Publications & Testimony

On the open­ing day of the U.S. Supreme Court’s new term, the Justices announced they would not review the case of Warren Hill, a death row inmate in Georgia with mul­ti­ple find­ings of intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty. Hill peti­tioned the Court after three men­tal health experts, who ini­tial­ly said he was not men­tal­ly dis­abled, changed their assess­ment. The exe­cu­tion of inmates with men­tal retar­da­tion was ruled uncon­sti­tu­tion­al in 2002, but Georgia has…

On October 4, Ohio announced it will be obtain­ing its exe­cu­tion drug, pen­to­bar­bi­tal, from a com­pound­ing phar­ma­cy if it is not avail­able from the man­u­fac­tur­er. Texas made a sim­i­lar announce­ment a few days ear­ler. In the past, some com­pound­ing phar­ma­cies have been impli­cat­ed in pro­vid­ing con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed drugs with fatal side effects. These local com­pa­nies are not reg­u­lat­ed by the Food and Drug Administration. Florida…

Since DPIC released its new report, The 2% Death Penalty, on October 2, both nation­al and inter­na­tion­al media have been report­ing on its find­ings. The Washington Post not­ed, ​“Two per­cent of the coun­ties in the coun­try were respon­si­ble for [most] 685 of 1,320 exe­cu­tions from 1976, when the Supreme Court rein­stat­ed the death penal­ty, to 2012.” The Los Angeles Times, quot­ed DPIC’s Executive…

On October 2 the Death Penalty Information Center released a new report, The 2% Death Penalty: How a Minority of Counties Produce Most Death Cases at Enormous Costs to All. The report shows that, con­trary to the assump­tion that the death penal­ty is wide­ly used in the U.S., only a few juris­dic­tions employ cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment exten­sive­ly. Only 2% of the coun­ties in the U.S. have been respon­si­ble for the major­i­ty of cas­es lead­ing to exe­cu­tions since 1976. Likewise, only…

An analy­sis of the death penal­ty in Utah shows how rarely it has been used in recent years. Prosecutors have sought it in only 7 cas­es in the last 5 years, and none has result­ed in a death sen­tence. Utah has had only 1 exe­cu­tion in the past 13 years. Experts have offered sev­er­al rea­sons for the declin­ing use: the alter­na­tive sen­tence of life with­out parole is now ava­ial­ble; the appeal of a death sen­tence is cost­ly and slow; and many vic­tims’ fam­i­lies wish to see a more timely…

A recent Boston Globe edi­to­r­i­al called on U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder not to seek the death penal­ty for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the man accused of car­ry­ing out the bomb­ing at the Boston Marathon. The edi­tors said the lengthy death-penal­ty process would put the spot­light on the defen­dant to the detri­ment of the vic­tims: ​“Years of pro­ceed­ings, and their poten­tial cul­mi­na­tion in a death sen­tence, would also give Tsarnaev what he and his broth­er appar­ent­ly sought: pub­lic­i­ty and…

On September 26, the Joint Task Force to Review the Administration of Ohio​’s Death Penalty vot­ed 15 – 2 to rec­om­mend a ban on death sen­tences for peo­ple with severe men­tal ill­ness. The pan­el of legal experts was cre­at­ed by the Ohio Supreme Court and the Ohio State Bar Association and includes judges, attor­neys, and leg­is­la­tors. Their pro­pos­al will be sub­mit­ted with oth­er rec­om­men­da­tions to the gov­er­nor and the General Assembly in 2014. Terry Russell, executive…

Grave Injustice, a new book by Richard Stack, presents a crit­i­cal exam­i­na­tion of the death penal­ty through pro­files of indi­vid­u­als who were exe­cut­ed but may have been inno­cent. Their sto­ries are used to illus­trate flaws in the death penal­ty, includ­ing faulty eye­wit­ness iden­ti­fi­ca­tion, gov­ern­ment mis­con­duct, and inef­fec­tive rep­re­sen­ta­tion. In exam­in­ing these prob­lems, Stack writes that the pos­si­ble end of the death penal­ty ​“will not be based on its immorality…but on…

Legislators in Kansas have said they may debate the repeal of the death penal­ty in 2014. Senate Vice President Jeff King said a recent ses­sion on oth­er crim­i­nal jus­tice issues indi­cat­ed a need for a broad­er dis­cus­sion of sen­tences for mur­der. Senator David Haley, who sup­ports repeal of the death penal­ty, said, ​“I believe now is the time for a dis­cus­sion among those in the Legislature who con­sid­er reli­gion a main part of their pub­lic ser­vice to decide whether it’s necessary…