Additional Resources

This page is intend­ed for those who would like to dive deep­er into the lit­er­a­ture, stud­ies, and relat­ed resources that aid in our under­stand­ing of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment and the peo­ple it affects. It is orga­nized by top­ic area, and alpha­bet­i­cal­ly with­in each top­ic area by lead author last name or by name of organization.

This list does not con­sti­tute an endorse­ment by DPI of a par­tic­u­lar cit­ed source, nor is it intend­ed to con­vey endorse­ment of DPI by the authors or spon­sors of the resources listed here. 

DPI would love to keep this list of resources as up to date as pos­si­ble, so if there are arti­cles or stud­ies you think should be includ­ed, please con­sid­er send­ing an email to DPI@​deathpenaltyinfo.​org with your sug­ges­tion and attach­ing a .pdf ver­sion of the arti­cle or a link to a pub­lic web­site where the resource can be accessed.

David Baldus, et al., Arbitrariness And Discrimination In The Administration Of The Death Penalty: A Challenge To State Supreme Courts, 15 Stetson L. Rev. 133 (1986).

Frank R. Baumgartner, The Geography of the Death Penalty (Univ. of North Carolina, 2010) .

Frank Baumgartner, Marty Davidson, Kaneesha Johnson, Arvind Krishnamurthy, and Colin Wilson, Deadly Justice — A Statistical Portrait of the Death Penalty (Oxford Univ. Press, 2017).

Vivian Berger, Black Box Decisions On Life Or Death — If They’re Arbitrary, Don’t Blame The Jury: A Reply To Judge Patrick Higginbotham, 41 Case W. Res. L. Rev. 1067 (1991).

John Blume, Ghosts of Executions Past: A Case Study of Executions in South Carolina in the Pre-Furman Era, Cornell Law Review, Volume 7, No. 6, September 2022.

John Blume, Theodore Eisenberg, and Martin T. Wells, Explaining Death Row’s Population and Racial Composition, Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, Volume 1, Issue 1, 165 – 207, March 2004.

Michael Burkhead & James Luginbuhl, Sources of Bias and Arbitrariness In The Capital Trial, 50 J. Soc. Issues 103 (1994).

J. Donohue, An Empirical Evaluation of the Connecticut Death Penalty System Since 1973: Are There Unlawful Racial, Gender, and Geographic Disparities?, 11 Journal of Empirical Legal Studies (Dec. 2014).

Brandon Garret, End of Its Rope — How Killing the Death Penalty Can Revive Criminal Justice (Harvard Univ. Press, 2017).

Samuel R. Gross, Still Unfair, Still Arbitrary — But Do We Care?, Keynote Address, 26 Ohio N.U. L. Rev. 517 (2000).

Carol Steiker and Jordan Steiker, Little Furmans Everywhere: State Court Intervention and the Decline of the American Death Penalty, Cornell Law Review, Volume 7, No. 6, September 2022.

Ben Steiner, Still Arbitrary: Capital Sentencing in the Post-Furman Era, 10 Crim. Just. Pol’y Rev. 85 (1999).

Russell Stetler, Maria McLaughlin, and Dana Cook, Mitigation Works: Empirical Evidence of Highly Aggravated Cases Where the Death Penalty Was Rejected at Sentencing, Hofstra Law Review (Dec. 24, 2021).

Ronald J. Tabak, The Death of Fairness: The Arbitrary and Capricious Imposition of The Death Penalty In The 1980s, 14 Rev. of L. & Soc. Change 797 (1986).

Rick Unklesbay, Death: A Prosecutor’s Perspective on the Death Penalty (Wheatmark, Inc., 2019).

Mona Chalabi, ​“How Often Are Executions Botched?,” FiveThirtyEight (Apr. 30, 2014).

Corinna Lain, ​“Secrets of the Killing State: The Untold Story of Lethal Injection” (NYU Press 2025).

Greg Miller, ​“America’s Long and Gruesome History of Botched Executions,” Science (May 12, 2014).

Austin Sarat, Aubrey Jones, et al., ​“Gruesome Spectacles: The Cultural Reception of Botched Executions in America,” 1 British Journal of American Legal Studies 1 (Spring 2012).

Austin Sarat, ​“Gruesome Spectacles: Botched Executions and America’s Death Penalty” (Stanford Univ. Press 2014).

The ABA​’s Capital Clemency Resource Initiative (CCRI).

American Civil Liberties Union, A Death Before Dying: Solitary Conditions on Death Row, July 2013.

Andrea C. Armstrong, Death Row Conditions Through an Environmental Justice Lens, 70 Ark. L. Rev. 203 (2017).

David Cloud, et al., The Safe Alternatives to Segregation Initiative: Findings and Recommendations for the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections, and Progress Toward Implementation, Vera Institute, May 2019.

Mark D. Cunningham and Mark P. Vigen, Death row inmate char­ac­ter­is­tics, adjust­ment, and con­fine­ment: A crit­i­cal review of the lit­er­a­ture, Behavioral Sciences and the Law 20.1‐2 (2002).

Susan Greene, The Gray Box: The inhu­man­i­ty of soli­tary con­fine­ment, Dart Society, February 2012, reprint­ed in the Colorado Independent on September 25, 2017; view the accom­pa­ny­ing video here.

Joe Gyan Jr., After 6‑year legal bat­tle, Louisiana death row ​‘heat index’ suit near­ing final res­o­lu­tion, The Advocate, May 11, 2019.

Edmund H. Mahony, U.S. Judge rules for­mer Connecticut death row inmate’s incar­cer­a­tion amounts to cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment, Hartford Courant, August 28, 2019.

Porter v. Clarke, 290 F. Supp. 3^d 518 (E.D. Va. 2018).

Christine Tartaro and David Lester, Suicide on Death Row, Journal of Forensic Sciences, Vol. 61, No. 6, November 2016.

Solitary Watch, American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana, and Jesuit Social Research Institute/​Loyola University New Orleans, Louisiana on Lockdown: A Report on the Use of Solitary Confinement in Louisiana State Prisons, With Testimony From the People Who Live It, June 2019.

Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg, Oklahoma Department of Corrections Agrees to Move ​‘Qualifying’ Death Row Prisoners Out of Tomblike Unit, The Appeal, September 28, 2019.

Jack D’Aurora, Death-penal­­ty cas­es waste a lot of tax­pay­ers’ mon­ey, Columbus Dispatch, Aug. 8, 2012.

DPI: State Studies on Monetary Costs.

DPI: State Studies on Time Costs.

DPI Report: The 2% Death Penalty: How a Minority of Counties Produce Most Death Cases at Enormous Costs to All, 2013.

DPI Report: Smart on Crime: Reconsidering the Death Penalty in a Time of Economic Crisis, 2009.

DPI Report: Millions Misspent: What Politicians Don’t Say About the High Costs of the Death Penalty, 1994

DPI: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center, before the Nebraska Judiciary Committee on the Costs of the Death Penalty (Lincoln, March 13, 2013)

DPI: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center, before the Nebraska Judiciary Committee on the Costs of the Death Penalty (Lincoln, March 13, 2013)

DPI: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center, before the Kentucky Standing Committee on Judiciary Hearings on the Costs of the Death Penalty (Frankfort, March 1, 2012)

DPI: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center, before the Pennsylvania Senate Government Management and Cost Study Commission on the costs of the death penal­ty and its lack of return. (Harrisburg, June 7, 2010)

DPI: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center, before the Commission to Study the Death Penalty in New Hampshire on costs of the death penal­ty and relat­ed issues. (December 4, 2009)

DPI: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center, before the Maryland Commission on Capital Punishment regard­ing the costs of the death penal­ty and relat­ed issues (Sept. 5, 2008)

DPI: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center, before the Nevada Advisory Commission on the Administration of Justice regard­ing the costs of the death penal­ty and relat­ed issues (July 7, 2008; tele­phon­ic testimony).

DPI: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center, before the Colorado Senate Judiciary Committee ​“Costs of the Death Penalty and Related Issues” (February 7, 2007). 

