Publications & Testimony

Benjamin Ritchie’s exe­cu­tion in Indiana on May 20, 2025, has raised new con­cerns about the use of pen­to­bar­bi­tal after defense coun­sel report­ed their client dis­played an unusu­al phys­i­cal reac­tion after being inject­ed with the drug. But because Indiana offi­cials bar media wit­ness­es from observ­ing exe­cu­tions, the pub­lic has no inde­pen­dent wit­ness reports on what tran­spired. Steve Schutte, an attor­ney for Mr. Ritchie, told the Indiana Capital Chronicle that Mr. Ritchie…

In this month’s pod­cast episode of 12:01 The Death Penalty in Context, DPI’s Managing Director Anne Holsinger speaks with Corinna Barrett Lain, the S.D. Roberts & Sandra Moore Professor of Law at the University of Richmond School of Law and author of the recent­ly pub­lished book, Secrets of the Killing State: The Untold Story of Lethal Injection. Ms. Lain’s new book chal­lenges a wide­ly held assump­tion that lethal injec­tion is a pain­less, reg­u­lat­ed, and medically-sound…

On May 15, 2025, the Utah Supreme Court unan­i­mous­ly upheld a low­er court’s deci­sion vacat­ing Douglas Carter’s (pic­tured) con­vic­tion and death sen­tence and order­ing a new tri­al. The Court found that Utah County pros­e­cu­tors vio­lat­ed Mr. Carter’s con­sti­tu­tion­al rights on mul­ti­ple occa­sions with their​“inten­tion­al mis­con­duct” dur­ing his 1985 tri­al that accused him of caus­ing the death of Eva Olesen dur­ing a home inva­sion. In November 2023, Utah County District…

The Idaho Department of Corrections (IDOC) has admit­ted to spend­ing $200,000 on lethal injec­tion exe­cu­tion drugs since 2023, all of which have since expired with­out use. Josh Tewalt, the for­mer direc­tor of IDOC said in recent court fil­ings that the drugs in IDOC’s pos­ses­sion expired because of repeat­ed delays asso­ci­at­ed with sched­ul­ing an exe­cu­tion. Sanda Kuzeta-Cerimagic, an IDOC spokesper­son, told the Idaho Statesman that the depart­ment does not currently have…

On May 8, 2025, a group of fam­i­ly mem­bers who have lost loved ones to vio­lence in Tennessee deliv­ered a let­ter to Governor Bill Lee’s office request­ing that he halt the state’s upcom­ing sched­uled exe­cu­tions. In their let­ter, the group of 51​“vic­tims, sur­vivors, and fam­i­ly mem­bers of those impact­ed by vio­lent crime” argue the death penal­ty does not act as a heal­ing tool for vic­tims and takes away from state-fund­ed resources that could help with their heal­ing. For these…

On May 8, 2025, Mikal Deen Mahdi’s lawyers sub­mit­ted to the South Carolina Supreme Court the state pathol­o­gy report in his case which sug­gests that Mr. Mahdi’s exe­cu­tion last month by fir­ing squad did not go as planned. Pathologists report­ed that not only did Mr. Mahdi have two wounds as opposed to the antic­i­pat­ed three wounds from three South Carolina Corrections Department (SCDC) shoot­ers, but also that they missed the intend­ed tar­get over his heart, prolonging his…