Publications & Testimony

The North Carolina Supreme Court has struck down the state legislature’s attempted retroactive repeal of the state’s Racial Justice Act (RJA), restoring the rights of approximately 140 death-row prisoners to seek redress of death sentences that they had claimed were substantially affected by racial bias. The Court issued its rulings in the cases of death-row prisoners Andrew Ramseur (pictured, left) and Rayford Burke (pictured, right) on June 5, 2020, holding that “the retroactive application…

In three decades of providing information and analysis on the death penalty, DPIC has covered thousands of cases, studies, and scholarly articles on the administration of the death penalty in the United States. We know that racial injustice has been a core problem in the administration of the death penalty and that it persists to the present day. The history of the death penalty is intertwined with that of vigilante and law enforcement violence against African Americans. With this knowledge, we…

NEWS (6/5/20) — North Carolina: The North Carolina Supreme Court has struck down the state legislature’s attempted retroactive repeal of the state’s Racial Justice Act, restoring the rights of approximately 130 death-row prisoners to seek redress of death sentences that they had claimed were substantially affected by racial bias. The Court issued its 6 – 1 rulings in the cases of death-row prisoners Andrew Ramseur (pictured, left) and Rayford Burke (pictured, right), holding that “the…

NEWS (6/5/20) — Ohio: Governor Mike DeWine (pictured) issued reprieves to the last three Ohio death-row prisoners facing executions dates in 2020, ensuring that the state will not carry out any executions this year. A news release announcing the action said the reprieves were granted “due to ongoing problems involving the willingness of pharmaceutical suppliers to provide drugs to the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (DRC), pursuant to DRC protocol, without endangering other…

Texas death-row prisoner Ruben Gutierrez (pictured) has asked the Texas state courts to stay his execution because of the COVID-19 pandemic as federal litigation continues on his efforts to obtain DNA testing and to require Texas to permit him to have a chaplain present in the execution chamber if his execution proceeds. Attorneys for Gutierrez, whose execution is currently scheduled for June 16, 2020, argue that the pandemic has made it impossible for them to perform critical investigation…

U.S. District Judge Kristine Baker on June 1, 2020 denied a challenge brought by Arkansas death-row prisoners to the use of the controversial drug midazolam in carrying out executions. The ruling followed a two-week hearing on the issue held in May 2019. Lawyers for the prisoners had argued that midazolam does not adequately anesthetize a prisoner during an execution before the second and third drugs, a paralytic drug and a drug that stops the heart, are administered. An attorney for the…

Atlanta is poised to become the latest in a growing number of U.S. cities in which prosecutors have pledged not to seek the death penalty or to use it more sparingly. On May 26, 2020, at a candidate forum hosted by the Georgia Justice Reform Partnership, all three Democratic candidates in Fulton County, Georgia’s June 9 primary election for District Attorney said they would not seek the death penalty. With no Republican opponent in the general election, the winner of the Democratic primary…

State appeal courts in Nevada and Pennsylvania have barred the retrial of two former death-row prisoners as a result of prosecutorial misconduct, paving the way for their exonerations. On January 24, 2020, months after his release from prison, the Nevada Supreme Court affirmed the decision of a Las Vegas trial court that had dismissed all charges against former death-row prisoner Paul Browning (pictured, left), formally completing his exoneration. Then, on May 19, 2020, the Pennsylvania…

A Florida judge has denied death-row prisoner James Dailey’s motion for a new trial on May 29, 2020, ruling that no new admissible evidence supported Dailey’s claim of innocence. Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Pat Siracusa’s decision came just one day after journalist Pamela Colloff won a National Magazine Award for her investigation of a notorious jailhouse informant who provided key testimony against Dailey. At a hearing in March, Dailey’s attorneys had hoped to present testimony from his…

A federal district court has granted a new trial to Pennsylvania death-row prisoner Samuel Randolph (pictured), holding that the trial court unconstitutionally denied Randolph the right to be represented by counsel of choice, forcing him to go to trial with an unprepared court-appointed lawyer with whom he had an “absolute[,] complete breakdown of communication.” In overturning Randolph’s convictions and death sentences for the murders of two men in a Harrisburg bar in 2001, Chief Judge…