Publications & Testimony

Nebraska​’s uni­cam­er­al leg­is­la­ture vot­ed on February 13, 2020 to advance a bill that would increase trans­paren­cy in the state’s exe­cu­tion process. LB 238, which would allow wit­ness­es to see the exe­cu­tion from the moment the pris­on­er enters the death cham­ber until the pris­on­er is declared dead or the exe­cu­tion is halt­ed, passed an ini­tial con­sid­er­a­tion by a 33 – 7 vote. It must pass a sec­ond vote in order to be submitted…

NEWS (2/​19/​20): Dana Cook has been named National Mitigation Coordinator for the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts’ National Habeas Assistance and Training Counsel Project. Cook has more than two decades of expe­ri­ence in cap­i­tal defend­er offices in Pennsylvania and Tennessee work­ing as a mit­i­ga­tion spe­cial­ist at the tri­al and post-con­vic­­tion stages of death-penal­­ty cas­es and in train­ing lawyers and inves­ti­ga­tors in prepar­ing and presenting…

The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) has announced plans to allow some of the state’s death-sen­­tenced pris­on­ers to move from San Quentin’s death row to oth­er state pris­ons that offer work and oth­er reha­bil­i­ta­tive pro­grams. In what has been billed a​“pilot pro­gram,” the eli­gi­ble pris­on­ers will be able to trans­fer to one of eight less cost­ly high-secu­ri­­ty pris­ons that pro­vide reha­bil­i­ta­tive ser­vices. The death-sentenced…

Tennessee has sched­uled three upcom­ing exe­cu­tions, despite ongo­ing lit­i­ga­tion sur­round­ing the use of its lethal injec­tion pro­to­col and prob­lems with its lethal-injec­­tion drugs that have led five pris­on­ers to opt for death by elec­tro­cu­tion. Attorneys for five oth­er death-row pris­on­ers, includ­ing Oscar Smith, who has an exe­cu­tion date of June 4, 2020, have filed a fed­er­al suit pre­sent­ing new evi­dence chal­leng­ing the state’s…

DNA exon­er­at­ed Ryan Matthews in 2004, after he had spent five years on death row at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola for a mur­der he did not com­mit. In December 2019, he received his col­lege degree.​“I’m so used to obsta­cles get­ting in my way,” Matthews, told Nola​.com.​“But that won’t stop me. When one door shuts, I work to get another…

NEWS (2/​17/​20): A Kentucky pub­lic defend­er has been cleared of charges that she tam­pered with evi­dence in a cap­i­tal case. On February 17, 2020, a Kentucky grand jury declined to indict Angela Elleman on a felony charge aris­ing out of alle­ga­tions that she and a defense inves­ti­ga­tor had dug up shell cas­ings linked to a mur­der case and kept them in a safe for more than six years. Elleman rep­re­sents Anthony Hogan,…

After a five-year hia­tus, Oklahoma has announced plans to resume exe­cu­tions by return­ing to the same com­bi­na­tion of lethal-injec­­tion drugs that were part of its exe­cu­tion pro­to­col dur­ing a series of botched executions in…

Rocky Myers (pic­tured) may be inno­cent and intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled, and his jury vot­ed to sen­tence him to life. So why is he fac­ing execution in…

NEWS (2/​13/​20): The California Supreme Court has grant­ed a new tri­al to Kenneth Earl Gay, who was sen­tenced to death in 1985 for the mur­der of a Los Angeles police offi­cer. In a unan­i­mous deci­sion on February 13, 2020, the court ruled that Gay’s lawyer had​“obtained appoint­ment to rep­re­sent Gay through fraud, coun­seled him to make dam­ag­ing con­fes­sions to the pros­e­cu­tion with­out safe­guards to ensure the con­fes­sions would not be used with­out a deal…

NEWS (2/​13/​20): The Florida Supreme Court issued opin­ions on February 13, 2020 deny­ing relief to pris­on­ers in three death…