Publications & Testimony

In the February 2025 episode of 12:01: The Death Penalty in Context, DPI Managing Director Anne Holsinger speaks with three experts on California’s Racial Justice Act (RJA). Natasha Minsker, an attorney and consultant, formerly of the ACLU, speaks on the history of the RJA and the impetus for its passage. Genevie Gold, research and writing fellow at the Office of the State Public Defender (OSPD), describes the process that an RJA claim follows through the legal system, and how the RJA has…

On February 19, 2025, in new filings, Robert Roberson returned to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (CCA) with a request for relief, presenting substantial new evidence that supports his claim of actual innocence. Mr. Roberson’s latest habeas application incorporates new expert opinions and references scientific advancements that have emerged since October 2024, when the CCA acknowledged in a similar case that the scientific foundation for “Shaken Baby” Syndrome (SBS) convictions lack…

In a 5 – 3 decision issued in Glossip v. Oklahoma on February 25, 2025, the United States Supreme Court threw out Richard Glossip’s 2004 conviction for arranging the murder of Barry Von Treese and ordered a new trial because prosecutors allowed a key witness to lie in court and withheld crucial information about the same witness. Justice Sonya Sotomayor, writing for the majority, said that prosecutors in Mr. Glossip’s case “violated [their] constitutional obligation to correct false testimony,”…

A new report from the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), Unreliable Verdicts: Racial Bias and Wrongful Convictions, explores the history of racial bias in jury selection in the United States, including the last 40 years of racially-discriminatory preemptory jury strikes, and highlights the growing body of research showing that jury bias is reduced and the deliberative process enhanced when juries are more diverse. Looking at the pool of documented death penalty…

On February 11, 2025, the Alabama House of Representatives voted 86 – 5, with nine abstentions, in favor of a bill that would expand the use of the death penalty to those convicted of the rape or sodomy of a child under the age of 12. This bill will be headed to the state Senate. If passed, the law would directly violate United States Supreme Court precedent established in Kennedy V. Louisiana (2008), which found the death penalty an unconstitutional form of punishment for the rape of a child…

On February 10, 2025, Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry announced his decision to end a 15-year pause on executions, saying the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections is ready to carry out executions under a new nitrogen gas execution protocol. In a press release following his announcement, Gov. Landry said, “For too long, Louisiana has failed to uphold the promises made to victims of our State’s most violent crimes; but that failure of leadership by previous administrations is…

On January 30, 2025, the Montana House of Representatives rejected by a vote of 51 – 49 House Bill 205 (HB 205), which would have modified the state’s lethal injection protocol. The bill sought to remove language in the Montana lethal injection protocol that requires the use of an “ultra-fast acting” drug in combination with a “chemical paralytic agent” and replace it with broader terminology that would allow for the use of any “substance or substances in a lethal quantity sufficient to cause…

For the third consecutive session, the Georgia House of Representatives is reviewing a bill seeking to provide better protections to capital defendants with intellectual disabilities. Currently, the state requires a defendant to prove “beyond a reasonable doubt” that they have an intellectual disability – the only death penalty state to have this unusually high standard. Introduced by a bipartisan group of legislators on January 27, 2025, HB 123 would lower the standard of proof required to a…