Publications & Testimony

In the lat­est edi­tion of the Death Penalty Information Center’s pod­casts, Professor Michael H. Fox, direc­tor of the Japan Innocence and Death Penalty Research Center, dis­cuss­es the cur­rent state of the death penal­ty in Japan. Prof. Fox com­pares pub­lic opin­ion on the death penal­ty in Japan and the U.S., explains some of the unique aspects of Japan’s crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem, and dis­cuss­es the prospects for change. Click here to…

In a recent op-ed in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, for­mer U.S. President Jimmy Carter called for the end of the death penal­ty. President Carter cit­ed the risk of wrong­ful exe­cu­tions, the lack of evi­dence of deter­rence, and the costs of pros­e­cu­tion as rea­sons to abol­ish cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. He wrote, “[T]here has nev­er been any evi­dence that the death penal­ty reduces cap­i­tal crimes or that crimes increased when exe­cu­tions stopped. Tragic…

A new book pub­lished in elec­tron­ic for­mat, The Death Penalty Failed Experiment: From Gary Graham to Troy Davis in Context by Diann Rust-Tierney, exam­ines the prob­lem of arbi­trari­ness in the death penal­ty since its rein­state­ment in 1976. Through an analy­sis of the cas­es of Gary Graham and Troy Davis, the author argues that race, wealth and geog­ra­phy play a more sig­nif­i­cant role in deter­min­ing who faces cap­i­tal punishment than…

In an op-ed writ­ten for the 25^th anniver­sary of the U.S. Supreme Court​’s deci­sion in McCleskey v. Kemp, nation­al­ly acclaimed death penal­ty expert James Acker (pic­tured) called for a reassess­ment of how race is affect­ing death penal­ty deci­sions. Prof. Acker ques­tioned the Court’s refusal to find bias in the wake of the strong sta­tis­ti­cal evi­dence pre­sent­ed in that case. He wrote,​“The time has sure­ly come for…

On April 25, 2012, Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy (pic­tured) signed into law a bill that replaces the death penal­ty with life with­out parole. At that time, Connecticut became the fifth state in five years, and the 17^th over­all, to do away with cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Governor Malloy, who once sup­port­ed the death penal­ty, offered the fol­low­ing state­ment:​“My posi­tion on the appro­pri­ate­ness of the death penal­ty in our crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem evolved over…

On April 20, the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles reduced the death sen­tence of Daniel Greene (pic­tured) to life in prison with­out the pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole. The Board had stayed Greene’s exe­cu­tion, which was set for April 19, in order to fur­ther con­sid­er his clemen­cy peti­tion. Greene’s peti­tion includ­ed let­ters from sev­er­al mem­bers of the Taylor County com­mu­ni­ty, where the mur­der occurred, urg­ing the Board to spare Greene’s life.

On April 23, the SAFE California Act, an ini­tia­tive to replace California​’s death penal­ty with a sen­tence of life with­out parole, qual­i­fied for the November 2012 bal­lot by pre­sent­ing an ample num­ber of qual­i­fied sig­na­tures. The ini­tia­tive gar­nered almost 800,000 sig­na­tures for the mea­sure that would repeal the death penal­ty and make cap­i­tal crimes pun­ish­able by life in prison with­out parole. The ini­tia­tive would also require…

(Superior Court, Judge Gregory Weeks, April…

Marcus Robinson was the first defen­dant to receive a hear­ing under North Carolina’s Racial Justice Act. His sen­tence was reduced to life with­out parole due to evi­dence of racial bias in…

On April 20, North Carolina Superior Court Judge Gregory Weeks issued an his­toric rul­ing under the state’s Racial Justice Act find­ing inten­tion­al bias by the state in select­ing juries for death penal­ty cas­es. In what may be the first rul­ing of its kind in the coun­try, the court held that​“race was a mate­ri­al­ly, prac­ti­cal­ly and sta­tis­ti­cal­ly sig­nif­i­cant fac­tor in the deci­sion to exer­cise peremp­to­ry chal­lenges during jury…