Policy Issues
Innocence
The death penalty carries the inherent risk of executing an innocent person. Since 1973, at least 190 people who had been wrongly convicted and sentenced to death in the U.S. have been exonerated.
Policy Issues
The death penalty carries the inherent risk of executing an innocent person. Since 1973, at least 190 people who had been wrongly convicted and sentenced to death in the U.S. have been exonerated.
A Death Penalty Information Center database of every death-row exoneration since 1972.
The Most Common Causes of Wrongful Death Penalty Convictions: Official Misconduct and Perjury or False Accusation
Given the fallibility of human judgment, there has always been the danger that an execution could result in the killing of an innocent person. Nevertheless, when the U.S. Supreme Court held the administration of the death penalty to be unconstitutional in 1972, there was barely any mention of the issue of innocence in the nine opinions issued. Although mistakes were surely made in the past, the assumption prevailed that such cases were few and far between. Almost everyone on death row was surely guilty.
However, as federal courts began to more thoroughly review whether state criminal defendants were afforded their guaranteed rights to due process, errors and official misconduct began to regularly appear, requiring retrials. When defendants were now afforded more experienced counsel, with fairly selected juries, and were granted access to scientific testing, some were acquitted and released. Since 1973, 192 former death-row prisoners have been exonerated of all charges related to the wrongful convictions that had put them on death row.
It is now clear that innocent defendants will be convicted and sentenced to death with some regularity as long as the death penalty exists. It is unlikely that the appeals process—which is mainly focused on legal errors and not on factual determinations—will catch all the mistakes. Reforms have been begrudgingly implemented, increasing both the costs and the time that the death penalty consumes, but have not been sufficient to overcome human error. The popularity and use of capital punishment have rapidly declined as the innocence issue has gained attention. The remaining question is how many innocent lives are worth sacrificing to preserve this punishment.
DPIC has led the way in highlighting the issue of innocence. Its list of exonerated individuals is presented in a searchable database, with links to more complete descriptions of each case. DPIC has issued a series of reports on this issue, collecting the latest information on why so many mistakes occur. It also follows the related questions of whether innocent individuals have already been executed and whether some defendants are in fact innocent, despite not being completely exonerated in the eyes of the law.
Feb 18, 2021
New research by the Death Penalty Information Center has found 11 previously unrecorded death-row exonerations, bringing the total number of people exonerated after being wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death to 185. The data now show that f…
Read MoreInnocence
Sep 27, 2023
On September 18, 2023, former Texas death-sentenced prisoner Clinton Young filed a federal civil rights lawsuit in the Western District of Texas, accusing two Midland County district attorneys, the prosecutor on his case, and Midland County itself…
Innocence
Sep 20, 2023
Glynn Simmons, who was convicted and sentenced to death in Oklahoma in 1975, has been exonerated after Oklahoma County District Attorney Vicki Behenna dropped charges against him. Mr. Simmons told The Black Wall Street Times, “I’m happ…
Arbitrariness
Sep 13, 2023
In most states, a death sentence may only be imposed by a jury in unanimous agreement. But in two recent cases, defendants faced the possibility of a death sentence despite the objections of ju…
Innocence
Sep 11, 2023
In an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, novelist John Grisham recounts the flawed science that led to the conviction of Robert Roberson (pictured, with his daughter Nikki) and the inadequate legal process that has maintained that conviction.…
Innocence
Sep 08, 2023
On September 5, 2023, Jesse Johnson (pictured) was released from Marion County Jail in Oregon when prosecutors formally declined to retry him for the 1998 murder of Harriet Thompson. Mr. Johnson was convicted of Ms. Th…
Innocence
Aug 31, 2023
On August 30, 2023, the Tennessee Criminal Court of Appeals affirmed a lower court’s ruling that formerly death-sentenced prisoner Pervis Payne can serve his two life sentences concurrently, making him eligible to apply for parole in less than fou…
Innocence
Aug 29, 2023
Larry Hudson has been added to DPIC’s Descriptions of Innocence page as a newly-discovered death row exoner…
Innocence
Aug 11, 2023
Gary Tyler was just 16 years old when he was charged with shooting a white student in 1974 and sentenced to death, a crime that, many witnesses agree, he did not commit. Mr. Tyler, then a sophomore in high school in St. Charles Parish, Louisiana, …
Innocence
Aug 08, 2023
UPDATE: On August 8, 2023, the Oklahoman reported that AG Drummond has declined Representative Humphrey’s request to retest DNA evidence in Anthony Sanchez’s case.Oklahoma State Representative J…
Innocence
Jul 25, 2023
In the July 2023 episode of Discussions with DPIC, Anne Holsinger, Managing Director of DPIC, speaks with Kirk Bloodsworth (pictured), the first person exonerated from death row by DNA evidence. Mr. Bloodsworth reflects on the thirty years since h…