DPI: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center, regard­ing the costs of the death penal­ty and relat­ed issues before the New York State Assembly Standing Committees on Codes, Judiciary, and Correction. (January 25, 2005).

DPI: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center, regard­ing the costs of the death penal­ty before the Massachusetts Joint Committee on Criminal Justice. (March 27, 2003).

DPI: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center, regard­ing the costs of the death penal­ty to the Assembly and Senate of Nevada, Legislative Commission’s Subcommittee to Study the Death Penalty and Related DNA Testing. (April 18, 2002).

J. Gould and L. Greenman, Report to the Committee on Defender Services-Judicial Conference of the United States (September 2010) (con­tains cost data on defense rep­re­sen­ta­tion and analy­sis on capital prosecutions).

Justin Marceau and Hollis Whitson, The Cost of Colorado’s Death Penalty, 3 Univ. of Denver Criminal Law Review 145 (2013).

Office of Performance Evaluations, Idaho Legislature, Financial Costs of the Death Penalty, March 17, 2014.

Tony Saavedra, Taxpayer cost for mass mur­der­er Scott Dekraai’s case tops $2 mil­lion, The Orange County Register, September 17, 2017.

Jennifer Sullivan, Seeking death penal­ty adds $1M to pros­e­cu­tion cost, study says, The Seattle Times, Jan. 7, 2015.

Carol Williams, Death penal­ty costs California $184 mil­lion a year, study says, Los Angeles Time, June 20, 2011.

Adriano Martins, Ensemble Contre Le Peine De Mort Board Member, Death penal­ty for child sex­u­al abuse and mis­car­riages of jus­tice in Florida and Tennessee, September 19, 2024.

DPI: Use of the Death Penalty for Killing a Child Victim, An analy­sis of age-of-vic­­tim aggra­vat­ing fac­tors in death penal­ty cas­es, 2022.

J. Kirchmeier, ​“A Tear in Eye of the Law: Mitigating Factors and the Progression Toward a Disease Theory of Criminal Justice,” 83 Oregon L. Rev. 631 (2004).

Library of Congress, Congressional Research Service, List of Federal Capital Offenses: crime that are eli­gi­ble for death sen­tences under federal law.

Terry Lenamon and Reba Kennedy, Terry Lenamon’s List of Federal Death Penalty Aggravating Factors and Mitigating Circumstances, DeathPenaltyBlog​.com, August 13, 2010.

William Bailey, Deterrence, Brutalization, and the Death Penalty: Another Examination of Oklahoma’s Return to Capital Punishment, 36 Criminology 711 – 33 (1998).

DPI Podcast, Does Capital Punishment Deter Murder? Exploring mur­der rates, killings of police offi­cers, and the death penal­ty, plus Supporting data and analy­sis meth­ods. (2017)

DPI Podcast,  Does Capital Punishment Deter Murder? Exploring mur­der rates, killings of police offi­cers, and the death penal­ty (2017).

Keith Harries, Derral Cheatwood, The Geography of Execution: The Capital Punishment Quagmire in America (Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, (1997).

Tomislav V. Kovandzic, Lynne M. Vieraitis, and Denise Paquette Boots, Does the Death Penalty Save Lives?, Criminology & Public Policy 8, no. 4 (2009).

D. Nagin and J. Pepper, ​“Deterrence and the Death Penalty,” Committee on Law and Justice at the National Research Council, April 2012.

D. Nagin, ​“Deterrence,” in ​“Reforming Criminal Justice: Bridging the Gap Between Scholarship and Reform,” vol. 4, ​“Punishment, Incarceration, and Release,” (Academy for Justice, Arizona State University, 2017).

National Institute of Justice, Five Things About Deterrence, NCJ 247350 (May 2016).

National Research Council, Deterrence and the Death Penalty (The National Academies Press, 2012).

Stephen Oliphant, Estimating the effect of death penal­ty mora­to­ri­ums on homi­cide rates using the syn­thet­ic con­trol method, Criminology & Public Policy, Volume 21, Issue 4, 915 – 944 (November 2022).

Brett Parker,  Death Penalty Statutes and Murder Rates: Evidence From Synthetic Controls, Journal of Empirical Legal Studies 18, 488 – 533 (2021).

Michael L. Radelet, Traci L. Lacock, Do Executions Lower Homicide Rates?: The Views of Leading Criminologists, 99 Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 489 (2008 – 2009).

John Sorenson, Robert Wrinkle, et al., Punishment and Deterrence: Examining the Effect of Executions on Murder in Texas, 45 Crime and Delinquency 481 – 93 (1999).

Ernie Thompson, Effects of an Execution on Homicides in California,3 Homicide Studies 129 – 150 (1999).

DPI Study: Racial Disparities in Federal Death Penalty Prosecutions: 1988 – 1994 (1994).

DPI: The Death Penalty in Puerto Rico.

Department of Justice, Federal Death Penalty System: A Statistical Survey (1988 – 2000) (September 12, 2000). 

Department of Justice Manual Regarding Capital Prosecutions.

J. Gould and L. Greenman, Report to the Committee on Defender Services-Judicial Conference of the United States (September 2010) (con­tains cost data on defense rep­re­sen­ta­tion and analy­sis on capital prosecutions).

The Federal Capital Habeas Project.

The Federal Death Penalty Resource Counsel Project.

Stuart Banner, The Death Penalty: An American History (Harvard University Press, 2003).

John D. Bessler, Cruel & Unusual:The American Death Penalty and The Founders’ Eighth Amendment (Northeastern University Press, 2012).

Sheldon Ekland-Olson, Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Decides: Abortion, Neonatal Care, Assisted Dying, and Capital Punishment (Routledge, 2012).

David Garland, Peculiar Institution: America’s Death Penalty in an Age of Abolition (Belknap Press, 2010).

David Garland, Randall McGowen & Michael Meranze (eds.), America’s Death Penalty: Between Past and Present (New York University Press, 2011).

Brandon L. Garrett, End of Its Rope: How Killing the Death Penalty Can Revive Criminal Justice (Harvard University Press, 2017).

Michael Meltsner, Cruel and Unusual: The Supreme Court and Capital Punishment (Quid Pro, LLC, 2011).

Franklin E. Zimring, The Contradictions of American Capital Punishment (Oxford University Press, 2003).

Warren Allmand et al., Human Rights and Human Wrongs: Is the United States Death Penalty System Inconsistent with International Human Rights Law, Fordham Law Review, 1999.

Amnesty International: pro­duces year­ly reports on the death penalty globally. 

Anthony N. Bishop, The Death Penalty in the United States: An International Human Rights Perspective, Texas Law Review, 2001 – 2002.

Center for Constitutional Rights: The Death Penalty is a Human Rights Violation: An Examination of the Death Penalty in the U.S. from a Human Rights Perspective.

Christina M. Cerna, Universality of Human Rights: The Case of the Death Penalty, ILSA Journal of International Comparative Law, 1997.

Matthew D. Mathias, The Sacralization of the Individual: Human Rights and the Abolition of the Death Penalty, American Journal of Sociology, March 2013. 

Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights: pro­vides infor­ma­tion on human rights from vic­tims’ perspective.

Samantha K. Brooks and Neil Greenburg, ​“Psychological impact of being wrong­ful­ly accused of crim­i­nal offences: A sys­tem­at­ic lit­er­a­ture review,” Med Sci Law. 2021 Jan; 61(1): 44 – 54.

Edward F. Connors, Convicted by Juries, Exonerated by Science: Case Studies in the Use of DNA Evidence to Establish Innocence After Trial (DIANE Publishing, 1996).

Samuel Gross et al. ​“Rate of false con­vic­tion of crim­i­nal defen­dants who are sen­tenced to death.” Proc Natl Acad Sci USA (2014).

Norma Herrera, Last Words from Death Row: The Walls Unit (Nightengale Press, 2007). 

Jay Jarvis, That Bird Has My Wings: The Autobiography of an Innocent Man on Death Row (HarperOne, 2010).

