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.
 

Reports: 41 — 45

Dec 10, 2008

The Death Penalty in 2008: Year End Report

Executions resumed in 2008 after a de fac­to mora­to­ri­um was effec­tive­ly lift­ed by the Supreme Court fol­low­ing its deci­sion uphold­ing lethal injec­tion. But only the South returned to reg­u­lar exe­cu­tions, account­ing for 95% of exe­cu­tions car­ried out in the coun­try in 2008. Almost half of the exe­cu­tions were in Texas. In some states, such as California, Maryland, Delaware and North Carolina, the lethal injec­tion issue remains unset­tled, and no executions…

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Dec 17, 2007

The Death Penalty in 2007: Year End Report

Two dra­mat­ic events this year sym­bol­ized the broad changes that have been occur­ring in the death penal­ty around the coun­try. Executions halt­ed after September 25 when the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a chal­lenge to the con­sti­tu­tion­al­i­ty of the mix­ture of chem­i­cals used in lethal injec­tions in Kentucky (Baze v. Rees). This de fac­to mora­to­ri­um on lethal injec­tions con­tributed to the fewest num­ber of exe­cu­tions in 13…

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Jun 09, 2007

A Crisis of Confidence: Americans’ Doubts About the Death Penalty

According to a nation­al pub­lic opin­ion poll con­duct­ed in 2007, the pub­lic is los­ing con­fi­dence in the death penal­ty. People are deeply con­cerned about the risk of exe­cut­ing the inno­cent, about the fair­ness of the process, and about the inabil­i­ty of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment to accom­plish its basic pur­pos­es. Most Americans believe that inno­cent peo­ple have already been exe­cut­ed, that the death penal­ty is not a deter­rent to crime, and that a mora­to­ri­um should be placed on all…

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Dec 14, 2006

The Death Penalty in 2006: Year End Report

The use of the death penal­ty in the U.S. con­tin­ued to decline in 2006, con­sis­tent with a pat­tern over the past six years. Executions dropped to their low­est lev­el in 10 years as many states grap­pled with prob­lems relat­ed to wrong­ful con­vic­tions and the lethal injec­tion process. The num­ber of death sen­tences and the size of death row are also decreas­ing. And for the first time, the Gallup Poll report­ed that more peo­ple sup­port­ed a sen­tence of life with­out parole over the death…

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Dec 15, 2005

The Death Penalty in 2005: Year End Report

The year 2005 may be remem­bered as the year that life with­out parole became an accept­able alter­na­tive to the death penal­ty in the U.S. Texas became the 37th out of 38 death penal­ty states to adopt this option for its juries. New York’s leg­is­la­ture did not restore the death penal­ty after it was found uncon­sti­tu­tion­al, leav­ing life with­out parole as the pun­ish­ment for cap­i­tal mur­der. Across the coun­try, the num­ber of death sen­tences dropped to record lows and some of the most notorious…

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