DPI Reports
Below are reports released by the Death Penalty Information Center since its inception, covering subjects such as race, innocence, politicization, costs of the death penalty, and more. When opening a report, please allow the report page to load fully before selecting links to sections or footnotes. Most of these reports are also available in printed form from DPIC. For a copy of one of these reports, e‑mail DPI. For bulk orders, please download our Resource Order Form.
Reports are separated into Year End Reports, In-Depth Reports, and Special Reports. In-Depth Reports are DPI’s signature long, thorough reports on major death-penalty issues. These include “The 2% Death Penalty,” examining geographic arbitrariness in capital punishment, and “Behind the Curtain,” covering secrecy in the death penalty system. Special Reports are shorter, and typically address a specific event or question. These include DPI’s explanation of the 2017 spate of executions that were scheduled in Arkansas, and our analysis of the largest number of executions performed on a single day.
Featured
Reports
Feb 18, 2021
DPIC Special Report: The Innocence Epidemic
In 1993, the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Civil and Constitutional Rights conducted hearings on what was then a relatively unknown question: How significant was the risk that innocent people were being wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death in the United States. After taking testimony from four exonerees who had been wrongfully condemned to death row, Representative Don Edwards, the subcommittee chairman, asked the Death Penalty Information Center to research the issue and…
Read MoreLatest
Jul 01, 2024
Lethal Election: How the U.S. Electoral Process Increases the Arbitrariness of the Death Penalty
May 14, 2024
Broken Promises: How a History of Racial Violence and Bias Shaped Ohio’s Death Penalty
In January 2024, Ohio lawmakers announced plans to expand the use of the death penalty to permit executions with nitrogen gas, as Alabama had just done a week earlier. But at the same time the Attorney General and the Ohio Prosecuting Attorneys Association are championing this legislation, a bipartisan group of state legislators has introduced a bill to abolish the death penalty based on “significant concerns on who is sentenced to death and how that sentence is carried out.” The competing…
Read MoreDec 01, 2023
Compromised Justice: How A Legacy of Racial Violence Informs Missouri’s Death Penalty Today
Missouri is one of a handful of states that has consistently executed people in the last five years. In 2023, Missouri executed four people. Understanding the historical application of the death penalty in Missouri helps our understanding of how capital punishment is used…
Read MoreDec 01, 2023
The Death Penalty in 2023: Year End Report
Only Five States Conducted Executions and Seven States Imposed New Death Sentences in 2023, the Lowest Number of States in 20 Years. Florida’s Six Executions and Five New Death Sentences Responsible for 2023 Increase. For the First Time, More Americans Believe the Death Penalty Is Administered Unfairly than…
Read MoreJun 16, 2023
Doomed to Repeat: The Legacy of Race in Tennessee’s Contemporary Death Penalty
The historical use of capital punishment in Tennessee shows a clear connection between the extrajudicial lynchings of the 1800s and 1900s and the state sanctioned death penalty practices of today. As one lynching expert notes, “[l]ocal traditions, situations, and personalities must be considered in any attempt to explain patterns of lynching.…” This emphasis on locality parallels modern death penalty trends in Tennessee — as well as the rest of the nation — wherein death sentencing is heavily…
Read More