Phillip Morris, Sentenced to Death, but Innocent: These Are Stories of Justice Gone Wrong, National Geographic, 24 Aug. 2021.

Jim Petro and Lisa Petro, False Justice: Eight Myths That Convict the Innocent (Kaplan Publishing, 2011).

Sister Helen Prejean, The Death of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Executions (Vintage, 2006).

Austin Sarat, et al. ​“Innocence is Not Enough: The Public Life of Death Row Exonerations,” British Journal of American Legal Studies, Volume 9(2)(2020).

The Innocence Project: Provides infor­ma­tion about Innocence Projects across the country. 

The National Registry of Exonerations: Provides infor­ma­tion about exon­er­a­tions in the United States.

Witness to Innocence: To con­tact indi­vid­u­als who have been exon­er­at­ed from death row. 

John Blume, ​“Intellectual Disability, Innocence, Race, and the Future of the American Death Penalty.” Human Rights, vol. 42, no.2, pp.10 – 13. JSTOR (2017)

John Blume, et al., ​“A Tale of Two (and Possibly Three) Atkins: Intellectual Disability and Capital Punishment Twelve Years After the Supreme Court’s Creation of a Categorical Bar,” 23 William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal 393 (2014).

John Blume, et al., ​“An Empirical Look at Atkins v. Virginia and Its Application in Capital Cases, Tennessee Law Review, Vol. 76:625; Spring 2009 . (Study of 234 Atkins cas­es show­ing that about sev­en per­cent of all death row inmates have filed Atkins claims and near­ly 40% ​“of all defen­dants who allege men­tal retar­da­tion have, in fact, proved it.”)

Stephen J. Ceci, et al., Timing Of IQ Test Can Be A Life Or Death Matter, Science Daily Magazine (2003) — about the impli­ca­tions on death row inmates who are giv­en IQ tests in years in which alter­ations to results are made to re-estab­lish the mean score at 100.

Ronald Conley, et al., The Criminal Justice System and Mental Retardation: Defendants and Victims, Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co. (1992).

DPI Podcast: Intellectual Disability and the Death Penalty, With Law Professor John Blume (2016)

DPI Podcast: He May Be Innocent and Intellectually Disabled, But Rocky Myers Faces Execution in Alabama (2020)

DPI: Sentence Reversals in Intellectual Disability Cases (2002 – 2012)

DPI: List of Defendants with Mental Retardation Executed in the United States (1976 – 2002). (Source: Dr. Denis Keyes, William Edwards, Esq., & Robert Perske,​“People with Mental Retardation are Dying — Legally: At least 44 have been exe­cut­ed,” Mental Retardation, Vol. 3, June 2002. pp. 243 – 44).

DPI: State Statutes Prohibiting the Death Penalty for People with Mental Retardation (pre-Atkins). (Source: Denis W. Keyes and William J. Edwards,​“Mental Retardation and the Death Penalty: Current Status of Exemption Legislation,” 687 Mental & Physical Disabilities Law Reporter (September — October 1997) with updat­ed infor­ma­tion for Arizona, Nebraska and South Dakota by DPIC.)

Human Rights Watch, Beyond Reason: The Death Penalty and Offenders with Mental Retardation (2001).

Sheri Lynn Johnson, John H. Blume, and Brendan Van Winkle. ​“Atkins v. Virginia at Twenty: Still Adaptive Deficits, Still in the Developmental Period.” Wash. & Lee J. Civ. Rts. & Soc. Just. 29 (2022): 55.

Daniel Kiel. ​“Avoiding Atkins: How Tennessee is on the Verge of Unconstitutionally Executing an Individual with Intellectual Disabilities.” Law & Inequality (2020).

Kevin McGrew, Intellectual Competence & the Death Penalty (Blog).

Farbycki Reed, The Penry Penalty: Capital Punishment and Offenders with Mental Retardation (Lantham: University Press of America 1993).

Emily V. Shaw, et al. ​“INTELLECTUAL DISABILITY, THE DEATH PENALTY, AND JURORS.” Jurimetrics, vol. 58, no. 4, pp.437 – 58. JSTOR (2018).

Robert Schalock, et al., ​“The Renaming of Mental Retardation: Understanding the Change to the Term Intellectual Disability.” 45 Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities 116 (2007).

Sanaz Alasti, The Death Penalty in Iran: the Road to Abolition is Paved with Paradox, Siavash Publishing (2021).

Amnesty International: pro­duces year­ly reports on the death penalty globally. 

DPI Report: ​“International Perspectives on the Death Penalty: A Costly Isolation for the US” (1999).

Acker, James R. and Lanier, Charles S., ​“Ready for the Defense? Legislative Provisions Governing the Appointment of Counsel in Capital Cases” 35 Criminal Law Bulletin 429 (1999).

American Bar Association: Death Penalty Representation Project.

American Bar Association: Confidential Practice Area for Attorneys Handling Capital Cases.

American Bar Association, ​“Guidelines for the Appointment and Performance of Defense Counsel in Death Penalty Cases”, 31 Hofstra Law Review 903 (2003).

Shamena Bayer Anward, and Randi Patrick Hijalmarsson, ​“Unequal Jury Representation and Its Consequences”; 4 American Economic Review: Insights 159 – 74 (2022).

Stephen B. Bright, ​“Counsel for the poor: the death sen­tence not for the worst crime but for the worst lawyer”, 103 The Yale Law Journal 1835 (1994).

Stephen B. Bright, ​“Death by lot­tery — pro­ce­dur­al bar of con­sti­tu­tion­al claims in cap­i­tal cas­es due to the inad­e­quate rep­re­sen­ta­tion of indi­gent defen­dants”, 92 West Virginia Law Review 679 (1990).

Stephen B. Bright, ​“Elected Judges and the Death Penalty in Texas: Why Full Habeas Corpus Review by Independent Federal Judges Is Indispensable to Protecting Constitutional Rights”, 73 Texas Law Review 1805 (2000).

Stephen B. Bright, ​“In defense of life: Enforcing the Bill of Rights on behalf of poor, minor­i­ty and dis­ad­van­taged per­sons fac­ing the death penal­ty”, 57 Missouri Law Review 849 (1992).

CapDefNet: Federal Death Penalty Resource Counsel Project

Mark Costanzo and Julie Peterson, ​“Attorney per­sua­sion in the cap­i­tal penal­ty phase: a con­tent analy­sis of clos­ing argu­ments”, 50 Journal of Social Issues 125 (1994).

Douglas M. Cohen and Esther F. Lardent, ​“The last best hope: rep­re­sent­ing death row inmates”, 23 Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review 213 (1989).

Phyllis L. Crocker, ​“Feminism and Defending Men on Death Row”, 29 St. Mary’s Law Journal 4 (1998).

DPI Report: ​“With Justice for Few: The Growing Crisis in Death Penalty Representation (1995)”.

C. Drinan, ​“The Revitalization of Ake: A Capital Defendant’s Right to Expert Assistance”, 60 Oklahoma Law Review, Summer 2007.

William S. Geimer, ​“A decade of Strickland’s Tin Horn: doc­tri­nal and prac­ti­cal under­min­ing of the right to coun­sel”, 4 William and Mary Bill of Rights Journal 91 (1995).

John Gross, Reframing the Indigent Defense Crisis, Blog, March 28,2023.

Roscoe C. Howard Jr., ​“The defund­ing of the post con­vic­tion defense orga­ni­za­tions as a denial of the right to coun­sel”; 98 West Virginia Law Review 864 (1996).

Celestine Richards McConville, ​“The Meaninglessness of Delayed Appointments and Discretionary Grants of Capital Postconviction Counsel”, 42 Tulsa Law Review 253 (2006).

Celestine Richards McConville, ​“The Right to Effective Assistance of Capital Postconviction Counsel: Constitutional Implications of Statutory Grants of Capital Counsel”, 2003 Wisconsin Law Review 31 (2003).

Micheal Mello, ​“Death and his lawyers: why Joseph Spaziano owes his life to the Miami Herald — and not to any defense lawyer or judge”, 20 Vermont Law Review 19 (1995).

