Publications & Testimony

UPDATE: Wesbrook was exe­cut­ed on Mar. 9. EARLIER: Coy Wesbrook is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed in Texas on March 9. If the exe­cu­tion pro­ceeds, it will be the eighth in the U.S. this year, half of which have been in Texas. Wesbrook killed five peo­ple after a con­fronta­tion with his ex-wife. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that defen­dants with intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty (for­mer­ly referred to as ​“men­tal retar­da­tion”) are exempt from the death penalty.

The Lexington Herald-Leader, Kentucky’s sec­ond-largest news­pa­per, announced it was end­ing its long-held sup­port for the death penal­ty, and now believes the state leg­is­la­ture should abol­ish cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Describing its pre­vi­ous posi­tion as ​“keep it but fix it,” the edi­tors stat­ed, ​“we must now con­cede that the death penal­ty is not going to be fixed and, in fact, prob­a­bly can­not be fixed at any defen­si­ble cost to tax­pay­ers.” Citing the 2011 American Bar Association assess­ment of…

The U.S. Supreme Court issued a per curi­am deci­sion on March 7 grant­i­ng a new tri­al to Louisiana death row inmate Michael Wearry as a result of mul­ti­ple acts of mis­con­duct by pros­e­cu­tors in his case. No phys­i­cal evi­dence linked Wearry to the mur­der. His con­vic­tion was based large­ly on the tes­ti­mo­ny of an infor­mant, Sam Scott, who came for­ward two years after the crime with an account that did not match the details of the crime. Scott altered his sto­ry over the course of four…

UPDATE: Gov. Rick Scott signed the bill into law on March 7. Previously: The Florida leg­is­la­ture passed a bill on March 3 to restruc­ture its death penal­ty statute in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s rul­ing in Hurst v. Florida, which declared the state’s death penal­ty pro­ce­dures uncon­sti­tu­tion­al. The bill mod­i­fies Florida’s prac­tice of per­mit­ting judges to impose death sen­tences with­out the unan­i­mous agree­ment of jurors by requir­ing that at least…

Jefferson County, Alabama Circuit Judge Tracie Todd (pic­tured) ruled on March 3 that Alabama’s cap­i­tal sen­tenc­ing pro­ce­dure vio­lates the U.S. Constitution. Judge Todd barred the death penal­ty for four cap­i­tal mur­der defen­dants, say­ing that Alabama’s use of judi­cial over­ride vio­lates the Sixth…

Delaware pub­lic defend­ers have filed a brief in the Delaware Supreme Court argu­ing that the state’s death sen­tenc­ing pro­ce­dures are uncon­sti­tu­tion­al. In their brief, the defend­ers describe ​“mul­ti­ple con­sti­tu­tion­al prob­lems” that they say ​“require Delaware’s death penal­ty scheme to be sub­stan­tial­ly restruc­tured.” These include sev­er­al pro­ce­dures that they say are uncon­sti­tu­tion­al under the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent 8 – 1 deci­sion in Hurst v. Florida.…

Stephen Urquhart (pic­tured), a Republican state sen­a­tor in Utah, sup­port­ed the death penal­ty until about a year ago, when a friend con­vinced him that cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment did­n’t fit his con­ser­v­a­tive beliefs. Now Urquhart sees the death penal­ty as inef­fi­cient, cost­ly, and wrong and is the lead spon­sor of a bill to repeal the state’s death penal­ty. He said con­cerns about the cost of the death penal­ty and the risk of exe­cut­ing an inno­cent per­son changed his stance on the issue. In…

On February 29, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral argu­ment in Williams v. Pennsylvania, a case chal­leng­ing for­mer Pennsylvania Supreme Court Chief Justice Ronald Castille’s par­tic­i­pa­tion in the state’s appeal of a death penal­ty case involv­ing Terry Williams (pic­tured), whose cap­i­tal pros­e­cu­tion Castille per­son­al­ly autho­rized in his ear­li­er role as Philadelphia District Attorney. A low­er court judge over­turned Williams’ death sen­tence in 2012 find­ing that Philadelphia…

United States Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia, one of the Court’s most ardent pro­po­nents of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, has died at age…

A Wake County North Carolina jury vot­ed on February 22 to sen­tence cap­i­tal defen­dant Travion Devonte Smith to life with­out parole, mak­ing Smith’s case the sixth con­sec­u­tive Wake County death penal­ty tri­al to end with a life…