Publications & Testimony

On September 26, Ohio Governor John Kasich (pic­tured) grant­ed clemen­cy to Joseph Murphy, com­mut­ing his death sen­tence to life with­out parole, cit­ing the defen­dan­t’s hor­rif­ic child­hood. Murphy was sched­uled for exe­cu­tion on October 18. The Ohio Parole Board had unan­i­mous­ly rec­om­mend­ed spar­ing Murphy’s life, cit­ing evi­dence from Murphy’s child­hood that indi­cat­ed he was beat­en, starved and sex­u­al­ly abused. The Parole Board also cit­ed a 1992 Ohio…

The lead edi­to­r­i­al in the New York Times on September 26 called for an end to the death penal­ty because, the edi­tors said, it can­not be made to com­ply with the U.S. Constitution. The edi­toral reviewed the 35-year his­to­ry since the death penal­ty was rein­stat­ed in 1976 and con­clud­ed, ​“The death penal­ty is grotesque and immoral and should be repealed.” The paper point­ed to the recent case of Troy Davis, who was exe­cut­ed on September 21 in…

On September 22, Kenneth Kagonyera and Robert Wilcoxson (pic­tured l. to r.) were exon­er­at­ed of mur­der and freed from prison in North Carolina after a spe­cial com­mis­sion ruled they were inno­cent. The two men spent a decade in prison after plead­ing guilty to sec­ond-degree mur­der. They have con­sis­tent­ly main­tained their inno­cence, claim­ing that they only pled guilty because they were threat­ened with the death penal­ty and feared exe­cu­tion. The exon­er­a­tions came…

Family mem­bers of James Anderson (pic­tured), who was killed on June 26 in Jackson, Mississippi, are ask­ing the District Attorney not to seek the death penal­ty for Anderson’s killer. Deryl Dedmon, a white teenag­er, was charged with Anderson’s mur­der after he and oth­er white teens took turns beat­ing him. Dedmon then drove over Anderson with a truck. Barbara Anderson Young, the vic­tim’s sis­ter, wrote a let­ter to the D.A. on behalf of their moth­er and two…

Desert Storm vet­er­an Cleve Foster (pic­tured), who faced exe­cu­tion in Texas for the third time this year for a mur­der near­ly a decade ago, was grant­ed anoth­er stay by the U.S. Supreme Court on September 20. The Supreme Court stopped Foster’s exe­cu­tion twice before in 2011. In January, six hours before his sched­uled exe­cu­tion, the Justices grant­ed a reprieve to allow them more time to con­sid­er his appeal. In April, the Court again halt­ed his…

After a hear­ing on September 19, the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles denied clemen­cy to Troy Davis who is fac­ing exe­cu­tion on September 21, despite pre­sen­ta­tion of tes­ti­mo­ny cast­ing doubt on his guilt. Brian Kammer, one of Davis’s attor­neys, said, ​“I am utter­ly shocked and dis­ap­point­ed at the fail­ure of our jus­tice sys­tem at all lev­els to cor­rect a mis­car­riage of jus­tice.” Davis’s claims of inno­cence have received inter­na­tion­al atten­tion, and calls for…

In an op-ed for the Los Angeles Daily News, Don Heller (pic­tured), a Republican, for­mer pros­e­cu­tor, and the author of the 1978 bal­lot ini­tia­tive that rein­stat­ed California​’s death penal­ty, voiced his sup­port for replac­ing the death penal­ty with life with­out parole. ​“It makes no sense to prop up such a failed sys­tem,” he wrote. He urged California vot­ers to sup­port a new bal­lot ini­tia­tive that would abol­ish the state’s death penal­ty, cit­ing the…

William S. Sessions, the for­mer direc­tor of the FBI and a for­mer fed­er­al judge and pros­e­cu­tor, recent­ly wrote an op-ed call­ing for the com­mu­ta­tion of Troy Davis​’s death sen­tence to life in prison with­out parole. Writing in the Atlanta Journal Constitution, Sessions said that ​“seri­ous ques­tions about Davis’ guilt, high­light­ed by wit­ness recan­ta­tions, alle­ga­tions of police coer­cion and a lack of rel­e­vant physical…