Publications & Testimony

A new report on the death penal­ty in Texas found that death sen­tences have declined by more than 75% since 2002, and more than half of all new death sen­tences were imposed in the Dallas-Fort Worth area this year, while no new death sen­tences were imposed in Harris County (Houston) for the third time in five years. The report, ​“Texas Death Penalty Developments in 2012: The Year in Review” by the Texas Coalition to Abolish Death Penalty, stat­ed there…

On December 18, the Death Penalty Information Center released its lat­est report, ​“The Death Penalty in 2012: Year End Report,” on devel­op­ments in cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the past year. The report not­ed the num­ber of new death sen­tences in 2012 was the sec­ond low­est since the death penal­ty was rein­stat­ed in 1976, rep­re­sent­ing a near­ly 75% decline since 1996, when there were 315 new death sen­tences. Only nine states car­ried out exe­cu­tions in 2012,…

In a recent op-ed in Colorado​’s Daily Camera, Boulder County District Attorney Stan Garnett expressed his con­cerns about the death penal­ty, as the state pre­pares to con­sid­er its repeal. Garnett said, “[T]he prac­ti­cal prob­lems with the death penal­ty make it of lim­it­ed rel­e­vance to Colorado law enforce­ment.” He point­ed to the high costs of cap­i­tal cas­es, the time required to pros­e­cute, and the ran­dom­ness of its appli­ca­tion as major con­cerns: ​“Prosecuting a death…

UPDATE: (Dec. 17). Gov. Kasich grant­ed clemen­cy to Ronald Post, fol­low­ing the Parole Board’s rec­om­men­da­tion. On December 14, the Ohio Parole Board (5 – 3) rec­om­mend­ed clemen­cy for death row inmate Ronald Post, say­ing his legal rep­re­sen­ta­tion was inef­fec­tive and did not meet expec­ta­tions for a death penal­ty case. Post is cur­rent­ly sched­uled for exe­cu­tion on January 16, 2013. The Board’s rec­om­men­da­tion con­clud­ed: “[A] major­i­ty of the mem­bers of…

On December 13, North Carolina Superior Court Judge Greg Weeks reduced the sen­tences of three death row inmates to life with­out parole after find­ing that race played a sig­nif­i­cant role in the selec­tion of the juries in their…

West of Memphis is a fea­ture-length doc­u­men­tary by Academy-Award win­ner Peter Jackson, offer­ing a pen­e­trat­ing look into the mur­der con­vic­tions and even­tu­al free­ing of the West Memphis Three. Jackson has called it his ​“most impor­tant film.” Three teenagers, Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin, and Jessie Misskelley, were con­vict­ed of killing three young boys in West Memphis, Arkansas, in 1993. Echols was sen­tenced to death…

In a recent op-ed in the San Francisco Chronicle, death penal­ty schol­ar Franklin Zimring sug­gest­ed that the close (52 – 48%) vote in November on California​’s Proposition 34 to end cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment means the repeal effort is far from over. Zimring, a law pro­fes­sor at the University of California, Berkeley, wrote, ​“For decades, it has been assumed that the death penal­ty was the third rail of California pol­i­tics …. Measured against that rep­u­ta­tion, the…

On December 6, Bobby Tarver, who had spent 30 years on Alabama​’s death row, final­ly had his death sen­tence reduced to life with­out parole by a state judge because of his intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty. Tarver was Mobile County’s longest-serv­ing death row inmate, hav­ing been con­vict­ed in 1982 of mur­der­ing a taxi cab dri­ver. Last September, a fed­er­al judge over­ruled state court opin­ions and held that Tarver could not be exe­cut­ed because of his men­tal retar­da­tion, thus…

On December 5, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals grant­ed (5 – 3) Cathy Lynn Henderson a new tri­al based on recent sci­en­tif­ic devel­op­ments about the death of a baby who had been in her care. At one point, Henderson had been two days from exe­cu­tion. The appeals court accept­ed the fac­tu­al find­ings of a dis­trict judge who ruled ear­li­er this year that no rea­son­able juror would have con­vict­ed Henderson if pre­sent­ed with new sci­en­tif­ic dis­cov­er­ies relat­ed to the…

On November 28, the University of Nebraska host­ed a dia­logue on the death penal­ty with J. Kirk Brown (left), Nebraska’s Solicitor General, and Professor Michael Radelet (right) of the University of Colorado. Mr. Kirk was the state’s coun­sel of record for all of its exe­cu­tions since 1978. Prof. Radelet is a well-known death penal­ty expert, researcher, and the author of sev­er­al works on inno­cence and the death penal­ty. The dis­cus­sion was…