Publications & Testimony

After con­tro­ver­sial exe­cu­tions raised ques­tions of gov­ern­ment com­pe­tence or mis­con­duct, leg­is­la­tures in two states have respond­ed with bills tak­ing sharply dif­fer­ent approach­es to the ques­tions of gov­ern­ment account­abil­i­ty and public…

By an over­whelm­ing 279 – 88 mar­gin, a veto-proof major­i­ty of the New Hampshire House of Representatives vot­ed on March 7, 2019 to repeal the state’s death penal­ty. Demonstrating strong bipar­ti­san sup­port that gar­nered the back­ing of 56 more leg­is­la­tors than an iden­ti­cal repeal bill received in April 2018, the vote end­ed spec­u­la­tion as to how the recon­sti­tut­ed cham­ber would respond to repeal. 93 of the 400 rep­re­sen­ta­tives in the state house who par­tic­i­pat­ed in the vote in 2018 did not…

A new study of four­teen years of Pennsylvania mur­der con­vic­tions has doc­u­ment­ed a sharp decline in coun­ty pros­e­cu­tors’ use of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment across the Commonwealth. After exam­in­ing the court files of 4,184 mur­der con­vic­tions from 2004 to 2017, the Allentown Morning Call found that Pennsylvania pros­e­cu­tors sought the death penal­ty at more than triple the rate (3.3) at the start of the study peri­od than they did four­teen years lat­er — a drop of more than 70%. In…

For the first time in more than a decade, a jury in Wake County, North Carolina has sen­tenced a defen­dant to death. On March 4, 2019, a cap­i­tal sen­tenc­ing jury vot­ed to impose the death penal­ty upon Seaga Edward Gillard, con­vict­ed of the dou­ble mur­der of a preg­nant pros­ti­tute and her boyfriend, who was assist­ing her in her busi­ness. It was the county’s tenth death-penal­ty tri­al since 2008, but juries had reject­ed a death sen­tence in each of the previous nine…

Whose inter­ests does a lawyer rep­re­sent, the cap­i­tal defen­dant whose life is at stake or the abu­sive father pay­ing for his defense? Alabama death-row pris­on­er Nicholas Acklin (pic­tured) is seek­ing U.S. Supreme Court review of that issue because he alleges that the lawyer who rep­re­sent­ed him at tri­al had a finan­cial con­flict of inter­est that affect­ed the way he rep­re­sent­ed Acklin in the penal­ty phase of his cap­i­tal tri­al. Nick Acklin’s father, Theodis Acklin,…

Death-row exoneree Alfred Dewayne Brown (pic­tured) was declared ​“actu­al­ly inno­cent” by Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg on March 1, 2019, mak­ing Brown eli­gi­ble for state com­pen­sa­tion for the time he spent wrong­ful­ly impris­oned on Texas’ death row. ​“My oblig­a­tion as an advo­cate is not to tell peo­ple what they want to hear but to tell them the truth,” Ogg said at a press con­fer­ence. ​“Alfred Brown was wrong­ful­ly con­vict­ed through pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct.” Brown was freed…

The United States Supreme Court has reversed a deci­sion of the Alabama state courts that would have per­mit­ted the exe­cu­tion of Vernon Madison (pic­tured), a death-row pris­on­er whose severe demen­tia has left him with no mem­o­ry of the crime for which he was sen­tenced to death and com­pro­mised his under­stand­ing of why he was to be…

Texas is sched­uled to exe­cute Billie Wayne Coble (pic­tured) on February 28, 2019, despite court find­ings that two expert wit­ness­es who tes­ti­fied for the pros­e­cu­tion gave ​“prob­lem­at­ic” and ​“fab­ri­cat­ed” tes­ti­mo­ny at his tri­al. Coble was sen­tenced to death in 1990 and resen­tenced in 2008 after his orig­i­nal sen­tence was over­turned as a result of con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly defi­cient jury instruc­tions. At his resen­tenc­ing, the issue of future dan­ger­ous­ness presented a…