Publications & Testimony

Amidst a con­tin­ued post-elec­­tion exe­cu­tion surge and increased sup­pres­sion of peace­ful prison protests, Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO) and 67 human rights orga­ni­za­tions across four con­ti­nents expressed their sup­port for the ongo­ing​“No Death Penalty Tuesdays” week­ly hunger strike move­ment cur­rent­ly span­ning 17 Iranian pris­ons across the coun­try. The August 27, 2024 state­ment, pub­lished a day after the first pub­lic hang­ing of the year,​“call[ed] for an…

South Carolina…

In this new series, the Death Penalty Information Center will occa­sion­al­ly high­light stu­dent works on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, includ­ing master’s and PhD the­ses, and law…

On August 21, 2024, Marcellus Williams (pic­tured), who is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed on September 24, 2024, agreed to enter an Alford plea in exchange for a sen­tence of life with­out parole. This agree­ment would have ensured that Mr. Williams, who has always main­tained his inno­cence in the 1998 mur­der of Felicia Gayle, would not be exe­cut­ed. But hours after Judge Bruce F. Hilton accept­ed the plea agree­ment, Attorney General Andrew Bailey asked the Missouri Supreme Court to…

Glynn Simmons, cen­ter, with members of…

An analy­sis from The Appeal of more than two dozen cas­es in which LGBTQ+ defen­dants faced the death penal­ty found evi­dence that anti-LGBTQ+ bias affect­ed case out­comes. After an exam­i­na­tion of media reports, aca­d­e­m­ic jour­nals, and legal doc­u­ments, The Appeal deter­mined that these cas­es are like­ly a sig­nif­i­cant under­count of the num­ber of LGBTQ+ peo­ple sen­tenced to death.​“These cap­i­tal cas­es illus­trate the ingrained anti-LGBTQ+ bias endemic to…

Senator Carolyn McGinn (left) and Kelson Bohnet…

Former U.S. Solicitor General Theodore…

On August 7, 2024, Oklahoma’s Pardon and Parole Board vot­ed 3 – 2 to rec­om­mend clemen­cy for 52-year-old Emmanuel Littlejohn, who is cur­rent­ly sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed on September 26. The final deci­sion to grant clemen­cy, reduc­ing Mr. Littlejohn’s death sen­tence to life with­out parole, rests with Governor Kevin Stitt, who has only grant­ed clemency once…

Photo cour­tesy of friends…