Publications & Testimony

A recent study in North Carolina found that the odds of a defen­dant receiv­ing a death sen­tence were three times high­er if the per­son was con­vict­ed of killing a white per­son than if he had killed a black per­son. The study, con­duct­ed by Professors Michael Radelet and Glenn Pierce, exam­ined 15,281 homi­cides in the state between 1980 and 2007, which result­ed in 368 death sen­tences. Even after account­ing for additional factors,…

A recent poll con­duct­ed in California showed that sup­port for life with­out parole for first-degree mur­der has increased among reg­is­tered vot­ers since 2000. When asked which sen­tence they pre­ferred for a first-degree mur­der­er, 42% of reg­is­tered vot­ers said they pre­ferred life with­out parole and 41% said they pre­ferred the death penal­ty. In 2000, when vot­ers were asked the same ques­tion, 37% chose life with­out parole while 44% chose the…

Dan Glode, a for­mer dis­trict attor­ney in Lincoln County, Oregon, recent­ly crit­i­cized the death penal­ty for​“the enor­mous expense in dol­lars and emo­tion­al cap­i­tal [it takes] for the fam­i­lies of homi­cide vic­tims.” Writing in the Newport News-Times, he expe­ri­enced crime both as a pros­e­cu­tor and as a rel­a­tive of a mur­der vic­tim:​“The emo­tion­al cost on the fam­i­lies of the vic­tim is also enor­mous. I have some knowledge of…

Terrence Dwyer, for­mer­ly with the New York Police Bureau of Criminal Investigation, recent­ly chron­i­cled the evo­lu­tion of his think­ing about the death penal­ty and whether it serves the needs of law enforce­ment. Dwyer cit­ed sev­er­al exam­ples of recent exon­er­a­tions and not­ed,​“Clearly, by keep­ing the death penal­ty in place, we run the unac­cept­able risk of exe­cut­ing the inno­cent. Those of us in law enforce­ment do our best to take the…

David Garland, a pro­fes­sor of law and soci­ol­o­gy at New York University, recent­ly addressed some com­mon myths regard­ing the death penal­ty in America. In an op-ed in the Washington Post, Garland pro­vid­ed infor­ma­tion chal­leng­ing the com­mon wisdom about…

A hear­ing to set an exe­cu­tion date for Texas death row inmate Humberto Leal was post­poned after the pre­sid­ing judge received a let­ter from a high-rank­ing U.S. State Department offi­cial. Leal, a Mexican cit­i­zen who was sen­tenced to death in 1995, had already been trans­ferred to Bexar County Jail for the hear­ing to set the exe­cu­tion date. Harold Hongju Koh, a top legal advis­er to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, wrote the…

Bruce Webster faces a fed­er­al exe­cu­tion despite new evi­dence – includ­ing eval­u­a­tions by three doc­tors – indi­cat­ing he is intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled. Although the U.S. Supreme Court banned the exe­cu­tion of the​“men­tal­ly retard­ed” (now referred to as​“intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled”) in 2002, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in April denied Webster’s request for a hear­ing on his men­tal capac­i­ty claim. The court found that…

Sharon Keller, the pre­sid­ing judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, received a pub­lic warn­ing from the State Commission on Judicial Conduct on July 16 for her con­duct in bar­ring access to the courts to a death row inmate who was about to be exe­cut­ed in 2007. The Commission said her actions con­sti­tut­ed​“will­ful or per­sis­tent con­duct that is clear­ly incon­sis­tent with the prop­er per­for­mance of her duties.” When request­ed at home to…

A recent poll con­duct­ed by Lake Research Partners found that a major­i­ty of Illinois reg­is­tered vot­ers pre­fer an alter­na­tive sen­tence to the death penal­ty for those who com­mit mur­der. The poll­sters sur­veyed vot­ers in April, and found that 43% believed that the penal­ty for mur­der should be life with no pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole and a require­ment to make resti­tu­tion to the victim’s fam­i­ly. Another 18% felt that the penal­ty for mur­der should be life in…

On July 14, Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen com­mut­ed the death sen­tence of Gaile Owens to life in prison. Owens, who was sen­tenced to death in 1986 for hir­ing a man to kill her hus­band, had accept­ed a deal to plead guilty to the crime in exchange for a sen­tence of life in prison. However, the man who did the killing refused to plead guilty, and pros­e­cu­tors then rescind­ed the deal for Owens. Both co-defen­­dants were sen­tenced to death. In…