Publications & Testimony

An in-depth inves­ti­ga­tion con­duct­ed by USA Today found 201 crim­i­nal cas­es in which fed­er­al judges deter­mined that U.S. Department of Justice pros­e­cu­tors vio­lat­ed laws or ethics rules, includ­ing the recent pros­e­cu­tion of Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska. The inves­ti­ga­tion looked at cas­es since 1997, when Congress enact­ed a law aimed at end­ing pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct. Some of the vio­la­tions reviewed by USA Today result­ed in judges throw­ing out…

Leroy White (pic­tured) was exe­cut­ed in Alabama on January 13 despite the fact that his tri­al jury, the pros­e­cu­tion, and mem­bers of the vic­tim’s fam­i­ly had sought a dif­fer­ent sen­tence. Shortly before his exe­cu­tion, he received a stay from the U.S. Supreme Court to con­sid­er his final motion. However, near­ly three hours lat­er the stay was lift­ed and he was exe­cut­ed for the 1988 mur­der of his estranged wife, Ruby White. During the time that the…

U. S. Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois recent­ly announced at a break­fast hon­or­ing Martin Luther King, Jr., that he has changed his life-long opin­ion on the death penal­ty and now favors its abo­li­tion. Sen. Durbin, who is the sec­ond-rank­ing mem­ber of the U.S. Senate as the assis­tant major­i­ty leader, said that his reflec­tions over many years brought about an evo­lu­tion in his think­ing about cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, par­tic­u­lar­ly with respect to its unfair­ness and the…

On January 14, in one of his final acts as gov­er­nor, Pennsylvania Governor Edward G. Rendell wrote a let­ter to the state General Assembly urg­ing leg­is­la­tors to con­sid­er replac­ing the death penal­ty with a sen­tence of life with­out parole if it can­not be made more effec­tive than it has been. Gov. Rendell wrote that the death penal­ty in Pennsylvania is not a real­i­ty: ​“As a for­mer District Attorney and as a death penal­ty sup­port­er, I believe the death penal­ty can be a deterrent –…

On January 11, Desert Storm vet­er­an Cleve Foster of Texas received a stay of exe­cu­tion just moments before his lethal injec­tion. Foster had already fin­ished his last meal when the United States Supreme Court halt­ed the exe­cu­tion. Foster was sen­tenced to death for a 2002 shoot­ing, but has always main­tained that his friend was respon­si­ble for the mur­der. The friend also received the death penal­ty for the crime but died of can­cer before he was…

Four law enforce­ment offi­cials from var­i­ous coun­tries who came togeth­er in Washington, D.C., in 2010 for a ground­break­ing inter­na­tion­al dia­logue on the death penal­ty recent­ly pub­lished an op-ed in the San Jose Mercury News regard­ing their dis­cus­sion. From their expe­ri­ence, they dis­count­ed the argu­ment that the death penal­ty deters potential…

On January 11, the Illinois Senate, by a vote of 32 – 25, joined the House in vot­ing to repeal the state’s death penal­ty and re-allo­cate funds in the Capital Litigation Trust Fund to a fund for mur­der vic­tims’ ser­vices and law enforce­ment. If signed into law, Illinois would become the 16^th state to stop cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment and would mark the fewest states with the death penal­ty since 1978. Since 1976, Illinois has car­ried out 12 exe­cu­tions. In…