Publications & Testimony

A group of former Georgia prisoners is calling for clemency for Kelly Gissendaner, who is scheduled to be executed on September 29. The women say Gissendaner gave them hope and helped them turn their lives around. Nikki Roberts said she spoke to Gissendaner through a heating vent after Roberts had been placed in “lockdown” for trying to slit her wrists. Gissendaner told her, “Don’t wish death on yourself. You sound like you’ve got some sense.” Gissendaner encouraged Roberts to take taching…

In an historic address before a joint session of the United States Congress, Pope Francis called for the abolition of capital punishment. Linking to the broader theme of protecting human life and dignity, he said, “This conviction has led me, from the beginning of my ministry, to advocate at different levels for the global abolition of the death penalty. I am convinced that this way is the best, since every life is sacred, every human person is endowed with an inalienable dignity, and society…

Sun Pharma, which is based in India, has publicly dissociated itself from the use of its drugs in upcoming Arkansas executions. The company said it prohibits the sale of its products to entities that might use them for killing. Sun Pharma was notified of the possible misuse of its products by the Associated Press, which had obtained redacted photographs of the drugs Arkansas planned to use in eight scheduled executions. A recently passed secrecy law allows the state to withhold the source of…

A Reuters analysis of more than 2,000 state Supreme Court rulings in capital cases has found that elected judges are much less likely to overturn death sentences than judges who are appointed. In the 15 states in which the state Supreme Court is directly elected, justices overturned death sentences only 11% of the time as compared to a 26% reversal rate in the 7 states in which justices are appointed. 15 states have a hybrid system, where justices are initially appointed, but must then face…

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit will hear arguments on September 23 regarding Scott Panetti’s competency to be executed. Panetti is a severely mentally ill man who represented himself at his trial wearing a cowboy costume, and attempted to subpoena the Pope, John F. Kennedy, and Jesus Christ. As the court prepares to hear Panetti’s case, opinion pieces in two Texas newspapers used it to illustrate larger problems with the death penalty and mental illness. In an op-ed in The…

A shipment of sodium thiopental, an anesthetic once widely used in executions, was recently stopped in India before it could reach Nebraska. The Indian distributor sold more than $50,000 worth of sodium thiopental to the state in May, but the shipment was stopped before leaving the country because of “improper or missing paperwork.” FedEx said it halted the shipment because it did not have Food And Drug Administration clearance: “As with any international importation of a drug, data about that…

So far in 2015, no one has been sentenced to death in Texas. The death row population has dropped to 257, down from 460 at its peak in 1999. In that year, Texas sentenced 48 people to death, the most in any year since the death penalty was reinstated. Among the reasons for the decline in death sentences has been the adoption of the alternative sentence of life without parole (adopted in 2005), and a change in the political climate that had led politicians to compete in trying to appear “tough…

In his new book, The Court and the World: American Law and the New Global Realities, and in media interviews accompanying its release, Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer discusses the relationship between American laws and those of other countries and his dissent in Glossip v. Gross, which questioned the constitutionality of the death penalty. In an interview with The National Law Journal, Breyer summarized the core reasons underlying his Glossip dissent: “You know, sometimes people make…

In a sweeping look at the current state of the U.S. death penalty, USA Today reporters Richard Wolf and Kevin Johnson highlight several recent story lines that collectively illustrate a dramatic decline in the country’s use of capital punishment. Their conclusion: “The death penalty in America may be living on borrowed time.” Wolf and Johnson recount recent cases in which high-profile crimes resulted in a life without parole sentence, in many instances because victims’ families raised concerns…

Montez Spradley, sentenced to death by an Alabama judge in 2008 over a jury’s 10 – 2 recommendation for life without parole, was freed from prison on September 4. Spradley spent 9.5 years incarcerated, including 3.5 years on death row. He was granted a new trial in 2011 as a result of multiple evidentiary errors in his trial. The state’s key witness against Spradley, his ex-girlfriend, Alisha Booker, later testified that she had lied at trial because Spradley was cheating on her. “I just felt he…