Publications & Testimony

Items: 151 — 160


Apr 25, 2024

Articles of Interest: Juror Who Sentenced Toforest Johnson to Death Now Believes He Is Innocent

Monique Hicks, one of the twelve peo­ple who served on the Alabama jury that con­vict­ed Toforest Johnson and sen­tenced him to death, said in an op-ed pub­lished on April 22, 2024 that she now believes Mr. Johnson deserves a new tri­al. Ms. Hicks recounts the new evi­dence that has come to light in the case and writes, My role in the wrong­ful con­vic­tion of an inno­cent man keeps me awake at…

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Apr 24, 2024

Supreme Court Roundup: Justices Hear Oral Arguments on Ineffective Assistance of Counsel, Cruel and Unusual Punishment; Defend Positions on Stays

On April 17, the Supreme Court heard oral argu­ments in Thornell v. Jones, a case impli­cat­ing the test for inef­fec­tive assis­tance of coun­sel — and the first and only oral argu­ment in a death penal­ty case sched­uled this term. Arizona appealed the Ninth Circuit’s deci­sion vacat­ing the death sen­tence of Danny Lee Jones, which found that Mr. Jones was prej­u­diced by his attorney’s fail­ure to present key mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence as to Mr. Jones’ brain dam­age, child­hood phys­i­cal and sex­u­al abuse, and…

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Apr 23, 2024

Articles of Interest: Reprieve Issues New Report on Botched Executions and Racial Disparities

A new report issued April 17, 2024 by the UK-based inter­na­tion­al human rights orga­ni­za­tion Reprieve found racial dis­par­i­ties in the occur­rence of botched exe­cu­tions in the United States. As report­ed in The Guardian, Reprieve ana­lyzed all lethal injec­tion exe­cu­tions between 1976 and 2023. It chron­i­cled 73 con­firmed botched pro­ce­dures and found that 8% of exe­cu­tions of Black peo­ple were botched (37 times out of 465 exe­cu­tions), com­pared with 4% for white peo­ple (28 out of…

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Apr 22, 2024

Louisiana Senate Committee Approves Legislation Supported by Jewish Community to Remove Nitrogen Hypoxia as Possible Method of Execution

On April 16, 2024, the Louisiana Senate Judiciary B Committee unan­i­mous­ly vot­ed to advance a bill that would remove nitro­gen hypox­ia from the state’s avail­able meth­ods of exe­cu­tion. Introduced by state Senator Katrina Jackson-Andrews, Senate Bill 430 is sup­port­ed by the Jews Against Gassing Coalition, an orga­ni­za­tion con­sist­ing of Jewish Louisiana res­i­dents who oppose state-sanc­tioned gas exe­cu­tions. We rec­og­nize, of course, that the gassing of inno­cent vic­tims in the Holocaust is quite…

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Apr 18, 2024

United States Provides Binding Assurances to the United Kingdom that Julian Assange Will Not Face the Death Penalty If Extradited

On April 16, 2024, the Biden Administration pro­vid­ed assur­ances to the United Kingdom that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who is fac­ing extra­di­tion to the United States on espi­onage charges, would not face the death penal­ty. A hear­ing is now sched­uled in London on May 20 to eval­u­ate the assur­ances and decide whether Mr. Assange has any remain­ing legal recourse. A few weeks ear­li­er, the High Court in London grant­ed Mr. Assange a reprieve from extra­di­tion, agree­ing to grant him an appeal if…

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Apr 17, 2024

Justices Sotomayor and Jackson Issue Dissents Over Supreme Court’s Refusal to Review Two Capital Misconduct Cases

On Monday, April 15, Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson and Sonia Sotomayor issued dis­sents over the Supreme Court’s refusal to hear the peti­tions of two death-sen­tenced pris­on­ers who alleged offi­cial mis­con­duct in their cas­es. In the first case, Dillion Compton alleged that Texas pros­e­cu­tors ille­gal­ly used thir­teen of their fif­teen peremp­to­ry strikes to remove female prospec­tive jurors because of their gen­der. In the sec­ond case, Kurt Michaels argued that California police officers unlawfully…

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Apr 16, 2024

Trial Judge Signs Agreed Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law, Recommending Melissa Lucio’s Conviction and Death Sentence Be Overturned

On April 12, 2024, Judge Arturo Nelson signed an Agreed Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law sub­mit­ted by the pros­e­cu­tion and defense stat­ing that Melissa Lucio (pic­tured) was not giv­en access to favor­able infor­ma­tion in the prosecution’s pos­ses­sion at the time of tri­al. The acknowl­edge­ment of this con­sti­tu­tion­al error result­ed in Judge Nelson’s rec­om­men­da­tion to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCCA) that Ms. Lucio’s con­vic­tion and death sen­tence be over­turned. The rul­ing marks the…

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Apr 15, 2024

Wilbert Rideau, former Louisiana Death-Sentenced Prisoner, is Honored for Extraordinary Journalism During 44 Years at Angola Prison

On April 12, 2024, Long Island University cel­e­brat­ed the 2023 George Polk Awards in Journalism, hon­or­ing inves­tiga­tive jour­nal­ists and rec­og­niz­ing six­teen for­mer win­ners, includ­ing for­mer­ly death-sen­tenced pris­on­er Wilbert Rideau. Mr. Rideau spent forty-four years incar­cer­at­ed in Louisiana’s Angola State Penitentiary where he cre­at­ed The Lifer, one of the first Black prison peri­od­i­cals. Sentenced to death in 1961 at age nine­teen, Mr. Rideau spent twelve years on death row before the…

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Apr 12, 2024

John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight” Criticizes Execution Secrecy Laws and Sketchy” Procurement of Pentobarbital by Federal Government

During the April 7, 2024, episode of Last Week Tonight,” host John Oliver focused on grim devel­op­ments” in the death penal­ty since his last seg­ment cov­er­ing lethal injec­tion in 2019. Since then, 91 peo­ple have been exe­cut­ed, includ­ing 13 fed­er­al pris­on­ers dur­ing for­mer President Donald Trump’s admin­is­tra­tion. Our fed­er­al and state gov­ern­ments have con­tin­ued to pur­sue ques­tion­ably legal and def­i­nite­ly hor­ri­fy­ing ways, that, again, I would argue they shouldn’t be doing at all,” Mr. Oliver…

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Apr 11, 2024

Rare Agreement Between District Attorney and Defense Counsel Acknowledge Prosecutorial Misconduct and Need for New Trial for Melissa Lucio

On April 5, 2024, Cameron County District Attorney Luis Saenz and Innocence Project attor­ney Vanessa Potkin released a joint state­ment regard­ing Melissa Lucio’s case, which has been pend­ing addi­tion­al review for almost two years. On January 11, 2023, the par­ties sub­mit­ted an Agreed Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law stat­ing that the defense was not giv­en access to favor­able infor­ma­tion in the prosecution’s pos­ses­sion at tri­al, an error that they agree should enti­tle Ms. Lucio to a new…

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