Publications & Testimony

President Obama has ordered Attorney General Eric Holder to review the appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty in the U.S. fol­low­ing the failed exe­cu­tion of Clayton Lockett in Oklahoma on April 29. The President not­ed con­cerns about inno­cence and racial bias:​“In the appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty in this coun­try, we have seen sig­nif­i­cant prob­lems — racial bias, uneven appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty, you know, situations…

On April 30 Ohio Governor John Kasich com­mut­ed the death sen­tence of Arthur Tyler to life in prison with­out the pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole. The deci­sion fol­lowed a rec­om­men­da­tion for clemen­cy from Cuyahoga County pros­e­cu­tor Tim McGinty. Following a hear­ing on the case, the Ohio Parole Board rec­om­mend­ed com­mu­ta­tion of Tyler’s sen­tence to life with parole: six of the eleven mem­bers rec­om­mend­ed immediate parole…

Randy Workman (pic­tured) is a for­mer war­den of the Oklahoma State Penitentiary, where he over­saw 32 exe­cu­tions. In a recent inter­view, he was crit­i­cal of many aspects of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. He said the death penal­ty failed the vic­tims’ fam­i­lies and wast­ed mon­ey:​“We spend mil­lions of dol­lars on these cas­es and going through the process and the end result is the fam­i­ly, do they feel vin­di­cat­ed? I’d…

On April 29, Oklahoma inmate Clayton Lockett died of a heart attack approx­i­mate­ly 40 min­utes after the state began admin­is­ter­ing a new lethal injection…

Three for­mer Chief Justices of the Oregon Supreme Court have recent­ly called for an end to the death penal­ty in their state. Retired Chief Justice Wallace P. Carson, Jr. (l.), was the most recent Justice to call for a change:​“In my opin­ion, the excep­tion­al cost of death penal­ty cas­es and the seem­ing­ly hap­haz­ard selec­tion of which cas­es deserve the death penal­ty out­weigh any per­ceived pub­lic ben­e­fit of this sanc­tion,” Carson said.​“The…

On April 28 a study pub­lished in the pres­tigous Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences indi­cat­ed that far more inno­cent peo­ple have been sen­tenced to death than those found through the legal process. According to the study, many inno­cent defen­dants are prob­a­bly not being iden­ti­fied because they were tak­en off death row and giv­en a less­er sen­tence. The rate of exon­er­a­tions for those sen­tenced to death would be over twice as high if all…

On April 23 the U.S. Supreme Court rein­stat­ed the death sen­tence of Kentucky inmate Robert Woodall, revers­ing an ear­li­er rul­ing by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. At Woodall’s tri­al, his attor­ney asked the judge to instruct the jury not to draw any neg­a­tive infer­ence from the fact that Woodall had not tes­ti­fied in the sen­tenc­ing phase. The judge refused to give the instruc­tion. The 6^th Circuit held that the failure to…

In a peti­tion to the Ohio Parole Board, Cuyahoga County pros­e­cu­tor Tim McGinty (pic­tured) request­ed the death sen­tence of Arthur Tyler be reduced to life in prison with­out parole. McGinty said,​“At the time of Tyler’s tri­al, Ohio law did not allow for the pos­si­bil­i­ty of a sen­tence of life with­out parole for an aggra­vat­ed mur­der conviction.…In light of the lim­it­ed sen­tenc­ing options, the absence of the…

UPDATE: On April 23, the Oklahoma Supreme Court held that the inmates fac­ing exe­cu­tion do not have a right to be informed of the source of the drugs that will be used in their exe­cu­tions. The Court lift­ed the stays of exe­cu­tion, which means they could occur on April 29. ‑Earlier: On April 21, the Oklahoma Supreme Court indef­i­nite­ly stayed the exe­cu­tions of Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner so it could resolve the…

The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles will soon con­sid­er the clemen­cy peti­tion of Robert Holsey describ­ing a near com­plete fail­ure in the judi­cial process that sent him to death row in 1997. As Marc Bookman described in the lat­est edi­tion of Mother Jones, Holsey was assigned a lawyer, Andy Prince, who con­sumed a quart of vod­ka every night of the tri­al. While prepar­ing Holsey’s case, he was arrest­ed in an inci­dent after pointing…