Stateline​.org​’s recent ​“State of the States” report fea­tures an exten­sive arti­cle on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment trends in the United States. The piece includes a thor­ough review of lethal injec­tion chal­lenges in the states, as well as a brief update on the issue of inno­cence and an overview of oth­er state leg­isla­tive devel­op­ments, such as efforts to autho­rize the death penal­ty for some crimes oth­er than mur­der.

The arti­cle notes that ques­tions about lethal injec­tion put the death penal­ty on hold in nine states in 2006, and prob­lems with the pro­ce­dure left law­mak­ers grap­pling with the ques­tion of how much pain the con­demned feel as they die and what role, if any, med­ical pro­fes­sion­als should play in exe­cu­tions. The report states that the 90-minute botched exe­cu­tion of Ohio death row inmate Joseph Clark was ​“a stark exam­ple of why America is tak­ing a hard­er look at lethal injec­tion.” Clark raised his head and declared that the process was not work­ing before prison offi­cials closed the view­ing room cur­tain as they strug­gled to find a new vein through which to car­ry out the exe­cu­tion.

The report also pro­vides charts illus­trat­ing the num­ber of exe­cu­tions car­ried out in the U.S. dur­ing the past year and since the death penal­ty was rein­stat­ed, as well as a graph­ic show­ing state-by-state infor­ma­tion on death row exon­er­a­tions.

(“State of the States Report,” Stateline​.org, 2007). Order or down­load the Report. See Resources, Lethal Injections, and Recent Legislative Activity.

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