National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL).

National Legal Aid and Defender Association (NLADA).

W. Redick, B. MacLean, and M. Truett, ​”Pretend Justice – Defense Representation in Tennessee Death Penalty Cases”, 38 University of Memphis Law Review 303 ( 2008).

State Bar of Texas: GUIDELINES AND STANDARDS FOR TEXAS CAPITAL COUNSEL: STANDING COMMITTEE ON LEGAL SERVICES TO THE POOR IN CRIMINAL MATTERS ADOPTED BY THE STATE BAR BOARD OF DIRECTORS APRIL 21, 2006, 69 Tex. B. J. 966 (2006).

Ronald J. Tabak, ed., ​“The death of fair­ness? Counsel com­pe­ten­cy and due process in death penal­ty cas­es”, 31 Houston Law Review 1105 (1994).

Ronald J. Tabak, ​“The Private Bar’s Efforts to Secure Proper Representation for Those Facing Execution,”29 Justice System Journal 356 (2008).

Douglas W. Vick, ​“Poorhouse jus­tice: under­fund­ed indi­gent defense ser­vices and arbi­trary death sen­tences”, 43 Buffalo Law Review 329 (1995).

Robert Weisberg, ​“Who defends cap­i­tal defen­dants?”, 35 Santa Clara Law Review 535 (1995).

Ty Alper, Lethal Incompetence, The Champion, Sept.-Oct. 2006.

American Bar Association: American Bar Association Resolution 108B, (February 9, 2015).

Amnesty International: Execution by Lethal Injection: A Quarter Century of State Killing, (October 2007).

Associated Press Poll: Glance: Execution Drug Secrecy in 5 States, (April 5, 2014).

Douglas Berman, Finding Bickel Gold in a Hill of Beans, Cato Supreme Court Review, 2006. (On the legal ram­i­fi­ca­tions of Hill v. Crosby).

Deborah Denno, The Lethal Injection Quandary: How Medicine Has Dismantled the Death Penalty, Fordham Legal Studies Research Paper No. 983732 (May 1, 2007); 76 Fordham L. Rev. 49 (2007).

Deborah Denno, When Legislatures Delegate Death: The Troubling Paradox Behind State Uses of Electrocution and Lethal Injection and What It Says About Us, 63 Ohio State Law Journal 63 (2002).

DPI: Methods of Execution by State

DPI: Botched Executions 

DPI Report: Behind the Curtain: Secrecy and the Death Penalty in the United States (2018).

DPIC Podcast: Discussions With DPIC — Behind the Curtain

DPIC Podcast: Discussions With DPIC — Anesthesiologist Dr. Joel Zivot on What Prisoner Autopsies Tell Us About Lethal Injection

DPI: Excerpts from the Supreme Court Opinion in Baze v. Rees.

Larry Greenmeier, Cruel and Usual?: Is Capital Punishment by Lethal Injection Quick and Painless?, Scientific American (October 27, 2010).

Human Rights Watch: Report on Lethal Injection.

Human Rights Watch: Letter to Gov. Bush in Hill Case.

Talia Roitberg Harmon, Michael Cassidy, and Richelle Kloch, Examination of deci­sion mak­ing and botch­es lethal injec­tion exe­cu­tions in Texas, American behav­ioral sci­en­tist 64.12 (2020): 1715 – 1732.

Elizabeth Kim and Richard J. Levy, The Role of Anaesthesiologists in Lethal Injection: A Call to Action, The Lancet 395, no. 10225 (2020): 749 – 54.

Ellen Kreizberg and David Richter, But Can it Be Fixed? A Look at Constitutional Challenges to Lethal Injection Executions, Santa Clara University School of Law, Legal Studies Research Papers Series, Working Paper No. 07 – 28 (June 2007); 47 Santa Clara L. Rev. 445 (2007).

Emma Marris, Death-row drug dilem­ma, Nature (January 27, 2011).

Megan McCracken, Legally Indefensible: Requiring Death Row Prisoners to Prove Available Execution Alternatives, The Champion (January/​February 2017).

Megan McCracken and Jennifer Moreno, Through the Glass Darkly: What Oklahoma’s Lethal Injection Regime Tells Us about Secrecy, Incompetence, Disregard and Experimentation Nationwide, ABA Human Rights Magazine (2016 – 2017 Vol. 42).

Call M. Mears, Risk of Choking to Death on One’s Own Blood Is Not Cruel and Unusual Punishment, Mo. L. Rev. 85 (2020): 609.

Tasneem Nashrulla, What 13 States Aren’t Telling You About How They Execute Prisoners, Buzzfeed (June 16, 2014).

Reprieve: Lethal Injection Information Center.

Austin Sarat, Theo Dassin, and Aidan Orr, A Dark Shadow: The Intensification and Expansion of Lethal Injection Drug Secrecy, British Journal of American Legal Studies 12.1 (2023): 1 – 26.

Tamara Tabo, If Oregon Can Give Death With Dignity, Why Can’t Death Row?, Above the Law (November 24, 2014).

United States Department of Justice, Office of Legal Policy, Review of the Federal Execution Protocol Addendum and Manner of Execution Regulations, January 2025.

Henry Weinstein and Maura Dolan, The Chaos Behind California Executions, L.A. Times, Oct. 2, 2006 (hear­ings in California on lethal injections).

Jon Yorke, Comity, Finality, and Oklahoma’s Lethal Injection Protocol, Oklahoma Law Review (2017).

Zivot, Joel B., Mark A. Edgar, and David A. Lubarsky, Execution by lethal injec­tion: Autopsy fid­ings of pul­monary ede­ma, medRxiv (2022): 2022-08.

James Hampton, Homosexuality: An Aggravating Factor, Law & Sexuality, 2019. (This arti­cle exam­ines whether sex­u­al ori­en­ta­tion is used as an aggra­vat­ing fac­tor for LGBTQ+ peo­ple and whether suf­fi­cient pro­ce­dur­al safe­guards are in place to pro­tect those indi­vid­u­als from hav­ing their sex­u­al­i­ty used against them in a cap­i­tal tri­al. The arti­cle also looks at the his­to­ry of the crim­i­nal­iza­tion of homo­sex­u­al­i­ty in the U.S.)

Human Dignity Trust: Provides infor­ma­tion on LGBTQ+ peo­ple and the death penalty internationally.

Matt Kellner, Queer and Unusual: Capital Punishment, LGBTQ+ Identity, and the Constitutional Path Forward, Tulane Journal of Law and Sexuality, 2020. (This arti­cle explores the case of Charles Rhines, a gay man sen­tenced to death in South Dakota, and the role that homo­pho­bia played in the court­room with his jurors. Kellner explores anti-queer bias and ani­mus in the crim­i­nal legal system.)

Prison Policy Initiative: Why Abolition of The Death Penalty Is a Queer Issue.

Adam Rhodes, In U.S. Courts, Anti-LGBTQ+ Bias Can Be a Death Sentence, The Appeal, August 13, 2024.

Michael B. Shortnacy, Sexual Minorities, Criminal Justice, and the Death Penalty, Fordham Urban Law Journal, 2005. (This arti­cle address­es the bias­es LGBTQ+ peo­ple face in the court­room and the need for more insti­tu­tions to acknowl­edge these issues and devote more resources to under­stand­ing their preva­lence and impact. The arti­cle sug­gests that these bias­es may play a role in cap­i­tal sen­tenc­ing and calls for greater advo­ca­cy and pro­tec­tion for LGBTQ+ indi­vid­u­als in the crim­i­nal legal system.)

Bailey P. Stamp, No Pride, All Prejudice: Addressing LGBTQ+ Bias in Capital Punishment Sentencing, Lincoln Memorial University Law Review, Summer 2023. (This arti­cle focus­es on how stricter safe­guards must be put in place to pro­tect LGBTQ+ defen­dants from dis­crim­i­na­tion in cap­i­tal cas­es. Safeguards must be used to pre­vent a defen­dan­t’s sex­u­al­i­ty from being a fac­tor used to prej­u­dice a jury.)

