Publications & Testimony

California death row pris­on­er Kevin Cooper (pic­tured), whose inno­cence claims recent­ly spurred the American Bar Association to call for a reprieve, recent­ly authored an arti­cle describ­ing what is was like for him to expe­ri­ence near­ly being exe­cut­ed on February 10, 2004. Cooper described the days lead­ing up to his sched­uled exe­cu­tion, which includ­ed round-the-clock mon­i­tor­ing, med­ical exams, and meetings…

UPDATE: The Supreme Court dock­et indi­cates that its con­fer­enc­ing of Mr. Buck’s case, orig­i­nal­ly set for April 22, has been resched­uled. The Court is now sched­uled to con­sid­er­ing the case on April 29. PREVIOUSLY: On April 22, the U.S. Supreme Court is sched­uled to con­fer on whether to review the case of Duane Buck (pic­tured), who was sen­tenced to death in Harris County, Texas after a psy­chol­o­gist tes­ti­fied that he posed an increased risk…

The Oklahoma Department of Corrections knew it had used an unau­tho­rized drug in the exe­cu­tion of Charles Warner near­ly six months before it almost repeat­ed the mis­take in the abort­ed exe­cu­tion of Richard Glossip. Oklahoma exe­cut­ed Warner on January…

Texas State Comptroller Glenn Hegar has reject­ed an appli­ca­tion for com­pen­sa­tion filed by death-row exoneree Alfred DeWayne Brown, assert­ing that the court pro­ceed­ings lead­ing to his release did not con­sti­tute a deter­mi­na­tion that he was​“actu­al­ly inno­cent.” Brown had applied for approx­i­mate­ly $1.9 mil­lion in cash and annu­ity pay­ments under Texas’ exon­er­a­tion com­pen­sa­tion law. Harris County pros­e­cu­tors dismissed charges…

Georgia is prepar­ing to exe­cute Kenneth Fults (pic­tured) on April 12, fol­low­ing the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles denial of his clemen­cy appli­ca­tion. Fults’ cur­rent lawyers pre­sent­ed evi­dence to the Board that Fults is intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled and​“func­tions in the low­est 1 per­cent of the pop­u­la­tion.” They also argued that Fults’ tri­al lawyer failed to present this evi­dence to the jury, as well as exten­sive evidence that…

Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe reject­ed a bill that would have employed the elec­tric chair as the state’s method of exe­cu­tion if lethal injec­tion drugs are unavail­able. Instead, he offered amend­ments that would per­mit the Commonwealth’s Department of Corrections to enter into con­fi­den­tial con­tracts to obtain exe­cu­tion drugs from com­pound­ing phar­ma­cies, whose iden­ti­ties would be con­cealed from the pub­lic. His…

Kenneth Clair (pic­tured), whose California death sen­tence was over­turned last year, says he is inno­cent and that the Orange County District Attorney’s office is with­hold­ing DNA evi­dence that would prove it. His pros­e­cu­tors have declared that they will not seek the death penal­ty against Clair in a new sen­tenc­ing hear­ing, and in so doing may avoid pre­tri­al dis­cov­ery pro­ceed­ings in which they could have been required to turn…

A Texas court has found that a severe­ly men­tal­ly ill death-row inmate, Marcus Druery (pic­tured), is incom­pe­tent to be exe­cut­ed. Druery’s attor­neys pre­sent­ed more than 150 pages of reports from men­tal health pro­fes­sion­als argu­ing that, as a result of major men­tal ill­ness, Druery does not under­stand why he is being pun­ished, mak­ing it uncon­sti­tu­tion­al to exe­cute him. His​“para­noid and grandiose delusions…deprive him…

Amnesty International report­ed that world­wide exe­cu­tions spiked by 54% to at least 1,634 — a 25-year high — in 2015, even as the num­ber of coun­tries abol­ish­ing the death penalty reached…

After Debbie Carter was raped and mur­dered in Ada, Oklahoma in 1982, police and pros­e­cu­tors told her cousin, Christy Sheppard (pic­tured) that Ron Williamson and Dennis Fritz were guilty of the crime. In 1988, Williamson was con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death; Fritz received a life sen­tence. Eleven years lat­er, the pair were exon­er­at­ed when DNA test­ing exclud­ed them as per­pe­tra­tors and point­ed to anoth­er man who had once been a suspect.