Publications & Testimony

On October 12, Tennessee Judge James Beasley Jr. (pic­tured) over­turned the con­vic­tion and death sen­tence of Michael Rimmer because crit­i­cal evi­dence, not pre­sent­ed at his tri­al, throws doubt on Rimmer’s guilt. The court ruled that Rimmer’s​“over­bur­dened” tri­al lawyers repeat­ed­ly failed to uncov­er evi­dence that two oth­er men were seen at the vic­tim’s last loca­tion around the time of her dis­ap­pear­ance, and both had blood on their hands.

On October 12, Judge David Glant (state Circuit Court) reject­ed a request from attor­neys for Florida death row inmate John Ferguson (pic­tured) to halt his exe­cu­tion, despite acknowl­edg­ing that Ferguson has severe men­tal ill­ness. The judge wrote that Ferguson’s​“doc­u­ment­ed his­to­ry of para­noid schiz­o­phre­nia” was​“cred­i­ble and com­pelling,” and that​“it is inconceivable”…

Survivor on Death Row, a new e‑book co-authored by death row inmate Romell Broom and Clare Nonhebel, tells the sto­ry of Ohio​’s botched attempt to exe­cute Broom by lethal injec­tion in 2009. In September of that year, Broom was read­ied for exe­cu­tion and placed on the gur­ney, but the pro­ce­dure was ter­mi­nat­ed after cor­rec­tions offi­cials spent over two hours attempt­ing to find a suit­able vein for the lethal injec­tion. Broom was removed…

UPDATE: The U.S. Court of Appeals over­turned the stay of exe­cu­tion and Green was exe­cut­ed on Oct. 10. Earlier: Jonathan Green was sched­uled for exe­cu­tion in Texas on October 10, but a fed­er­al judge issued a stay because the state did not afford him due process in exam­in­ing his men­tal com­pe­ten­cy. U.S. District Court Judge Nancy Atlas said,​“It is clear from the record that, at a min­i­mum, the…

A news­pa­per’s inves­ti­ga­tion into the costs of the death penal­ty in Florida revealed the state is spend­ing as much as $1 mil­lion per inmate just for incar­cer­a­tion and appel­late costs. Trial costs would add sub­stan­tial­ly to the state’s total. Florida has over 400 inmates on death row. For exam­ple, keep­ing J.B. Parker under the spe­cial secu­ri­ty of death row for 29 years has cost tax­pay­ers $688,000; his appeals cost $296,000, for a total of $984,000. The…

According to a recent arti­cle in the Wall Street Journal, some long-time sup­port­ers of the death penal­ty have recent­ly shift­ed their posi­tions, ques­tion­ing whether the occa­sion­al exe­cu­tion is worth the costs incurred by tax­pay­ers at a time when bud­gets are strained. Gil Garcetti (pic­tured), the for­mer dis­trict attor­ney of Los Angeles County, which is respon­si­ble for rough­ly one-third of California​’s 727 death-row inmates,…

Anthony Haynes is seek­ing clemen­cy from the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles. Haynes was only 19 when he killed an off-duty police offi­cer who stopped his car in Houston. He had no pri­or crim­i­nal record. His defense lawyers failed to present mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence that was avail­able at the time of his tri­al. More than three dozen peo­ple have signed state­ments say­ing they would have been will­ing to tes­ti­fy that Haynes’ crime was extremely out…

On October 2, Judge Gregory Weeks heard tes­ti­mo­ny regard­ing racial bias in jury selec­tion, as three North Carolina death row inmates chal­lenged their sen­tences under the state’s Racial Justice Act. Prof. Barbara O’Brien of Michigan State University pro­vid­ed sta­tis­ti­cal evi­dence of racial bias in the fre­quent rejec­tion of African-American poten­tial jurors from death penal­ty tri­als in the state. According to O’Brien’s study, qualified black…

In a recent edi­to­r­i­al, the Great Falls Tribune reversed its long-stand­ing posi­tion and called for the end of the death penal­ty in Montana. The paper cit­ed the cost of main­tain­ing the death penal­ty as a pri­ma­ry rea­son for why the pun­ish­ment should be repealed. The edi­tors joined in the efforts of a rel­a­tive­ly new con­ser­v­a­tive group to end cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment: “[E]ven with­out defin­i­tive state data [on costs], we align with…

On October 9, the U.S. Supreme Court will con­sid­er cas­es from Arizona and Ohio ques­tion­ing whether death penal­ty appeals can con­tin­ue if the defen­dant is men­tal­ly incom­pe­tent. Under the Court’s pri­or rul­ings in Ford v. Wainwright (1986) and in Atkins v. Virginia (2002), cap­i­tal defen­dants can­not be exe­cut­ed if they are incom­pe­tent or intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled (men­tal­ly retard­ed). In the upcom­ing cas­es, Ryan…