Articles

In a recent op-ed in the Baltimore Sun, for­mer FBI Director William Sessions (pic­tured) under­scored the impor­tance of reli­able FBI foren­sic analy­sis in con­vict­ing the guilty and exon­er­at­ing the inno­cent. Sessions pro­vid­ed the exam­ple of Willie Jerome Manning, who received a last-minute stay of exe­cu­tion in Mississippi in order to allow time to con­duct test­ing on DNA evi­dence that could exon­er­ate him. Manning was con­vict­ed in 1994 based on FBI tes­ti­mo­ny that has since been inval­i­dat­ed by the U.S. Department of Justice. Sessions also urged state pros­e­cu­tors and judges to…

A June 3 edi­to­r­i­al in the Sun Sentinel called on Florida Governor Rick Scott (pic­tured) to veto the Timely Justice Act, a bill passed by the leg­is­la­ture ear­li­er this year that would accel­er­ate exe­cu­tions. The bill requires the gov­er­nor to sign a death war­rant with­in 30 days of a Supreme Court review, with an exe­cu­tion to fol­low with­in 180 days. According to the edi­to­r­i­al, flaws in the sys­tem, evi­denced by death row exon­er­a­tions, should be suf­fi­cient rea­son to reject a bill that would speed up the death penal­ty process in…

The Kansas City Star recent­ly called for an end to the death penal­ty in Kansas and Missouri. The edi­tors wrote, ​“The arc of his­to­ry is bend­ing toward jus­tice when it comes to the death penal­ty, and there’s no good rea­son Missouri and Kansas should lag behind and con­tin­ue to be on the wrong side of both his­to­ry and jus­tice.” The high costs of imple­ment­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment and the risks of wrong­ful exe­cu­tions were among the rea­sons cit­ed for doing away with the pun­ish­ment. With respect to inno­cence, the paper stated,…

Colorado recent­ly set an exe­cu­tion date in August for Nathan Dunlap, who has been con­vict­ed of mul­ti­ple mur­ders. This would be first exe­cu­tion in the state in 16 years. In an edi­to­r­i­al, the Aurora Sentinel rec­om­mend­ed that the gov­er­nor spare his life, not because of doubts about his guilt, but because of doubts about oth­er aspects of the process that led to his death sen­tence: ​“There is sim­ply too much doubt about the effec­tive­ness of the death penal­ty. There is too much doubt about whether Dunlap drew the sen­tence because…

An edi­to­r­i­al in the Miami Herald called on Florida Governor Rick Scott (pic­tured) to veto a bill recent­ly passed by the leg­is­la­ture requir­ing the gov­er­nor to sign a death war­rant with­in 30 days after state Supreme Court review, with the exe­cu­tion tak­ing place with­in 180 days after that. The edi­to­r­i­al list­ed sev­er­al death row inmates who were exon­er­at­ed after spend­ing more than 10 years on death row, and not­ed, ​“All of them might have been exe­cut­ed if the leg­is­la­tion that’s head­ing to the gov­er­nor’s desk had been the law.” The…

A recent edi­to­r­i­al in the Lincoln (Neb.) Journal Star high­light­ed some of the con­ser­v­a­tive argu­ments oppos­ing the death penal­ty. Edward Crane (pic­tured), founder of the CATO Institute, a lib­er­tar­i­an think tank, said, ​“My own view on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment is that it is moral­ly jus­ti­fied but that the gov­ern­ment is often so inept and cor­rupt that inno­cent peo­ple might die as a result. Thus, I per­son­al­ly oppose cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment.” The edi­to­r­i­al also quot­ed Mary Kate Cary, for­mer speech­writer for President George H. W. Bush, who said, ​“It’s becom­ing hard­er to justify…

A recent edi­to­r­i­al in the Nebraska Star-Herald indi­cat­ed a shift in its posi­tion on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Although the paper has always sup­port­ed the death penal­ty in the past, its lat­est edi­to­r­i­al described the death penal­ty as ​“a mock­ery of jus­tice” and a ​“cha­rade.” The edi­tors con­tin­ued to express the belief that some mur­der­ers might deserve cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, but the infre­quen­cy and unpre­dictabil­i­ty of exe­cu­tions led them to con­clude that “[S]o few killers are actu­al­ly put to death that it’s become a judi­cial aber­ra­tion.” The paper point­ed out that ​“only three…

The Dallas Morning News used the recent repeal of the death penal­ty in Maryland as an occa­sion to advo­cate for death-penal­ty reform in Texas. The edi­tors com­ment­ed on the over­all impro­pri­ety of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment: ​“At best, the death penal­ty is selec­tive­ly used state-sup­port­ed ret­ri­bu­tion, which has no place in a civ­i­lized soci­ety.” The edi­to­r­i­al sup­port­ed six pend­ing bills aimed at improv­ing the fair­ness of the death penal­ty. One bill would bar the use of infor­mant tes­ti­mo­ny in death penal­ty cas­es if the tes­ti­mo­ny was obtained from a wit­ness or accomplice…

Texas death-row inmate Andre Thomas has been diag­nosed with para­noid schiz­o­phre­nia, and audi­to­ry hal­lu­ci­na­tions drove him to gouge out both of his eyes. Nevertheless, pros­e­cu­tors still believe he should be executed.

A recent edi­to­r­i­al in the Great Falls Tribune in Montana out­lined some of the key prob­lems with the death penal­ty as the state leg­is­la­ture con­sid­ers its repeal. The edi­tors expressed con­cerns about the risks of mis­take with exe­cu­tions: ​“There is no way to take back an exe­cu­tion. That rea­son alone pro­vides good cause to elim­i­nate the death penal­ty in Montana.” The paper also not­ed that vic­tims’ fam­i­lies wait for decades for exe­cu­tions to be car­ried out, with the defen­dants receiv­ing most of the atten­tion: “[D]uring the long peri­ods before their…