Publications & Testimony

Saying that states have ​“no compelling need” to keep execution information secret, the American Bar Association (ABA) has asked the Idaho Supreme Court to require the state to disclose numerous execution-related documents under Idaho’s freedom of information law. On February 28, 2020, the ABA and a coalition of Idaho media organizations led by the Idaho Press Club filed amicus curiae briefs in Cover v. Idaho Board of Correction in support of an Idaho law professor’s lawsuit seeking release of…

NEWS (3/​13) — North Carolina: The North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission voted 5 – 3 to empanel a three-judge review committee to determine whether four men convicted as teens should be exonerated of the murder of NBA star Chris Paul’s grandfather, Nathaniel Jones. A fifth teen convicted in the murder died before he could submit his case for review by the Commission. Nathaniel Cauthen and his younger brother, Rayshawn Banner were charged and convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to…

Washington — A bill that would formally remove Washington’s judicially abolished death penalty from the state’s statute books has failed. SB 5339, which passed the state senate on January 31 and was approved by the House Committee on Public Safety on February 27, did not come up for a vote on the floor of the state House of Representatives by the March 7 deadline for consideration during the 2020 legislative session. The failure has no effect on the judicial abolition of the state’s death…

After a review of the case by its Conviction Integrity Unit (CIU), the Philadelphia District Attorney’s office has told a state trial court that death-row prisoner Walter Ogrod (pictured) is ​“likely innocent,” that newly discovered evidence showed that city prosecutors had violated his right to due process, and that his conviction and death sentence should be vacated. In briefing filed in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas on February 28, 2020, CIU Chief Patricia Cummings wrote that her…

NEWS (3/​6/​20): The United States Court of Military Appeals has upheld the conviction and death sentence of Timothy Hennis, following his acquittal in North Carolina on the same charges. The court’s ruling, issued on February 28, rejected Hennis’ challenges to the military court’s jurisdiction to try him for a May 1985 rape and triple murder. Hennis had been convicted of the charges in the North Carolina state courts in July 1986 and was sentenced to death. On appeal, the North Carolina Supreme…

A bipartisan coalition of Ohio lawmakers has announced plans to introduce legislation to end capital punishment in the Buckeye State. At a press conference at the state capitol in Columbus on March 4, 2020, State Senator Nickie J. Antonio (D – Lakewood, pictured, left) said that she and Senator Peggy Lehner (R – Kettering, pictured, right) would be jointly sponsoring a bill to abolish the death penalty and replace it with a sentence of life without possibility of parole. The announcement comes as…

In the March 2020 episode of Discussions with DPIC, Hannah Cox (pictured), National Manager of Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty (CCATDP) speaks with Death Penalty Information Center Executive Director Robert Dunham about the continuing movement by social and political conservatives away from capital punishment, how the death penalty is out of step with core conservative values, and the key role that conservative legislators are playing in abolition efforts across the U.S.

Sandra Lockett-Young (pictured, right, with Sister Helen Prejean), whose case established a capital defendant’s right to present a broad range of mitigating evidence concerning her character, background, and record and the circumstances of her offense, has died. Lockett had suffered a severe stroke in June 2019 from which she never recovered. She died in an Ohio hospice on February 26, 2020 at 65 years old. Then 21 years old, Lockett was sentenced to death in 1975 under an Ohio law that…

Less than two weeks after Oklahoma officials announced that the state would return to the same controversial three-drug execution protocol implicated in a series of botched executions in 2014 and 2015, the state’s death-row prisoners have asked a federal court to reactivate their lawsuit challenging the state’s execution process. The February 27, 2020 filing in the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma called the new protocol ​“incomplete” and said it failed to comply…

NEWS (2/​29/​20): Four states and the federal government had scheduled 12 executions to take place in January or February 2020. Through February 2020, four executions had been carried out: two in Texas and one each in Georgia and Tennessee. (To enlarge map, click here.) As of February 29, 43 execution dates had been scheduled for 2020 by 7 states and the federal government. Six executions had been stayed and another halted by commutation. Eight executions had been reprieved and rescheduled…