Publications & Testimony

DPI’s “What to Know” series examines capital punishment from multiple angles, one topic at a time. Each installment provides essential facts and data on specific aspects of the death penalty. Why it matters: Deterrence is among the most commonly cited justifications for the death penalty, yet decades of research have failed to produce credible evidence that use of the death penalty has an impact on homicide rates. Key Facts: 88% of the nation’s leading criminologists said they did not…

“By continuing to shroud its executions in secrecy, Florida undermines both the integrity of its own execution process and, potentially, this Court’s ability to ensure the State’s compliance with its constitutional obligations.”
—Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor in a February 24, 2026 *statement* accompanying the denial of certiorari in the case of Melvin Trotter. Melvin Trotter, Ronnie Heath, and Frank Walls — the most recent of the twenty-one…

UPDATE: On March 10, 2026, two days ahead of his scheduled execution, Governor Kay Ivey granted clemency for Charles “Sonny” Burton, commuting his death sentence to a sentence of life without parole. In a statement, Gov. Ivey said, “I cannot proceed in good conscience with the execution of Mr. Burton under such disparate circumstances. I believe it would be unjust for one participant in this crime to be executed while the participant who pulled the trigger was not.” In response to the…

In the February 2026 episode of DPI’s podcast, 12:01: The Death Penalty in Context, Furonda Brasfield (pictured, left) and Taylor Bonner (pictured, below) speak with DPI Managing Director Anne Holsinger about the racial history of the death penalty and how current data and narratives about racial justice play a role in advocacy on the death penalty. As the Death Penalty Information Center’s Racial Justice Storyteller, Ms. Bonner blends data and history to tell the story of the death penalty…

The Constitution mandates that juries be drawn from a “fair cross-section” of the community. Yet public opinion polls show that a substantial portion of the community opposes the death penalty. How, then, can the government seat a jury that will fairly decide whether to impose the death penalty and protect a defendant’s constitutional jury rights? The legal system’s longstanding answer to this question is a procedure called “death qualification,” which allows prosecutors to dismiss any…

“I am extremely concerned by the recent pace of death warrants and the speed with which the parties and involved entities must carry out their respective duties.” Florida Supreme Court Justice Jorge Labarga wrote those words in 2023, a year in which Florida conducted six executions with an average warrant period of 36 days. Such a pace was already straining the state’s judicial, legal, and prison systems. But in 2025, under the sole authority of Governor Ron DeSantis, the state tripled that…

February 21, 2006, a California court’s decision effectively halted the planned execution of Michael Angelo Morales, marking the start of California’s 20-year moratorium on execution scheduling and throwing into the spotlight the tension between physician participation in executions and their pledge to show “the utmost respect for life.” The events surrounding Morales’s impending fate brought to the surface the long-running schism between law and medicine, raising the question of whether any…

Reverend Jesse Jackson Sr., a Baptist minister, two-time presidential candidate, and outspoken critic of the death penalty, died on February 17, 2026, at age 84. His family announced that he died peacefully, surrounded by his loved ones. Rev. Jackson had been living with Parkinson’s disease since his diagnosis in 2015. Rev. Jackson brought sustained public attention to the death penalty across several decades, arguing its use was inseparable from questions of race and economic inequality. He…

When Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry and Attorney General Liz Murrill took office in January 2024, they moved aggressively to restart executions in the state. Gov. Landry signed bills that authorized nitrogen suffocation and electrocution as execution methods, increased his own power over the state capital defense system, and limited post-conviction appeals, while AG Murrill moved to take over capital appeal challenges from local district attorneys. In March 2025, the state conducted its first…