Jessica Sutton, John Mills, Jennifer Merrigan, Kristin Swain, Death by Dehumanization: Prosecutorial Narratives of Death-Sentenced Women and LGBTQ+ Prisoners, St. John’s Law Review, 2021. (This arti­cle explores dehu­man­iz­ing pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al nar­ra­tives often used against LGBTQ+ peo­ple fac­ing the death penal­ty and argues that these nar­ra­tives ulti­mate­ly vio­late the U.S. Constitution’s pro­tec­tion of the dig­ni­ty of those fac­ing loss of life or lib­er­ty. The authors pro­vide a wide range of exam­ples of dam­ag­ing nar­ra­tives and shows how they fur­ther dis­ad­van­tage LGBTQ+ defen­dants.)

The Gender and Sexuality Capital Resource Center at Phillips Black, Inc.: Provides infor­ma­tion about rep­re­sen­ta­tion for LGBTQ+ peo­ple fac­ing extreme sentences.

American Bar Association Death Penalty Due Process Review Project: Resources on Severe Mental Illness and Death Penalty.

American Bar Association Resolution 122A and accom­pa­ny­ing arti­cle on exempt­ing those with severe men­tal ill­ness from the death penal­ty, August 8, 2006. (See sim­i­lar res­o­lu­tions endorsed by the American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, and the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill.)

ABA Death Penalty Due Process Review Project White Paper on Severe Mental Illness and the Death Penalty.

ACLU: Mental Illness and the Death Penalty. (Background infor­ma­tion, includ­ing the var­i­ous points in a case at which men­tal ill­ness is an issue, descrip­tions of Supreme Court cas­es, and cur­rent legislative action.)

Amnesty International Report: ​“The Execution of Mentally Ill Offenders,” January 31, 2006.

Amnesty International USA: The Death Penalty and Mental Illness.

P. Applebaum,​​“Death Row Delusions: When is a Prisoner Competent to Be Executed?” (Law and Psychiatry, 2007). (An exam­i­na­tion of Panetti v. Quarterman.)

F. Bordenave, MD and D. Kelly, MD,​​“Death Penalty and Mentally Ill Defendants,” Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, 2010. 

Catholic University Symposium: The Death Penalty and Mental Illness, Catholic University Law Review, Summer 2005.

M. D’Emic,​​“The Promise of Mental Health Courts: Brooklyn Criminal Justice System Experiments with Treatment as an Alternative to Prison,” ABA Criminal Justice Magazine, Fall 2007, Volume 22, Number 3.

A. Dillard, ​​“Madness Alone Punishes the Madman: The Search for Moral Dignity in the Court’s Competency Doctrine as Applied in Capital Cases,” 79 Tennessee Law Review 461 (2012).

DPI: Death Row Conditions.

K. Drew,​​“Executed Mentally Ill Inmate Heard Voices Until End,” CNN, January 7, 2003. (Article fol­low­ing the exe­cu­tion of Charles Singleton in Arkansas.)

W. Follette, D. Davis, and R. Leo,​“Mental Health Status and Vulnerability to Police Interrogation Tactics,” ABA Criminal Justice Magazine, Fall 2007, Volume 22, Number 3.

Human Rights Watch Report: ​“Ill-Equipped: U. S. Prisons and Offenders With Mental Illness,” September 2003.

L. Mansnerus,​​“Damaged Brains and the Death Penalty,” New York Times, July 21, 2001.

M. Mello,​​“Executing the Mentally Ill: When Is Someone Sane Enough to Die?” ABA Criminal Justice Magazine, Fall 2007, Volume 22, Number 3.

National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI).

National Alliance on Mental Illness Report: ​​“Shattered Lives”.

National Alliance on Mental Illness and Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights Report: ​“Double Tragedies.” 

National Mental Health Association.

G. Nora,​​“Prosecutor as​​“Nurse Ratched”?: Misusing Criminal Justice as Alternative Medicine,” ABA Criminal Justice Magazine, Fall 2007, Volume 22, Number 3.C. Seeds, THE AFTERLIFE OF FORD AND PANETTI: EXECUTION COMPETENCE AND THE CAPACITY TO ASSIST COUNSEL, Saint Louis University Law Journal, Winter 2009

M. Radelet & K. Miller,​“Executing the Mentally Ill,” Sage Publications (1993).

C. Slobogin,​​“The Supreme Court’s Recent Criminal Mental Health Cases Rulings of Questionable Competence,” ABA Criminal Justice Magazine, Fall 2007, Volume 22, Number 3.

M. Spinelli, M.D.,​​“Maternal Infanticide Associated With men­tal Illness: Prevention and the Promise of Saved Lives,” American Journal of Psychiatry Digest, September 2004.

K. Swedlow,​​“Forced Medication of Legally Incompetent Prisoners: A Primer,” Human Rights Magazine, Spring 2003.

A. Taslitz,​​“Mental Health and Criminal Justice: An Overview,”
Prof. Taslitz, ABA Criminal Justice Magazine, Fall 2007, Volume 22, Number 3. 

Ty Alper, Lethal Incompetence, The Champion, Sept.-Oct. 2006.

American Bar Association Resolution 108B (Calls for all death penalty jurisdictions​“to pro­mul­gate exe­cu­tion pro­to­cols in an open and trans­par­ent man­ner and require pub­lic review and com­ment pri­or to final adop­tion of any exe­cu­tion pro­to­col, and require dis­clo­sure to the pub­lic by all rel­e­vant agen­cies of all rel­e­vant infor­ma­tion regard­ing exe­cu­tion pro­ce­dures.” (February 9, 2015).

Amnesty International, Execution by Lethal Injection: A Quarter Century of State Killing, (October 2007).

Douglas Berman, Finding Bickel Gold in a Hill of Beans, Cato Supreme Court Review, 2006.

Deborah Denno, The Lethal Injection Quandary: How Medicine Has Dismantled the Death Penalty, Fordham Legal Studies Research Paper No. 983732 (May 1, 2007); 76 Fordham L. Rev. 49 (2007).

Deborah Denno, When Legislatures Delegate Death: The Troubling Paradox Behind State Uses of Electrocution and Lethal Injection and What It Says About Us, 63 Ohio State Law Journal 63 (2002).

Department of Justice, Office of Legal Policy, Review of the Federal Execution Protocol Addendum and Manner of Execution Regulations, January 2025

DPI: Methods of Execution by State.

DPI: Botched Executions .

DPI Podcast: Discussions With DPIC — Behind the Curtain

DPI Podcast: Discussions With DPIC — Anesthesiologist Dr. Joel Zivot on What Prisoner Autopsies Tell Us About Lethal Injection

DPI Report: Behind the Curtain: Secrecy and the Death Penalty in the United States

Manny Fernandez, Executions Stall as States Seek Different Drugs, New York Times (November 8, 2013).

Larry Greenmeier, Cruel and Usual?: Is Capital Punishment by Lethal Injection Quick and Painless?, Scientific American (October 27, 2010).

Talia Roitberg Harmon, Michael Cassidy, and Richelle Kloch, Examination of deci­sion mak­ing and botch­es lethal injec­tion exe­cu­tions in Texas, American behav­ioral sci­en­tist 64.12: 1715 – 1732. (2020).

Andrew Welsh Huggins, Ohio faces snags in exe­cu­tion sys­tem, Associated Press, (August 31, 2011).

Human Rights Watch Report: So Long as They Die, (2006).

Elizabeth Kim, and Richard J. Levy, The Role of Anaesthesiologists in Lethal Injection: A Call to Action, The Lancet 395, no. 10225: 749 – 54. (2020).

Makiko Kitamura and Adi Narayan, Europe Pushes to Keep Lethal Injection Drugs From U.S. Prisons, Bloomberg Businessweek (February 7, 2013).

Kimberley Leonard, Lethal injec­tion drug access could put exe­cu­tions on hold, iWatch News (April 4, 2012).

