Articles
Items: 91 — 100
May 17, 2012
EDITORIALS: The Fallibility of Forensic Evidence Argues Against the Death Penalty
A recent editorial in the Lincoln Journal Star of Nebraska concluded that experience with inaccurate evidence from crime labs shows that the death penalty cannot be trusted in the taking of life. The paper called for the repeal of the death penalty based on a case in which the state’s CSI director tampered with evidence in a murder case. Recently, the Nebraska Supreme Court upheld the conviction of former CSI chief David…
Read MoreMay 16, 2012
NEW VOICES: Texas’s Baptist Standard Advocates Ending Death Penalty
An editorial in the Baptist Standard, published in Texas, recently called for repealing the death penalty in the next legislative session. Among the reasons cited by the paper for ending capital punishment were principles of religious faith, the risk of executing innocent defendants, its ineffectiveness in deterring crime, the high costs of prosecution, and its unfairness in affecting the poor and people of color. The editorial quoted the recent…
Read MoreMay 11, 2012
EDITORIALS: “Shortage of Key Drugs May Suspend Death Penalty in Missouri”
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch urged Missouri to end its death penalty as the system has ground to a halt because of controversies involving its method of execution. On May 8, a federal appeals court declined to rule on a challenge to the state’s lethal injection protocol because the Department of Corrections could no longer obtain one of the three drugs specified in the protocol. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit said,…
Read MoreMay 02, 2012
COMMENTARY: Death Penalty Climate Changing
Commentary from nationally syndicated columnist E.J. Dionne (pictured) and the New York Times reflected on the changing state of the death penalty in the U.S. in light of recent developments. Dionne cited the repeal of the death penalty in Connecticut as an example of a “remarkable pivot in the politics of the death penalty, the premier issue on which an overwhelming consensus favoring what’s taken to be the conservative side has…
Read MoreApr 26, 2012
RACE: Commentary on the Anniversary of McCleskey v. Kemp
In an op-ed written for the 25th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in McCleskey v. Kemp, nationally acclaimed death penalty expert James Acker (pictured) called for a reassessment of how race is affecting death penalty decisions. Prof. Acker questioned the Court’s refusal to find bias in the wake of the strong statistical evidence presented in that case. He wrote, “The time has surely come for a sober reassessment of…
Read MoreApr 13, 2012
EDITORIALS: New York Times Recommends All States to Follow Connecticut’s Lead
A recent editorial in the New York Times called Connecticut’s decision to repeal the death penalty part of “a growing movement against capital punishment.” The editorial attributed the trend away from the death penalty to new research that shows “gross injustice in its application and enormous costs in continuing to impose it.” The problem of arbitrariness recently came to light in Connecticut, where “a powerful, comprehensive study provided evidence that…
Read MoreMar 19, 2012
EDITORIALS: ABA Report Finds Serious Problems with Missouri’s Death Penalty
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch called upon leaders in Missouri to make numerous changes to the state’s death penalty in light of a recent American Bar Association report produced by a bipartisan panel of lawyers, judges, prosecutors and law professors. The editorial highlighted many of the ABA’s recommendations, including “improving evidence standards, increasing public defender funding and creating more accountability for prosecutors.”…
Read MoreMar 13, 2012
OP-ED: “Abolishing Death Penalty Was Right Choice for State”
Charles Hoffman, an assistant defender in the Office of the Illinois State Appellate Defender, recently wrote an op-ed in the Chicago Sun-Times, marking a year since the death penalty was repealed in Illinois. Hoffman, who has argued more than 30 death penalty cases before the Illinois Supreme Court, says that repealing the death penalty was the right choice for the state: “The rightness of that decision is more…
Read MoreMar 13, 2012
EDITORIALS: “Maryland’s Broken Death Penalty”
A recent editorial in The Washington Post highlighted ongoing problems with Maryland’s death penalty despite legislation passed in 2009 meant to reform the system. According to the editorial, “the legislature’s reform fixed nothing; if anything, it codified a system even more arbitrary than the one it replaced. Now the nature of the evidence, rather than the barbarity of the crime, is the critical factor. So a murder conviction based on DNA evidence…
Read MoreFeb 01, 2012
EDITORIALS: “Mistakes are made”
A recent editorial in Nebraska’s Journal Star urged support for a bill to replace the death penalty with a sentence of life in prison. Among the reasons cited for its position was the risk of executing an innocent person. The editorial noted that advancements in DNA testing have shown the fallibility of the current system: “Seventeen people who were on death row have been set free after DNA testing proved they were wrongly convicted.” The editorial also pointed to…
Read More