Publications & Testimony

The lat­est edi­tion of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund​’s Death Row USA shows a decrease of 52 inmates between January 1 and October 1, 2011. Over the last decade, the total pop­u­la­tion of state and fed­er­al death rows has decreased sig­nif­i­cant­ly, from 3,682 inmates in 2000 to 3,199 inmates as of October 2011. California con­tin­ues to have the largest death row pop­u­la­tion (721), fol­lowed by Florida (402),…

The U.S. Supreme Court grant­ed review in two cas­es from Arizona and Ohio to explore 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), defen­dants can­not be exe­cut­ed if they are insane or intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled (men­tal­ly retard­ed). The new cas­es, Ryan v.

A recent study pub­lished by the Jesuit Social Research Institute of Loyola University point­ed to numer­ous prob­lems with Louisiana​’s death penal­ty. In par­tic­u­lar, the study found: — Per capi­ta, Louisiana has one of the high­est wrong­­ful-con­vic­­tion rates in the coun­try. More peo­ple have been exon­er­at­ed in Louisiana in the last ten years than exe­cut­ed. — Within Louisiana’s most aggres­sive death penal­ty dis­tricts, white victims…

Retired District Judge Steven Becker, along with pros­e­cu­tors, defense lawyers, and reli­gious lead­ers, recent­ly tes­ti­fied at a leg­isla­tive hear­ing in Kansas in favor of a bill to repeal the death penal­ty. Judge Becker com­ment­ed,​“As long as the death penal­ty is a part of our imper­fect sys­tem, there will always be the unac­cept­able pos­si­bil­i­ty of the exe­cu­tion of an inno­cent per­son.” Ron Wurtz, a fed­er­al pub­lic defender and…

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch called upon lead­ers in Missouri to make numer­ous changes to the state’s death penal­ty in light of a recent American Bar Association report pro­duced by a bipar­ti­san pan­el of lawyers, judges, pros­e­cu­tors and law pro­fes­sors. The edi­to­r­i­al high­light­ed many of the ABA’s rec­om­men­da­tions, includ­ing​“improv­ing evi­dence stan­dards, increas­ing pub­lic defend­er fund­ing and creating more…

Edward Lee Elmore was released from prison in South Carolina on March 2 after agree­ing to a plea arrange­ment in which he main­tained his inno­cence but agreed the state could re-con­vict him of mur­der in a new tri­al. He had been on death row for near­ly 30 years after being con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death in 1982 for the sex­u­al assault and mur­der of an elder­ly woman in Greenwood, South Carolina. The state’s case was based on evi­dence gath­ered from a questionable…

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A recent arti­cle in the New York Times dis­cussed the most com­mon rea­sons why sus­pects under inter­ro­ga­tion con­fess to crimes they did not com­mit. The arti­cle, adapt­ed from​“Rights at Risk: The Limits of Liberty in Modern America,” a forth­com­ing book writ­ten by David Shipler, observed an over­rep­re­sen­ta­tion of chil­dren, the men­tal­ly ill, those with intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ties, and those who are drunk…

Charles Hoffman, an assis­tant defend­er in the Office of the Illinois State Appellate Defender, recent­ly wrote an op-ed in the Chicago Sun-Times, mark­ing a year since the death penal­ty was repealed in Illinois. Hoffman, who has argued more than 30 death penal­ty cas­es before the Illinois Supreme Court, says that repeal­ing the death penal­ty was the right choice for the state:​“The right­ness of that decision…

A recent edi­to­r­i­al in The Washington Post high­light­ed ongo­ing prob­lems with Maryland​’s death penal­ty despite leg­is­la­tion passed in 2009 meant to reform the sys­tem. According to the edi­to­r­i­al,​“the legislature’s reform fixed noth­ing; if any­thing, it cod­i­fied a sys­tem even more arbi­trary than the one it replaced. Now the nature of the evi­dence, rather than the bar­bar­i­ty of the crime, is the crit­i­cal fac­tor. So a murder…