Ellen Kreizberg and David Richter, But Can it Be Fixed? A Look at Constitutional Challenges to Lethal Injection Executions, Santa Clara University School of Law, Legal Studies Research Papers Series, Working Paper No. 07 – 28 (June 2007); 47 Santa Clara L. Rev. 445 (2007).

Lethal Injection Information Center.

Emma Marris, Death-row drug dilem­ma, Nature (January 27, 2011).

Call M. Mears, Risk of Choking to Death on One’s Own Blood Is Not Cruel and Unusual Punishment, Mo. L. Rev. 85: 609. (2020).

Mega McCracken, Legally Indefensible: Requiring Death Row Prisoners to Prove Available Execution Alternatives, The Champion (January/​February 2017).

Mega McCracken and Jennifer Moreno, Through the Glass Darkly: What Oklahoma’s Lethal Injection Regime Tells Us about Secrecy, Incompetence, Disregard and Experimentation Nationwide, ABA Human Rights Magazine (2016 – 2017 Vol. 42).

Tasneem Nashrulla, What 13 States Aren’t Telling You About How They Execute Prisoners, Buzzfeed (June 16, 2014).

Matt Pearce, Molly Hennessy-Fiske, and Paresh Dave, Oklahoma halts dou­ble exe­cu­tion after one is botched, Los Angeles Times (April 29, 2014).

Austin Sarat, Theo Dassin, and Aidan Orr, A Dark Shadow: The Intensification and Expansion of Lethal Injection Drug Secrecy, British Journal of American Legal Studies 12.1: 1 – 26. (2023)

Tamara Tabo, If Oregon Can Give Death With Dignity, Why Can’t Death Row?, Above the Law (November 24, 2014).

The Associated Press, Glance: Execution Drug Secrecy in 5 States,(April 5, 2014).

Mike Ward, Cost of exe­cu­tions sky­rock­et­ing in Texas, oth­er states, Austin American-Statesman (February 23, 2012).

Henry Weinstein and Maura Dolan, The Chaos Behind California Executions, L.A. Times, Oct. 2, 2006.

Jon Yorke, Comity, Finality, and Oklahoma’s Lethal Injection Protocol, Oklahoma Law Review (2017).

Joel B. Zivot, Mark A. Edgar, and David A. Lubarsky, Execution by lethal injec­tion: Autopsy fid­ings of pul­monary ede­ma, medRxiv: 2022-08. (2022).

A. Ashton, ​​“Capital pun­ish­ment rare for killers in U.S. mil­i­tary,” News Tribune, June 18, 2012.

D. Baldus et al., THE IMPACT OF CIVILIAN AGGRAVATING FACTORS ON THE MILITARY DEATH PENALTY (1984 – 2005): ANOTHER CHAPTER IN THE RESISTANCE OF THE ARMED FORCES TO THE CIVILIANIZATION OF MILITARY JUSTICE, 43 Univ. of Michigan Journal of Law Reform 569 (2010).

R. Bonner,​​“Push Is on for Larger Jury in Military Capital Cases,” New York Times, September 3, 2001.

T. DeFrank,​​“Servicemen on Death Row: 6 killers await as mil­i­tary jus­tice crawls” New York Daily News, June 24, 2001.

Maj. Mary M. Foreman,​“Military Capital Litigation: Meeting the Heightened Standards of United States V. Curtis” Military Law Review, 174 Mil. L. Rev. 1 (Dec. 2002).

C. Grosso et al., RACIAL DISCRIMINATION IN THE ADMINISTRATION OF THE DEATH PENALTY: THE EXPERIENCE OF THE UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES (1984 – 2005), Michigan State University News, February 17, 2012.

M. McCluer, Lindo Military death sen­tence case may head back for Supreme Court cer­tio­rari deci­sion, The Jurist, December 9, 2008.

Lt. J. Michael Montgomery,​“Death Is Different: Kreutzer and the Right to a Mitigation Specialist in Military Capital Offense Cases,” Army Lawyer, 2007 Army Law. 13 (2007).

D. Riechmann,​​“Bush OKs Execution of Army Death Row Prisoner,” Associated Press in New York Sun, July 28, 2008 (Pres. Bush signs order for execution).

David V. Baker, American Indian Executions in Historical Context, Criminal Justice Studies, 20:4, 315 – 373 (2007)

D. Hearn, Legal Executions in New England: A Comprehensive Reference, 1623 – 1960 (McFarland 1999)

E. Hensen & J. Taylor, Native America in the New Millennium (Harvard University 2002).

Justice Department Bureau of Justice Statistics, Jails in Indian Country.

C. Mann, Unequal jus­tice: A ques­tion of col­or (Indiana University Press 1993).

M. Severson & C. Duclos, American Indian sui­cides in jail: Can risk screen­ing be cul­tur­al­ly sen­si­tive?, U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice (2005).

DPI, 2010 Public Opinion Poll (November 2010).

DPI’s List of National Polls and Studies

DPI’s List of State Polls and Studies

DPI’s List of International Polls and Studies

Adriano Martins, ​“Is pub­lic opin­ion in the U.S. in favor of death penal­ty?’, Ensemble Contre le Peine de Mort Board Member, January 9, 2025

DPI: Articles and Opinions on the Death Penalty from a Religious Point of View

ACLU of Virginia Report: Unequal, Unfair, and Irreversible: The Death Penalty in Virginia (2000). 

Amnesty International USA:​US: Death by Discrimination — The Continuing Role of Race in Capital Cases,” (April 23, 2003).

Carol S. Steiker and Jordan M. Steiker, The American Death Penalty and the (In)Visibility of Race, The University of Chicago Law Review (Winter 2015).

Department of Justice: The Federal Death Penalty System: A Statistical Survey (1988 – 2000). (Finding 80% of the cas­es sub­mit­ted by fed­er­al pros­e­cu­tors for death penal­ty review in the past five years have involved racial minori­ties as defen­dants.) See also DPIC​’s sum­ma­ry of the report find­ings.

DPI: Summary of North Carolina v. Robinson, the first rul­ing issued under North Carolina’s Racial Justice Act (April 22, 2012).

DPI Podcast: Discussions with DPIC – Professor Elisabeth Semel on the Implications of Batson v. Kentucky and California’s Capital Punishment System.

DPI Podcast: Discussions with DPIC – Legacy of Race in Tennessee’s Contemporary Death Penalty with Tiana Herring.

DPI Podcast: Discussions with DPIC – DPIC​’s New Report on the Racial History of Oklahoma’s Death Penalty.

DPI Podcast: Georgetown Racial Justice Institute Director Diann Rust-Tierney on Reconceptualizing the U.S. Death Penalty as a Violation of Fundamental Human Rights.

DPI Podcast: 35 Years After McCleskey v. Kemp, Prof. Alexis Hoag Discusses the Decision’s Leegacy.

DPI Podcast: Discussions with DPIC – Julius Jones’ Long Road On and Off Death Row, and What Comes Next in His Case.

DPI Podcast: Discussions with DPIC – Contra Costa County, California District Attorney Diana Becton on Fair and Just Legal Reform and Ending the Death Penalty.

DPI Podcast: Discussions with DPIC – Professor Frank Baumgartner on Death-Penalty Data, Public Opinion, and Capital Punishment as a​“Failed Experiment”.

DPI Podcast: Discussions with DPIC – Injustice in Virginia: The Case of the​“Martinsville 7”.

DPI Podcast: Discussions with DPIC – Gretchen Engel on the Racist Roots Report from the Center for Death Penalty Litigation.

DPI Podcast: Discussions with DPIC – Henderson Hill and the North Carolina Racial Justice Act.

DPI Podcast: Discussions with DPIC – He May Be Innocent and Intellectually Disabled, But Rocky Myers Faces Execution in Alabama.

DPI Podcast: Discussions with DPIC – The Effect of Race on Sentencing Decisions in Washington with Dr. Katherine Beckett and Dr. Heather Evans.

