Publications & Testimony

A new report on the state’s death penal­ty sys­tem pub­lished by the ACLU of Northern California cat­a­logs numer­ous intractable prob­lems and wan­ing pub­lic sup­port which may lead to the end of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the state. According to the report, ​“California’s Death Penalty is Dead: Anatomy of a Failure,” the death penal­ty in California is being slow­ly aban­doned as pros­e­cu­tors, leg­is­la­tors and tax­pay­ers are increas­ing­ly turn­ing to life in prison…

A Texas cap­i­tal case that pre­cip­i­tat­ed a rare judi­cial review of the con­sti­tu­tion­al­i­ty of the state’s death penal­ty recent­ly end­ed on July 6 with an unex­pect­ed plea deal. At the end of six weeks of jury selec­tion, the pros­e­cu­tion accept­ed defen­dant John Edward Green Jr.‘s agree­ment to plead guilty to a less­er mur­der charge in exchange for 40 years in prison. The case was delayed in com­ing to tri­al when Judge Kevin Fine (pic­tured) agreed to con­duct a hearing…

On July 12, U.S. District Court Judge Raymond A. Jackson over­turned the mur­der con­vic­tion and death sen­tence of Justin Wolfe (pic­tured), who alleged­ly orches­trat­ed the slay­ing of his mar­i­jua­na sup­pli­er, Daniel Petrole Jr., in Virginia over a decade ago. Judge Jackson ruled that pros­e­cu­tors in Wolfe’s case with­held or ignored cru­cial evi­dence that could have helped Wolfe’s defense. The Court held that Prince William County Commonwealth’s Attorney Paul Ebert…

A new report from the Equal Justice Initiative in Alabama expos­es the prac­tice of state judges impos­ing death sen­tences by over­rid­ing a jury’s rec­om­men­da­tion for life. EJI’s study found that judges in the state have over­rid­den jury rec­om­men­da­tions 107 times since 1976. In 92% of the over­rides, judges over­ruled life ver­dicts to impose a death sen­tence. More than 20% of the defen­dants on Alabama’s death row were sen­tenced through judge over­rides. These…

Have you ever won­dered about how a death penal­ty tri­al is con­duct­ed or why the appeals take many years? The lat­est edi­tion of the Death Penalty Information Center’s series of pod­casts, DPIC on the Issues, may be help­ful in answer­ing those ques­tions. This pod­cast address­es ques­tions about the legal process in cap­i­tal cas­es, includ­ing jury selec­tion, sen­tenc­ing, and appeals. In addi­tion to cov­er­ing the basic steps in a death penal­ty case, the pod­cast dis­cuss­es issues such as…

On July 1, the Administration of President Barack Obama joined for­mer gov­ern­ment offi­cials and nation­al orga­ni­za­tions inter­ven­ing in the case of Texas death row inmate Humberto Leal Garcia. Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli, Jr. appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to delay Leal’s exe­cu­tion sched­uled for July 7. The Solicitor General wrote that Leal’s exe­cu­tion ​“would place the United States in irrepara­ble breach of its…