Publications & Testimony

In a recent op-ed in the San Francisco Chronicle, death penalty scholar Franklin Zimring suggested that the close (52 – 48%) vote in November on California’s Proposition 34 to end capital punishment means the repeal effort is far from over. Zimring, a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, wrote, “For decades, it has been assumed that the death penalty was the third rail of California politics …. Measured against that reputation, the narrowly divided electorate on Prop. 34 is…

On December 6, Bobby Tarver, who had spent 30 years on Alabama’s death row, finally had his death sentence reduced to life without parole by a state judge because of his intellectual disability. Tarver was Mobile County’s longest-serving death row inmate, having been convicted in 1982 of murdering a taxi cab driver. Last September, a federal judge overruled state court opinions and held that Tarver could not be executed because of his mental retardation, thus concluding a years-long legal…

On December 5, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals granted (5 – 3) Cathy Lynn Henderson a new trial based on recent scientific developments about the death of a baby who had been in her care. At one point, Henderson had been two days from execution. The appeals court accepted the factual findings of a district judge who ruled earlier this year that no reasonable juror would have convicted Henderson if presented with new scientific discoveries related to the death of Brandon Baugh. The appeals…

On November 28, the University of Nebraska hosted a dialogue on the death penalty with J. Kirk Brown (left), Nebraska’s Solicitor General, and Professor Michael Radelet (right) of the University of Colorado. Mr. Kirk was the state’s counsel of record for all of its executions since 1978. Prof. Radelet is a well-known death penalty expert, researcher, and the author of several works on innocence and the death penalty. The discussion was titled: “The Death Penalty: Justice, Retribution and…

Richard Stokley (pictured) is scheduled to be executed in Arizona on December 5 for rape and murder. Stokley’s accomplice, Randy Brazeal, was released from prison in 2011, despite DNA testing showing he was likely guilty of the same crime as Stokley. In 1991, Brazeal turned himself in to authorities and claimed that Stokley had held him hostage while committing the crime. However, subsequent DNA testing revealed that Brazeal likely participated in the crime and raped one of the victims. At the…

A former death row inmate with intellectual disabilities has languished in the Texas prison system for over 30 years despite having no valid criminal conviction. Jerry Hartfield, an illiterate man with an IQ of 51, had his capital conviction overturned in 1980 because the jury at his trial had been improperly selected. A Texas appeals court ordered a new trial for Hartfield, but that trial has never happened. In 1983, then-Governor Mark White attempted to commute Hartfield’s former death…

On November 29, the Colosseum in Rome, Italy, was illuminated in honor of Connecticut’s repeal of the death penalty in April of this year. The event featured former death row inmate Shujaa Graham of California and George Kain of the Connecticut Network to Abolish the Death Penalty. Five states in the past five years have abolished the death penalty: Connecticut, Illinois, New Mexico, New Jersey, and New York. The program also commemorated the 10^th World Day of Cities Against the Death Penalty…

A recent editorial in The Oregonian, one of the state’s major newspapers, endorsed a bill in the upcoming legislative session that could result in the repeal of the death penalty. The bill, to be introduced by Rep. Mitch Greenlick, would begin the process of amending the state’s constitution through a referendum as early as November 2014. The editors wrote, “5 states — New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Illinois and New Mexico — have abandoned the death penalty in recent years. Advances in DNA…

Texas Representative Harold Dutton recently filed a bill that would prevent prosecutors in death penalty cases from using testimony from informants or from alleged accomplices of the defendant if the testimony was obtained in exchange for leniency, immunity or other special provisions. If passed, the bill would make Texas among the first states to ban such testimony. Alexandra Natapoff, a professor at Loyola of Los Angeles Law School, said, “The use of criminal informants is a massive source of…

When Maryland’s legislature again convenes in January, it is likely to consider a bill to repeal the death penalty. Governor Martin O’Malley (pictured) has sponsored such legislation in the past and may do so again. O’Malley has called the death penalty “inherently unjust” and said resources spent on capital punishment could be better used elsewhere. Maryland has not carried out an execution or had a new death sentence since 2005. Executions are currently on hold because the state’s lethal…