DPI Podcast: Discussions With DPIC — Professor Bharat Malkani Explores the Relationship Between Slavery and Slavery-Abolition Strategies and the Modern U.S. Death Penalty.

DPI Podcast: Discussions With DPIC — Racial Discrimination in Death-Penalty Jury Selection: A Conversation with Steve Bright.

DPI Podcast: Discussions With DPIC — The Duane Buck Case: Race, Future Dangerousness, and the Death Penalty, with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund’s Christina Swarns.

DPI Podcast: On the Issues — Episode 6: Race.

DPI Report: The Death Penalty in Black and White: Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Decides (1998).

DPI Report: Racial Disparities in Federal Death Penalty Prosecutions 1988 – 1994 (1994).

DPI Report: Chattahoochee Judicial District: BUCKLE OF THE DEATH BELT: The Death Penalty in Microcosm (1991). 

DPI Report: Enduring Injustice: The Persistence of Racial Discrimination in the U.S. Death Penalty (2020).

DPI Report: Deeply Rooted: How Racial History Informs Oklahoma’s Death Penalty (2022).

DPI Report: Doomed to Repeat: The Legacy of Race in Tennessee’s Contemporary Death Penalty (2023).

DPI Report: Compromised Justice: How a Legacy of Racial Violence Informs Missouri’s Death Penalty Today (2023).

DPI Report: Broken Promises: How a History of Racial Violence and Bias Shaped Ohio’s Death Penalty (2024).

DPI Report: Fool’s Gold: How the Federal Death Penalty Has Perpetuated Racially Discriminatory Practices Throughout History (2024).

Equal Justice USA: Racial Inequality and the Death Penalty.

Equal Justice Initiative: A History of Racial Injustice.

National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers: Race and the Death Penalty.

Mark Peffley and Jon Hurwitz, Persuasion and Resistance: Race and the Death Penalty in America, American Journal of Political Science (October 2007). (Examines the​‘race gap’ between the sup­port for the death penal­ty among black and white peo­ple in America and explores pos­si­ble expla­na­tions using empirical data.)

Isaac Unah and Jack Boger, ​“Race and the Death Penalty in North Carolina An Empirical Analysis: 1993 – 1997″.

DPI’s Related Websites: fea­tures a list of orga­ni­za­tions and groups relat­ed to the death penalty.

ACLU Report: A Living Death: Life with­out Parole for Nonviolent Offenses, (2013).

Alfred Allan, Justine de Mott, Isolde M. Larkins, Laura Turnbull, Tracey Warwick, Lacey Willett & Maria M. Allan, The impact of vol­un­tari­ness of apolo­gies on vic­tims’ respons­es in restora­tive jus­tice: find­ings of a quan­ti­ta­tive study, Psychiatry, Psychology and Law, 29:4, 593 – 609 (2022).

E. Beck, S. Britto, A. Andrews, In the Shadow of Death: Restorative Justice and Death Row Families (2007).

DPI Report: Sentencing for Life: Americans Embrace Alternatives to the Death Penalty (1993).

H. Golden, Tribal courts across the coun­try are expand­ing holis­tic alter­na­tives to the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem, Associated Press. (August 20, 2023).

R. Johnson and A. Dobrzanska, Mature cop­ing among life-sen­­tenced inmates: an explorato­ry study of adjust­ment dynam­ics, Corrections Compendium. (November 2005).

J.L. D. Kennedy, A.P. Tuliao, K.N. Flower, J.J. Tibbs, and D.E. McChargue, Long-Term Effectiveness of a Brief Restorative Justice Intervention, International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 63(1), 3 – 17. (2019) https://​doi​.org/10.1177/​0306624X18779202.

L. Komar, A. Nellis, and K. Budd, Counting Down: Paths to a 20-Year Maximum Prison Sentence, The Sentencing Project (2023).

M. Lane, Is there life with­out parole? A cap­i­tal defendant’s right to a mean­ing­ful alter­na­tive sen­tence, 26 Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review 327 (1993).

O. Levinson, Reconciling Ideals: Restorative Justice as an Alternative to Sentencing Enhancements for Hate Crimes, Minnesota Law Review, 2020 – 2021.

A. Liptak, To More Inmates, Life Term Means Dying Behind Bars, New York Times, October 2, 2005.

A. Lloyd and J. Borrill, Examining the Effectiveness of Restorative Justice in Reducing Victims’ Post-Traumatic Stress. Psychol. Inj. and Law 13, 77 – 89 (2020). https://​doi​.org/10.1007/​s12207-019 – 09363‑9.

Marc Mauer; Ryan S. King; Malcolm C. Young, The Meaning of ​‘Life’: Long Prison Sentences in Context, The Sentencing Project (2004).

M. Mauer and K. Epstein, edi­tors, To Build a Better Criminal Justice System, The Sentencing Project (2012). 

R. Mendel, Effective Alternatives to Youth Incarceration, The Sentencing Project (2023).

A. Nellis, In the Extreme: Women Serving Life Without Parole and Death Sentences in the United States, The Sentencing Project (September 2021).

A. Nellis and N. Monazzam, Left to Die in Prison: Emerging Adults 25 and Younger Sentenced to Life, The Sentencing Project (June 2023).

A. Nellis, Life Goes On: The Historic Rise in Life Sentences in America, The Sentencing Project(2013).

A. Nellis and R. King, No Exit: The Expanding Use of Life Sentences In America, The Sentencing Project (2009). Read a sum­ma­ry by DPIC.

A. Nellis, Nothing But Time: Elderly Americans Serving Life Without Parole, The Sentencing Project (June 2022).

Lodi E, Perrella L, Lepri GL, Scarpa ML, Patrizi P. Use of Restorative Justice and Restorative Practices at School: A Systematic Literature Review. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 19(1):96 (2022). https://​doi​.org/10.3390/​ijerph19010096.

J. Rovner, Too Many Locked Doors: The scope of youth con­fine­ment is vast­ly under­stat­ed, The Sentencing Project (2022).

S.M. Sliva, M. Plassmeyer, Effects of restora­tive jus­tice pre-file diver­sion leg­is­la­tion on juve­nile fil­ing rates: An inter­rupt­ed time-series analy­sis. Criminal Public Policy. 2021; 20: 19– 40. https://​doi​.org/10.1111/​1745 – 9133.1251.

C. Steiker and J. Steiker, The Rise, Fall, and Afterlife of the Death Penalty in the United States, The Annual Review of Criminology (2020).

R. Stokes, A Fate Worse than Death? The Problems with Life Imprisonment as an Alternative to the Death Penalty, Against the Death Penalty (2008).

Time on Death Row

A. Alarcon, ​​“Remedies for California’s Death Row Deadlock,” 80 So. Cal. Law Rev. 697 (2007).

Vivian Berger,​​“Payne and suf­fer­ing — a per­son­al reflec­tion and a vic­­­tim-cen­tered cri­tique,” 20 Florida State University Law Review 21 (1992).

J. Blume,​​“Killing the Willing:​‘Volunteers,’ Suicide and Competency,” 103 Michigan Law Review 939 (2005).

Bureau of Justice Statistics Bulletin: Capital Punishment.

Roger Hood. The Death Penalty: A Worldwide Perspective, Third Edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002.

A. Liptak,​​“Justices Rule on Legal Effects of Slow-Moving Cases,” New York Times, March 9, 2009.

E. Rapaport,​​“A Modest Proposal: The Aged of Death Row Should Be Deemed Too Old to Execute,” 77 Brooklyn Law Review 1089 (2012).

William Schabas. The Abolition of the Death Penalty in International Law, Second Edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.

H. Schwartz,​​“Death Row Syndrome and Demoralization,” American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, June 2005. 

A. Smith, ​​“THE ANATOMY OF DEATH ROW SYNDROME AND VOLUNTEERING FOR EXECUTION”, Boston University Public Interest Law Journal, 17 B.U. Pub. Int. L.J. 237 (2008).

James R. Acker and David Reed Karp, Wounds That Do Not Bind: Victim-based Perspectives on the Death Penalty, Carolina Academic Press, 2006.

