Publications & Testimony

DPIC’s High School Curriculum on the Death Penalty, which was orig­i­nal­ly cre­at­ed in coop­er­a­tion with Michigan State University’s Communications Technology Laboratory in 2001, has been updat­ed and inte­grat­ed into DPIC’s main web­site. This resource cov­ers death penal­ty his­to­ry, legal pro­ce­dures, argu­ments for and against cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, and nar­ra­tives of real cap­i­tal cases.

In an arti­cle for the University of Oxford Death Penalty Research Unit, Professor John Bessler dis­cuss­es whether the use of the death penal­ty should be clas­si­fied as tor­ture under the norms of inter­na­tion­al law. Bessler argues that since psy­cho­log­i­cal tor­ture is pro­hib­it­ed under the most fun­da­men­tal prin­ci­ples of inter­na­tion­al law (jus cogens norms) and since death threats are a form of psy­cho­log­i­cal tor­ture, then gov­ern­men­tal death threats as part of the death penal­ty are tor­tur­ous and a vio­la­tion of inter­na­tion­al law. Death threats are an inte­gral part of death sentences,…

On May 3, 2023, the fam­i­ly of Joe Nathan James (pic­tured) sued the state of Alabama for the pain and suf­fer­ing it caused dur­ing his three-hour-long lethal injec­tion in 2022. It is believed to be the longest known exe­cu­tion in U.S. his­to­ry. The suit asserts that ​“the exe­cu­tion team failed to exe­cute Mr. James in a man­ner that com­ports with the U.S. Constitution, the Alabama Constitution, and applic­a­ble state law.”

On May 1, 2023, the state of Florida adopt­ed leg­is­la­tion allow­ing the death penal­ty for sex­u­al abuse of a child where no death occurred. This statute is uncon­sti­tu­tion­al under the U.S. Supreme Court’s rul­ing in Kennedy v. Louisiana (2008). Excerpts from that opin­ion and from an ami­cus brief cit­ed by the Court follow:

A recent arti­cle in the The Guardian described the reac­tions of some of the California pris­on­ers who have been moved from San Quentin’s death row and trans­ferred to oth­er facil­i­ties around the state. The pris­on­ers are still under a sen­tence of death, but in 2019 Governor Gavin Newsom declared a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions and has dis­man­tled the exe­cu­tion chamber.

In a detailed five-part series titled ​“Poorly exe­cut­ed: How Arizona has failed at car­ry­ing out the death penal­ty,” the Arizona Mirror explores the last 16 years of Arizona’s use of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. The series focus­es on con­tro­ver­sies sur­round­ing the exe­cu­tions them­selves, includ­ing changes to the drug pro­to­col, the use of inex­pe­ri­enced or unqual­i­fied per­son­nel, and the state secre­cy sur­round­ing the process. It also looks into oth­er major issues in cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, such as inno­cence, costs, and racial bias.

Bills to alter the state’s method of exe­cu­tion and to make the exe­cu­tion process more trans­par­ent failed in Tennessee’s leg­is­la­ture this year as its ses­sion con­clud­ed. In an effort to facil­i­tate exe­cu­tions bogged down by the state’s prob­lems with lethal injec­tion, a bill was pro­posed to give pris­on­ers the option of the fir­ing squad for their exe­cu­tion. Following an inde­pen­dent inves­ti­ga­tion into Tennessee’s lethal injec­tion pro­to­cols, Governor Bill Lee ® had sus­pend­ed exe­cu­tions on January 5, 2023.

The accom­pa­ny­ing graph (click to view sep­a­rate­ly) dis­plays the time in years since the last exe­cu­tion by each state as of May 1, 2023.

Bills to hide the iden­ti­ties of lethal-injec­tion drug sup­pli­ers and exe­cu­tion team mem­bers from the pub­lic have passed both cham­bers of the South Carolina leg­is­la­ture. The bills face a rec­on­cil­i­a­tion process before one can move to the governor’s desk for sig­na­ture. Proponents of the law say it is nec­es­sary because reveal­ing such infor­ma­tion might make exe­cu­tions dif­fi­cult or impos­si­ble. South Carolina has not car­ried out an exe­cu­tion in 12 years. Opponents say the pub­lic has the right to know about gov­ern­ment actions.

In the lat­est episode of Discussions with DPIC, Anne Holsinger, Managing Director of DPIC, inter­views Ron McAndrew (pic­tured), a for­mer Florida Prison Warden who wit­nessed exe­cu­tions using elec­tro­cu­tion and lethal injec­tion in Florida and Texas. He offers reflec­tions on the neg­a­tive impact that exe­cu­tions have on the fam­i­lies of both the vic­tim and the con­demned, the cor­rec­tion­al offi­cers, and on himself.