Publications & Testimony

On December 12, 2023 U.S. District Judge Michael P. Mills over­turned Terry Pitchford’s death sen­tence and ordered Mississippi to retry him in 6 months or release him from cus­tody. Judge Mills found that the orig­i­nal tri­al judge failed to allow the defense to prop­er­ly chal­lenge the exclu­sion of Black jurors by now-retired District Attorney Doug Evans, the same pros­e­cu­tor who pros­e­cut­ed Curtis Flowers. ​“This court can­not ignore the notion that Pitchford was seem­ing­ly giv­en no chance to rebut…

On December 18, Pennsylvania dropped all homi­cide charges against Noel Montalvo, twen­ty years after he was con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death in York County. Mr. Montalvo (pic­tured) pled guilty to one count of tam­per­ing with evi­dence in exchange for release and one year on pro­ba­tion. The Death Penalty Information Center has deter­mined that Mr. Montalvo meets the cri­te­ria for inclu­sion on our exon­er­a­tion list because the charges that placed him on death row have been…

On December 14, 2023, Lake County, Florida pros­e­cu­tors announced they are seek­ing the death penal­ty for a man accused of com­mit­ting the sex­u­al bat­tery of a minor under the age of twelve. A state­ment from the office of State Attorney William Gladson said the deci­sion reflects the ​“sever­i­ty of the crime and its impact on the com­mu­ni­ty.” Earlier this year, Governor Ron DeSantis signed leg­is­la­tion that expands death penal­ty eli­gi­bil­i­ty to those con­vict­ed of sex crimes against chil­dren. This is…

On Wednesday, December 13, the U.S. Supreme Court grant­ed cer­tio­rari in Thornell v. Jones, its first death penal­ty case to be heard at oral argu­ment in the 2023 term. Unlike most death penal­ty cas­es that seek Supreme Court review, the peti­tion­er here is the state of Arizona, which asks the Court to reverse the Ninth Circuit’s grant of relief for death-sen­tenced pris­on­er Danny Lee Jones (pic­tured). The Ninth Circuit held that Mr. Jones demon­strat­ed inef­fec­tive assis­tance of counsel at…

A new report released by the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty high­lights Texas’ con­tin­u­ing out­lier prac­tices in the admin­is­tra­tion of the death penal­ty. As one of just five states car­ry­ing out exe­cu­tions this year, Texas is respon­si­ble for a third of the 24 exe­cu­tions in 2023. Of the eight men exe­cut­ed, six dis­played sig­nif­i­cant intel­lec­tu­al or men­tal health impair­ments, includ­ing brain dam­age, intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty, and a range of men­tal ill­ness­es. ​“The vast majority of…

A pro­posed death penal­ty repeal bill in the Ohio leg­is­la­ture is draw­ing atten­tion to the state’s five-year pause on exe­cu­tions, and lead­ing state offi­cials from both par­ties to ques­tion whether the death penal­ty sys­tem is work­ing. Ohio Attorney General David Yost (pic­tured) summed up the sit­u­a­tion by say­ing, ​“This sys­tem sat­is­fies nobody. Those who oppose the death penal­ty want it abol­ished alto­geth­er, not tick­ing away like a time bomb that might or might not explode. Those who support the…

In a recent­ly pub­lished aca­d­e­m­ic arti­cle, Emory University History Professor Daniel LaChance writes about an impor­tant and under­rec­og­nized dis­tinc­tion in the way news­pa­per edi­tors and jour­nal­ists cov­ered the exe­cu­tions of Black and white men in the late 19^th and ear­ly 20^th cen­turies. Professor LaChance argues that the por­tray­als of the defen­dants made legal exe­cu­tions ​“a high-sta­tus pun­ish­ment that respect­ed the white­ness of those who suf­fered it.” While the length and detail of articles…

In North Carolina, a coali­tion of activists is call­ing on Governor Roy Cooper to com­mute the death sen­tences of 136 peo­ple ​“as an act of racial jus­tice” before he leaves office in 2024. Edward ​“Ed” Chapman, a death row exoneree who spent 14 years on death row, along with oth­er advo­cates with the North Carolina Coalition for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, are urg­ing Gov. Cooper to grant clemen­cy to all death-sen­tenced indi­vid­u­als in North Carolina ​“because of the injus­tices of the death…

In this month’s episode of Discussions with DPIC, Managing Director Anne Holsinger speaks with John Bessler (pic­tured), Professor of Law at the University of Baltimore School of Law. Professor Bessler is the author of sev­er­al books on the death penal­ty, includ­ing his 2023 book The Death Penalty’s Denial of Fundamental Human Rights: International Law, State Practice, and the Emerging Abolitionist Norm. In his most recent book, Professor Bessler argues that the death penalty…

On November 30, 2023, the Mississippi Supreme Court ordered that the state’s request to set an exe­cu­tion date for death row pris­on­er Willie Manning be held until the court rules on a recent peti­tion seek­ing to bring new evi­dence of Mr. Manning’s inno­cence. Mr. Manning’s attor­neys had filed a peti­tion at the court on September 29, ask­ing for an oppor­tu­ni­ty to present recan­ta­tions from jail­house infor­mants who tes­ti­fied against Mr. Manning, as well as new expert analy­sis debunking the…