Prosecutorial Accountability

On April 22, 2024, Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price announced that her office was ordered by a fed­er­al judge to review 35 death penal­ty con­vic­tions after the dis­clo­sure of evi­dence that sev­er­al pros­e­cu­tors inten­tion­al­ly exclud­ed Black and Jewish peo­ple from serv­ing on a cap­i­tal mur­der tri­al in 1995. In a press con­fer­ence, DA Price indi­cat­ed that her office dis­cov­ered the hand­writ­ten notes of for­mer pros­e­cu­tors that include dis­crim­i­na­to­ry jury selec­tion tac­tics, sug­gest­ing ​“seri­ous mis­con­duct” per­me­at­ed the office in the 1990s. ​“It’s not lim­it­ed to one or two pros­e­cu­tors, but…

On April 12, 2024, Judge Arturo Nelson signed an Agreed Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law sub­mit­ted by the pros­e­cu­tion and defense stat­ing that Melissa Lucio (pic­tured) was not giv­en access to favor­able infor­ma­tion in the prosecution’s pos­ses­sion at the time of tri­al. The acknowl­edge­ment of this con­sti­tu­tion­al error result­ed in Judge Nelson’s rec­om­men­da­tion to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCCA) that Ms. Lucio’s con­vic­tion and death sen­tence be over­turned. The rul­ing marks the lat­est chap­ter in a saga that saw Ms. Lucio nar­row­ly avoid an exe­cu­tion date…

On April 5, 2024, Cameron County District Attorney Luis Saenz and Innocence Project attor­ney Vanessa Potkin released a joint state­ment regard­ing Melissa Lucio’s case, which has been pend­ing addi­tion­al review for almost two years. On January 11, 2023, the par­ties sub­mit­ted an Agreed Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law stat­ing that the defense was not giv­en access to favor­able infor­ma­tion in the prosecution’s pos­ses­sion at tri­al, an error that they agree should enti­tle Ms. Lucio to a new tri­al. ​“Under Texas pro­ce­dure the tri­al court must make a recommendation…

In a March 26, 2024, op-ed pub­lished in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Patricia McTier, a Georgia nurse, recounts her expe­ri­ence being removed from a jury pool in 1998 for what she calls a ​“ques­tion­able rea­son” relat­ed to her race. Born and raised in Appling County, Georgia, Ms. McTier grew up in the Jim Crow era and writes that she ​“enter[ed] adult­hood dur­ing a time of great social change,” where she grew to ​“cher­ish our American sys­tem of jus­tice and the Constitution that endows all of us with equal rights.” In September…

Jessie Dotson, a man sen­tenced to death for killing six peo­ple in 2008 in the Binghampton neigh­bor­hood of Memphis, Tennessee, has filed a peti­tion for a writ of a habeas cor­pus ask­ing a judge to vacate his con­vic­tion and death sen­tence. His peti­tion alleges that he is inno­cent, that police coerced him to false­ly con­fess, and that a num­ber of pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al and defense errors occurred at tri­al. Mr. Dotson has been on death row since 2008, when he was sen­tenced to death for the mur­ders of four adults, includ­ing his…

Ivan Cantu is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed on February 28, 2024, although Texas courts have refused to con­sid­er new evi­dence in his case that may prove he was wrong­ful­ly con­vict­ed. Mr. Cantu was sen­tenced to death in Collin County for the mur­der of his cousin and his cousin’s fiancée in November 2000. Texas sched­uled an exe­cu­tion date for Mr. Cantu in April 2023, but a last-minute appeal describ­ing new evi­dence of false wit­ness tes­ti­mo­ny pro­vid­ed grounds for a stay of exe­cu­tion. However, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCCA) overturned…

In a February 14, 2024 op-ed pub­lished in the Washington Post, the long­time defense lawyer, for­mer direc­tor of the Southern Center for Human Rights, and law pro­fes­sor Stephen Bright high­lights the con­tin­ued ille­gal exclu­sion of Black jurors in vio­la­tion of Batson v. Kennedy (1986). The op-ed titled, ​“Struck from a jury for being Black? It still hap­pens all too often,” uses the case of Georgia death-sen­tenced pris­on­er Warren King, whose peti­tion the U.S. Supreme Court is expect­ed to review on February 23, as the lat­est exam­ple of the per­sis­tent prac­tice. ​“The…

In a new arti­cle from Bolts, jour­nal­ist Daniel Nichanian writes about the dearth of can­di­dates in Ohio’s coun­ty pros­e­cu­tor elec­tions. ​“Of the 27 coun­ties with more than 100,000 res­i­dents in Ohio, 70 per­cent drew just one can­di­date” to run for elec­tion or reelec­tion as coun­ty pros­e­cu­tor. Only 15 of Ohio’s 88 pros­e­cu­tor elec­tions this year drew mul­ti­ple can­di­dates by the December dead­line, accord­ing to Bolts’ research: ​“This means that the vast major­i­ty of the state’s pros­e­cut­ing attor­neys are run­ning unop­posed this year; Bolts has con­firmed that no more than one can­di­date has…

On January 26, 2024, the Louisiana Supreme Court grant­ed a new tri­al to death-sen­tenced pris­on­er Darrell Robinson based on egre­gious pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct. The Court held that Mr. Robinson ​“did not receive a fair tri­al, or a ver­dict wor­thy of con­fi­dence.” Mr. Robinson’s quest to prove his inno­cence advances at the same time that Governor Jeff Landry seeks to expand the state’s meth­ods of exe­cu­tion and restart exe­cu­tions. During a tumul­tuous 2023 in which out­go­ing Governor John Bel Edwards sup­port­ed clemen­cy review for Louisiana’s entire death row, only to be blocked…

On January 22, the Supreme Court grant­ed cer­tio­rari to Richard Glossip, sen­tenced to death in Oklahoma, whose inno­cence case has received inter­na­tion­al atten­tion. Mr. Glossip’s exe­cu­tion had been sched­uled for May 18, 2023, before the Court issued a stay on May 5 pend­ing the out­come of his peti­tions for cer­tio­rari. Mr. Glossip’s case is unusu­al in that the State of Oklahoma con­ced­ed error and sup­ports his request for a new tri­al. However, Mr. Glossip was forced to peti­tion the Supreme Court when the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals reject­ed a…