Publications & Testimony

A recent issue of The Angolite, a mag­a­zine pub­lished by prison inmates at the Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola, high­lights the sto­ry of Joe Arridy, who was exe­cut­ed in 1939 in Colorado. Arridy was sen­tenced to death in 1937 for the mur­der and sex­u­al assault of a teenage girl. After his exe­cu­tion, facts point­ing to Arridy’s inno­cence grad­u­al­ly emerged. New evi­dence showed that he had been coerced into giv­ing a false…

A recent arti­cle in the Justice Quarterly by Professor James Acker (pic­tured) and Rose Bellandi of the University at Albany, New York, exam­ined whether there is an irrec­on­cil­able con­flict between recent reforms to pre­vent the exe­cu­tion of the inno­cent and the tra­di­tion­al goals of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. The authors stud­ied recent changes to Maryland’s death penal­ty statute that were designed to reduce the risk of wrong­ful exe­cu­tions while try­ing to maintain the…

In a June 1 op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, Columbia University law pro­fes­sor James Liebman (pic­tured) point­ed to his recent inves­ti­ga­tion of a like­ly inno­cent man exe­cut­ed in Texas to illus­trate the dan­ger of a​“cheap­er and quick­er” death penal­ty. Such pro­pos­als for reform are​“a ter­ri­ble and dan­ger­ous idea,” Liebman said. Based on his research into the pros­e­cu­tion of Carlos DeLuna, who was exe­cut­ed in 1989, DeLuna’s…

Gallup recent­ly released its Values and Beliefs sur­vey regard­ing American moral views on a vari­ety of social issues. The results revealed a sig­nif­i­cant decline in the per­cent­age of the pub­lic that finds the death penal­ty​“moral­ly accept­able.” This year, only 58% of respon­dents said the death penal­ty is moral­ly accept­able, down from 65% last year. (Click on graph to enlarge.) This marks the low­est approval rating…

UPDATE2: Awkal was giv­en a two-week stay by Gov. Kasich to allow time for a men­tal com­pe­ten­cy deter­mi­na­tion. Abdul Awkal (pic­tured) is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed in Ohio on June 6, despite evi­dence of his severe men­tal ill­ness. Awkal lived through 8 years of a civ­il war in Lebanon, his home coun­try, before escap­ing to Michigan. He was sen­tenced to death for mur­der­ing his estranged wife and brother-in-law…

Jeff Chiesa was recen­ty sworn in as New Jersey’s new Attorney General. He for­mer­ly served as chief coun­sel and exec­u­tive assis­tant to Governor Chris Christie. In dis­cussing his pri­or­i­ties, he said he would not sup­port rein­state­ment of the death penal­ty. Chiesa said his opin­ion on the top­ic had evolved over the years and he would not sup­port restor­ing it in the state. New Jersey abol­ished the death penal­ty in 2007, becom­ing the first state to enact such legislation in…

The Death Penalty Information Center has pre­pared a sum­ma­ry of North Carolina v. Robinson, the first rul­ing issued under North Carolina’s Racial Justice Act. The opin­ion by Superior Court Judge Gregory Weeks on April 22, 2012, reduced Marcus Robinson’s (pic­tured) death sen­tence to life with­out parole. DPIC’s sum­ma­ry high­lights the sta­tis­ti­cal evi­dence of racial bias in elim­i­nat­ing poten­tial black jurors that led the court to rule in Robinson’s…

The Missouri Department of Corrections has announced that it is switch­ing from a three-drug lethal injec­tion pro­to­col to a sin­­gle-drug method, using Propofol. Missouri would be the first state to use Propofol (Diprivan) as an exe­cu­tion drug.The drug is man­u­fac­tured by AstraZeneca. At least one med­ical expert has ques­tioned whether the new exe­cu­tion drug is appro­pri­ate. Missouri’s writ­ten pro­to­col does not require a physi­cian to be a part…

In the lat­est edi­tion of the Death Penalty Information Center’s pod­casts, we inter­view attor­ney Jennifer Whitfield (pic­tured) of Covington & Burling, who worked to secure the release of for­mer death row inmate Larry Smith in Alabama. Mr. Smith was sen­tenced to death in 1995 for a mur­der relat­ed to a rob­bery. His con­vic­tion hinged on a state­ment he made after 4 hours of inter­ro­ga­tion. In vio­la­tion of police guide­lines, his…

A new book by Professor Jody Lynee’ Madeira of the Indiana University School of Law fol­lows the after­math of the Oklahoma City bomb­ing to explore whether the fam­i­lies of mur­der vic­tims obtain clo­sure from an exe­cu­tion. In Killing McVeigh: The Death Penalty and the Myth of Closure, Prof. Madeira recounts her wide range of inter­views with those who expe­ri­enced this tragedy first-hand. Regarding the book, Professor Carol Steiker of Harvard said,​“Everyone…