Publications & Testimony

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit heard nearly two hours of argument on January 15, 2020 in four consolidated cases that could determine whether the federal government will be able to resume executions in 2020. The appeals panel — composed of Gregory G. Katsas and Neomi Rao, both appointed by President Donald Trump, and David S. Tatel, appointed by former President Bill Clinton — sharply questioned lawyers for the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and four federal…

As Texas prepared to carry out the first execution of 2020 on January 15, neighboring Oklahoma — once the second most prolific executioner in the United States — marked five years since its last execution. The states present a contrast in execution practices. Though the use of the death penalty has sharply declined in both states, Texas continues to lead the nation in executions, while Oklahoma will join the nearly two-thirds of death-penalty states (18 of 29) that have not carried out any…

Just Mercy, the movie adaptation of Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) Executive Director Bryan Stevenson’s book of the same name, celebrated its nationwide release on January 10, 2020 with weekend ticket sales of more than $9.7 million. The film, which focuses on the wrongful conviction of Walter McMillian — one of Stevenson’s early death-penalty cases — ranked fifth among all movies in domestic box office receipts. McMillian, an African-American man who had angered local law enforcement by having an…

On January 16, Georgia plans to execute Jimmy Meders (pictured in his National Guard uniform), a man whom jurors say they would have sentenced to life without parole if that option had been available and who, state sentencing practices suggest, would not face the death penalty today. For those reasons, Meders’ lawyers say in court pleadings and an application before the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles, his execution would violate contemporary standards of decency and he should be granted…

NEWS — January 14 and 17: Florida juries have rejected the death penalty in capital sentencing retrials of two prisoners who had initially been unconstitutionally sentenced to death following non-unanimous jury votes for death. On January 14, a Flagler County jury for the third time returned a non-unanimous sentencing recommendation in the case of David Snelgrove, who was convicted in May 2002 of the double murder of an elderly couple. The judge in his first trial imposed the death penalty after…

In two cases in which the death penalty played a central role, recent exonerees in Florida and Idaho have initiated legal proceedings against government officials, alleging that they were wrongfully prosecuted and convicted. On January 7, 2020, Florida death-row exoneree Clemente Aguirre-Jarquin (pictured with his lawyers), filed suit in federal court against Seminole County, the county sheriff’s office, and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) alleging that he had been wrongfully…

The Nebraska Supreme Court has ruled that the 2015 legislative repeal of the state’s death-penalty statute did not invalidate the death sentences of the prisoners on the state’s death row because the repeal bill never became law before it was rejected by a statewide voter referendum. In a decision issued January 3, 2020, the court dismissed a claim brought by death-row prisoner Marco Torres (pictured) that the legislature’s repeal of the death-penalty law changed his death sentence to life…

After having been rebuked by the U.S. Supreme Court in June 2019 for his pattern of racially biased jury selection in the capital prosecutions of Curtis Flowers and sued in federal court to bar future race-based jury strikes, Mississippi prosecutor Doug Evans has voluntarily recused himself from future involvement in Flowers’ case. Evans has been the driving force in Flowers’ case for more than 20 years, personally prosecuting Flowers (pictured, right, with defense co-counsel Henderson Hill)…

On January 7, 2020, Louisiana marked the passage of ten years since its last execution. As a result of the milestone, two-thirds of U.S. states have now either abolished the death penalty or gone at least a decade without an execution. Twenty-one U.S. states have judicially or legislatively abolished capital punishment. With Louisiana joining their ranks, 12 of the 29 states that still authorize the death penalty (41.4%) have gone more than a decade without carrying out an execution. (Click…

With executions on hold due to problems with the lethal-injection protocol, the future of capital punishment in Ohio is uncertain. High-ranking Ohio officials have expressed concerns about the effectiveness and viability of the state’s death penalty, and two recent columns in leading Ohio newspapers have argued that the state should end capital punishment. In a year-end interview with the Toledo Blade, Governor Mike DeWine intimated that Ohio’s death penalty was both unworkable in practice and…