In-Depth Reports

On July 2, 1976, the United States Supreme Court handed down its decision in Gregg v. Georgia, which allowed the death penalty to resume after a decade-long moratorium on executions. The majority of the Court held that the potential for unfairness which had been a hallmark of capital punishment in the past had been sufficiently ameliorated by the enactment of recent laws which guided its imposition. In 1972, the Court had concluded that the death penalty was cruel and unusual punishment under…

As executions reach record numbers in the U.S., the system of representation for those facing the death penalty is in a state of crisis. Far from the legal “dream team” assembled in the O.J. Simpson case, capital defendants are given attorneys who fail to investigate, who fall asleep during trial or come into court drunk, attorneys barely out of law school, or attorneys who say nothing when their client’s life is on the line. Too many states encourage this malpractice by offering totally…

A new national survey of police chiefs from around the country discredits the repeated assertion that the death penalty is an important law enforcement tool. While politicians have extolled the importance of capital punishment in fighting crime, they have failed to assess the actual priorities of those in law enforcement and have saddled the taxpayers with an enormously costly death penalty at the expense of more effective crime fighting strategies. In January, 1995, Peter D. Hart Research…

Across the country, police are being laid off, prisoners are being released early, the courts are clogged, and crime continues to rise. The economic recession has caused cutbacks in the backbone of the criminal justice system. In Florida, the budget crisis resulted in the early release of 3,000 prisoners. In Texas, prisoners are serving only 20% of their time and rearrests are common. Georgia is laying off 900 correctional personnel and New Jersey has had to dismiss 500 police officers. Yet…

Texas is the nation’s foremost executioner. It has been responsible for a third of the executions in the country and has carried out two and a half times as many death sentences as the next leading state. Death warrants are being signed at an unmanageable pace, yet the Texas death row is bulging with unprecedented numbers of inmates. But this accelerated form of justice comes at a price. The rest of the country should heed the warning of the Texas experience before it embarks on a wholesale…