter­est law firm focused cap­i­tal defense. Ms. Sutton has rep­re­sent­ed clients fac­ing the death penal­ty in more than a dozen juris­dic­tions across the U.S. and at all stages of pro­ceed­ings. In recog­ni­tion of Pride month, Ms. Sutton dis­cuss­es the unique chal­lenges LGBTQ+ peo­ple face in the cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment system and…

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News

Feb 15, 2024

Discussions with DPIC Podcast: Shedding Light on Underreported Stories of Incarceration and Death Row — conversation with Keri Blakinger

In this month’s episode of Discussions with DPIC, Managing Director Anne Holsinger speaks with Keri Blakinger, a jour­nal­ist at the Los Angeles Times and for­mer reporter for the Marshall Project — a non­prof­it news orga­ni­za­tion focused on the U.S. crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem. At the Marshall Project, Ms. Blakinger wrote sto­ries about the human beings in the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem — a focus that is still a pri­or­i­ty in her report­ing with the Los…

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