Dakin Adone,​​“The Pittsburgh syn­a­gogue shoot­er faces the death penal­ty despite a pause on fed­er­al exe­cu­tions. Here’s what those who mourn the slain have said about it,” CNN, August 2, 2023.

Susan A. Bandes, Closure in the Criminal Courtroom: The Birth and Strange Career of an Emotion, Edward Elgar Research Handbook on Law and Emotion (September 2019).

Leo Barille,​​“I Forgive You, but You Must Die: Murder Victim Family Members, the Death Penalty, and Restorative Justice,” Victims and Offenders (2014).

Elizabeth Beck, Sarah Britto, and Arlene Andrews, In the Shadow of Death: Restorative Justice and Death Row Families, Oxford University Press, 2007.

Jeanne Bishop, One Woman’s Journey After Her Sister’s Murder, Westminster John Knox Press, 2015.

Antoinette Bosco, Choosing Mercy: A Mother of Murder Victims Pleads to End the Death Penalty, Orbis Books, 2001.

Corey Burton and Richard Tewksbury,​“How Families of Murder Victims Feel Following the Execution of Their Loved One’s Murderer: A Content Analysis of Newspaper Reports of Executions from 2006 – 2011,” Journal of Qualitative Criminal Justice and Criminology, Vol. 1, Number 1 (2013).

California Crime Victims for Alternatives to the Death Penalty.

Kimberly Cook, Shattered Justice: Crime Victims’ Experiences with Wrongful Convictions and Exonerations, Rutgers University Press, 2022.

DPI Podcast: Rep. Renny Cushing on Empowering Crime Survivors and Repealing New Hampshire’s Death Penalty (2019).

Families of Homicide Victims and Missing Persons, Inc. (FOHVAMP).

Eli Hager,​​“They Agreed to Meet Their Mother’s Killer. Then Tragedy Struck Again.” The Marshall Project, July 21, 2020.

Bill Jenkins, What To Do When the Police Leave, 3^rd Edition, In-Sight Books, 2001.

Journey of Hope…from Violence to Healing.

Judith W. Kay, Murdering Myths: The Story Behind the Death Penalty, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., June 2005.

Rachel King, Capital Consequences: Families of the Condemned Tell Their Stories, Rutgers University Press, 2005.

Rachel King, Don’t Kill in Our Names: Families of Murder Victims Speak Out Against the Death Penalty, Rutgers Press, 2003.

Pamela Blume Leonard, Michael Mears, John H. Blume, Stephen P. Garvey, Samuel R. Gross, Richard Burr, et al., Symposium:​“Victims and the Death Penalty: Inside and Outside the Courtroom,” 88 Cornell Law Review 257 (2003).

Brian MacQuarrie, The Ride: A Shocking Murder and a Bereaved Father’s Journey from Rage to Redemption, Da Capo Press, 2009.

Jody Lyneé Madeira, Killing McVeigh: The Death Penalty and the Myth of Closure, New York University Press, May 2012.

Thomas J. Mowen and Ryan D. Schroeder,​“Not In My Name: An Investigation of Victims’ Family Clemency Movements and Court Appointed Closure.” Western Criminology Review 12(1):65 – 81 (2011).

Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights.

National Center for Victims of Crime.

National Organization for Victim Assistance.

Oregonians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, Not in Our Name (December 2017).

Bill Pelke, Journey of Hope … From Violence to Healing, Xlibris Corporation, September 2003.

Marilyn Peterson Armour & Mark S. Umbreit, ​​“Assessing the Impact of the Ultimate Penal Sanction on Homicide Survivors: A Two State Comparison,” 96 Marquette Law Review 1 (2012).

Richard Pompelio,​​“For sur­vivor’s sake, abol­ish the death penal­ty.” Star Ledger, June 12, 2006.

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) Alliance.

Naseem Rakha, The Crying Tree, Broadway Books, 2009.

Michael Radelet, The Incremental Retributive Impact of a Death Sentence Over Life Without Parole, University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform (2016).

Susan F. Sharp, Hidden Victims, Rutgers University Press, 2005.

Richard Stack, Dead Wrong: Violence, Vengeance, and the Victims of Capital Punishment, Praeger Publishers, 2006.

U.S. Department of Justice Office for Victims of Crime.

Courtney Vaughn, Living With the Death Penalty, Xlibris Corporation, 2006.

Women

Mary W. Atwell, Wretched Sisters: Examining Gender and Capital Punishment (Peter Lang Press, 2^nd ed. 2014).

Sandra Babcock, Gendered Capital Punishment 31 Wm. & Mary J. Race, Gender & Soc. Just. (December 01, 2024).

David V. Baker, A Descriptive Profile and Socio-Historical Analysis of Female Executions in the United States: 1632 – 1997, 10(3) Women and Criminal Justice 57 (1999).

Valena E. Beety, ​​“Unfit”: Gender, Ableism and Reproductive Wrongful Convictions, Legal Studies Research Paper Series (2025).

Cornell Center for the Death Penalty Worldwide, Judged for More Than Her Crime: A Global Overview of Women Facing the Death Penalty (September 2018).

Cornell Center on the Death Penalty Worldwide, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with Harm Reduction International, ​‘No One Believed Me’: A Global Overview of Women Facing the Death Penalty for Drug Offenses, (September 2021).

Phyllis Crocker, Is the Death Penalty Good for Women?, 4 Buffalo Criminal Law Review 917 (2001).

Joan W. Howarth, Executing White Masculinities: Learning from Karla Faye Tucker, 81 Oregon Law Review 183 (2002).

Iran Human Rights, Women and the Death Penalty in Iran (October 2021).

Elizabeth Rapaport, Equality of the Damned: The Execution of Women on the Cusp of the 21^stCentury, 26 Ohio Northern University Law Review 581 (2000).

Elizabeth Rapaport, Staying Alive: Executive Clemency, Equal Protection, and the Politics of Gender in Women’s Capital Cases, 4 Buffalo Criminal Law Review 967 (2001). 

Victor Streib, The Fairer Death: Executing Women in Ohio (Ohio University Press, 2006).

American Bar Association Juvenile Justice Center

Amnesty International, ​“The Exclusion of Child Offenders from the Death Penalty Under General International Law”

Amnesty International, ​“Indecent and Internationally Illegal: the Death Penalty Against Child Offenders”

B.J. Casey, C. Simmons, L.H. Somerville, and A. Baskin-Sommers, Making the Sentencing Case: Psychological and Neuroscientific Evidence for Expanding the Age of Youthful Offenders, Annual Review of Criminology, Vol. 5:321 – 343 (2022).

DPI, Age Requirements for the Death Penalty (pri­or to March 1, 2005)

DPI, Immature Minds in a ​“Maturing Society”: Roper v. Simmons at 20, 2025

DPI, Juveniles on Death Row (pri­or to March 1, 2005 and Roper v. Simmons) 

DPI, Juveniles Executed in the U.S. (1976 – 2005)

DPI, Youth and the Death Penalty

DPI Podcast, Protecting Especially Vulnerable Defendants from the Death Penalty

Nitin Gogtay, Jay N. Giedd, Leslie Lusk, Kiralee M. Hayashi, Deanna Greenstein, A. Catherine Vaituzis, Tom F. Nugent, III, David H. Herman, Liv S. Clasen, Arthur W. Toga, Judith L. Rapoport, and Paul M. Thompson, Dynamic Mapping of Human Cortical Development dur­ing Childhood through Early Adulthood, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) (21), 8174 – 8179 (2004).

C. Haney, Baumgartner, F.R. & Steele, K. Roper and Race: the Nature and Effects of Death Penalty Exclusions for Juveniles and the ​“Late Adolescent Class”. J Pediatr Neuropsychol 8, 168 – 177 (2022).

Victor L. Strieb, ​“The Juvenile Death Penalty Today: Death Sentences and Executions for Juvenile Crimes January 1973 — February 28, 2005″.

The Marshall Project, They Went to Prison as Kids, Now They’re on Death Row (2020)