Publications & Testimony

In all states that use the death penal­ty, there are pro­vi­sions for sen­tenc­ing inmates to the alter­na­tive sen­tence of life with­out parole (LWOP). Prior to the U.S. Supreme Court’s rul­ing in Simmons v. South Carolina (1994), some states with LWOP did not inform the jury of this alter­na­tive even when so request­ed by the defense. Today, states apply a vari­ety of con­di­tions and use dif­fer­ing instruc­tions to inform the jury about this alternative…

According to the Chicago Tribune, the Texas Forensic Science Commission has received a report from a nation­al­ly known fire sci­en­tist that casts doubt on the guilt of Cameron Todd Willingham (pic­tured) who was exe­cut­ed in Texas in February 2004. Craig Beyler of Hughes Associates con­duct­ed a review for the Commission of the evi­dence used to con­vict Willingham of mur­der by arson, which led to his death sen­tence. Beyler con­clud­ed the Texas…

Georgia is seek­ing the death penal­ty for Khan Dinh Phan, a Vietnamese immi­grant charged with mur­der, but after four years the case has not come to tri­al because the state has failed to ade­quate­ly fund the defense. Phan’s defense attor­neys are ask­ing the Georgia Supreme Court to dis­miss the death penal­ty part of the pros­e­cu­tion.​“You don’t have to have the death penal­ty in Georgia, but if you have it, the Constitution requires you must pro­vide the defense the…

A state ethics tri­bunal exam­in­ing the con­duct of the pre­sid­ing judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in a death penal­ty case con­clud­ed its pro­ceed­ings on August 20. Judge Sharon Keller is fac­ing a rep­ri­mand or removal from the bench for her con­duct on the day Michael Richard was exe­cut­ed in Texas on September 25, 2007. She had left the court ear­ly that day and was at home when she received a call from an assistant at…

Dr. Allen Ault was the war­den at the max­i­mum secu­ri­ty prison in Georgia where exe­cu­tions were car­ried out. He also served as Commissioner of Corrections dur­ing a life­time career in the field. He is cur­rent­ly the Dean of the College of Justice & Safety at Eastern Kentucky University. In the video accom­pa­ny­ing this note, Dean Ault dis­cuss­es the tremen­dous drain that car­ry­ing out exe­cu­tions had, and con­tin­ues to have,…

In the book, A Life for a Life: The American Debate Over the Death Penalty, author Michael Dow Burkhead, a psy­chol­o­gist who has worked with crim­i­nal offend­ers for 25 years, explores the var­i­ous trends in pub­lic opin­ion that influ­ence crime pre­ven­tion efforts, cre­ate pub­lic pol­i­cy, and reform crim­i­nal law. He exam­ines eight core issues about the use of exe­cu­tions: cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment, dis­crim­i­na­tion, deter­rence, due process, culpability,…

On August 17 the United States Supreme Court ordered a new evi­den­tiary hear­ing for Georgia death row inmate Troy Davis, whose case has drawn world­wide atten­tion because of new evi­dence of his pos­si­ble inno­cence. For the first time in near­ly 50 years, the Court has favor­ably respond­ed to a peti­tion direct­ed to them, rather than as an appeal from oth­er courts. With only two Justices writ­ing in dis­sent, the Court ordered the lower federal…

In True Stories of False Confessions, edi­tors Rob Warden and Steven Drizin present arti­cles about some of the key accounts of false con­fes­sions in the U.S. jus­tice sys­tem writ­ten by more than forty authors, includ­ing Alex Kotlowitz and John Grisham. The cas­es are grouped into cat­e­gories such as brain­wash­ing, infer­ence, fab­ri­ca­tion, and men­tal fragili­ty. This refutes the per­cep­tion that false con­fes­sions rep­re­sent indi­vid­ual tragedies rather…

A num­ber of fed­er­al judges have recent­ly writ­ten strong dis­sents in cap­i­tal cas­es because they were con­cerned that restric­tions on appeals could lead to trag­ic mis­takes. Judge William Fletcher of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, for exam­ple, began his dis­sent in the case of Kevin Cooper with the words,​“The State of California may be about to exe­cute an inno­cent man.” According to a study by the New York Times, such…

The Death Penalty Project of London recent­ly pub­lished A Penalty Without Legitimacy: The Mandatory Death Penalty In Trinidad And Tobago (2009), a col­lec­tion of papers pre­sent­ed at a con­fer­ence in Trinidad & Tobago in March 2009. The papers include a study of opin­ions of judges, pros­e­cu­tors, and coun­sel on the use of the manda­to­ry death penal­ty in Trinidad and Tobago and ways to bring its prac­tice in line with oth­er coun­tries that have retained the death penal­ty. The…