Publications & Testimony

County admin­is­tra­tors in Washington state say a sin­gle death penal­ty case could cause bank­rupt­cy in their coun­ty. Court costs are paid at a coun­ty lev­el, mean­ing a lengthy and expen­sive death penal­ty tri­al can seri­ous­ly threat­en the coun­ty’s abil­i­ty to pay for oth­er pri­or­i­ties. Jim Jones, the for­mer pres­i­dent of the Washington County Administrative Association, said sev­er­al coun­ties told him, ​“If we had a death penal­ty case, and had to pay $1 mil­lion (in legal costs), we’d go…

One of the strongest accounts point­ing to the exe­cu­tion of a prob­a­bly inno­cent man in recent times con­cerns the case of Carlos DeLuna, who was exe­cut­ed in Texas in 1989. In a forth­com­ing book, The Wrong Carlos: Anatomy of a Wrongful Execution, Professor James Liebman of Columbia Law School describes his inves­ti­ga­tion into the case, along with a team of stu­dents. The inves­ti­ga­tion uncov­ered seri­ous prob­lems in DeLuna’s case, including…

In an edi­to­r­i­al sup­port­ing Washington Governor Jay Inslee’s recent­ly-announced death penal­ty mora­to­ri­um, the News Tribune (Tacoma) said its edi­to­r­i­al board ​“has grown increas­ing­ly uncom­fort­able with cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in recent years, and we now share Inslee’s feel­ing that Washington should move beyond it.” The paper said the gov­er­nor’s deci­sion ​“forced a wel­come new dis­cus­sion” of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. While acknowl­edg­ing the heinous­ness of many…

Support for the death penal­ty has fall­en sharply by 23 per­cent­age points since 1996, reach­ing its low­est lev­el in almost two decades, accord­ing to a recent poll by the Pew Research Center. The 2013 poll also found a 10 point drop in just the last 2 years in respon­dents who say they ​“strong­ly favor” the death penal­ty, from 28% to 18%. The per­cent­age of Americans who say they oppose the death penal­ty has risen to 37%. In 2011, Pew asked respon­dents about the reasons behind…

As a key New Hampshire com­mit­tee vot­ed over­whelm­ing­ly (14 – 3) to repeal the death penal­ty, a num­ber of leg­is­la­tors explained why they had changed their minds on this issue. Criminal Justice Committee Chair Laura Pantelakos (pic­tured) said racial inequities in the sys­tem led her to change her vote, cit­ing dif­fer­ent out­comes in recent cas­es for a black and a white defen­dant. Pantelakos, who has a grand­son about to become a police offi­cer, asked,…

In Missouri, the Director of the Department of Corrections tes­ti­fied that the state obtains its lethal injec­tion drugs by send­ing a cor­rec­tion­al offi­cial to anoth­er state with $11,000 in cash to pay a com­pound­ing phar­ma­cy called The Apothecary Shoppe. The offi­cer then hand deliv­ers the drug to the depart­ment. At a leg­isla­tive hear­ing on February 10, George Lombardi of the DOC said pen­to­bar­bi­tal was obtained in Oklahoma by pay­ing in cash in order to main­tain the anonymity of…

Washington Governor Jay Inslee announced on February 11 that he would issue a reprieve for any death penal­ty case that reach­es his desk. He said he does not intend to com­mute the sen­tences of the nine men on the state’s death row, but his action will ensure that no exe­cu­tions occur while he is gov­er­nor. In his press con­fer­ence announc­ing the deci­sion, Inslee said, ​“Equal jus­tice under the law is the state’s pri­ma­ry respon­si­bil­i­ty. And in death penal­ty cas­es, I’m not convinced…

Questions about the appro­pri­ate­ness of new lethal injec­tion meth­ods have recent­ly stayed exe­cu­tions in Louisiana and Ohio and caused the Florida Supreme Court to order a hear­ing pri­or to the next exe­cu­tion there. In Louisiana, Christopher Sepulvado received a 90-day stay to allow a fed­er­al court to deter­mine whether the state’s new pro­to­col vio­lates his con­sti­tu­tion­al pro­tec­tion against cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment. He was…

A pend­ing fed­er­al law­suit in Missouri asserts that a state law shroud­ing the mak­ers of lethal injec­tion drugs in secre­cy is a form of pri­or cen­sor­ship and an inter­fer­ence with the pulic’s right to free­dom of speech and free­dom of the press under the First Amendment. U.S. District Court Judge Beth Phillips, who has already expressed con­cern about with­hold­ing this infor­ma­tion from a death row defen­dant fac­ing exe­cu­tion, is expect­ed to rule soon on this broad­er prob­lem. The…