Publications & Testimony

Rhode Island Governor Lincoln D. Chafee (Indep.) recently explained his denial of a request to transfer Jason Pleau to the federal government for a potential death penalty prosecution. Chafee stated, ” As a matter of public policy, Rhode Islanders have long opposed the death penalty, even for the most heinous crimes. To voluntarily let Mr. Pleau be exposed to the federal death penalty for a crime committed in Rhode Island would be an abdication of one of my core responsibilities as governor…

A new report by Professor James S. Liebman (pictured) and Peter Clarke from Columbia University Law School analyzes the declining use of the death penalty and concludes that, although it is abstractly supported by two-thirds of the public, the death penalty is actually practiced by only a distinct minority of jurisdictions in the United States. In their forthcoming article, “Minority Practice, Majority’s Burden: The Death Penalty Today,” Liebman and Clarke attempt to explain why the use of the…

In a recent op-ed in the L.A. Times, Professor Jennifer L. Mnookin (pictured) of the UCLA Law School provided an analysis of how preconceptions and biases toward the unconventional suspects known as the West Memphis Three may have led to their wrongful convictions and a death sentence in Arkansas in 1994. Because of the grisly nature of the murders, investigators decided early on that it was probably related to satanic cult rituals. This theory pointed them to Damien Echols, who was a…

Ohio Rep. Terry Blair (pictured) is one of two Republican co-sponsors of House Bill 160, a bill that would replace the death penalty in the state with life without the possibility of parole. Blair, whose opinion on the death penalty puts him in the minority in the 59-member House Republican caucus, attributes his views to his religious beliefs. “I don’t think we have any business in taking another person’s life, even for what we call a legal purpose or what we might refer to as a justified…

Damien Echols was freed from death row and two codefendants were freed from prison in Arkansas on August 19 after almost two decades of maintaining their innocence for the murder of three children in 1993. Echols, along with Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley, were granted an opportunity to enter a special plea in which they continued to assert their innocence but acknowledged that the state could likely convict them again in a retrial. DNA evidence that emerged after their trial did not match…

The Innocence Project has launched a new multimedia resource illustrating the main causes of wrongful convictions and the reforms necessary to prevent such mistakes. This interactive tool, “Getting it Right,” features videos, case studies and research on such topics as false confessions, eyewitness identification, informant testimony, and failures by the defense and prosecution. Three death penalty cases are highlighted: Ron Williamson, Earl Washington, Jr., and Ray Krone, who collectively…

A new study by Professor Franklin Zimring of the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law provides an in-depth analysis of the factors that influenced the dramatic twenty-year decline of street crime in New York City. According to the study, which was recently discussed in Scientific American, the rate of common crimes such as homicide, robbery and burglary dropped by more than 80 percent in New York City. By 2009, the homicide rate was lower than it was in 1961. Zimring suggests that…

In Washington, King County has spent $656,564 to prosecute three capital defendants in two cases and over $4.3 million to defend the accused. The trials have yet to begin, but money has been needed for expert witnesses, investigators, and forensic analysis. Prosecution costs do not include work done by police officers and crime-lab analysts. The county has struggled with constraints on its criminal justice budget and has eliminated the jobs of 36 prosecutors since 2008. A third case prosecuted…