Publications & Testimony

As Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards (pic­tured) con­sid­ers the clemen­cy peti­tions filed by 51 of the state’s 57 death row pris­on­ers, advo­cates and jour­nal­ists have not­ed the sim­i­lar­i­ties between Louisiana’s death penal­ty sys­tem and that of Illinois, where Governor George Ryan com­mut­ed the sen­tences of all 167 peo­ple on death row in 2003. Both states have had high num­bers of death row exon­er­a­tions stem­ming from sys­temic mis­con­duct, death sen­tences in both states…

On June 28, 2023, Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCCA) denied Rodney Reed’s (pic­tured) appli­ca­tion for habeas relief and reject­ed Mr. Reed’s claim that pros­e­cu­tors at his 1998 tri­al ille­gal­ly pre­sent­ed false tes­ti­mo­ny and with­held excul­pa­to­ry evi­dence that could have exon­er­at­ed him. His case gained inter­na­tion­al atten­tion in 2019 when a bipar­ti­san group of law­mak­ers urged Republican Governor Abbot to stop his exe­cu­tion. Throughout his incar­cer­a­tion, he…

A forth­com­ing law review arti­cle tack­les big ques­tions about pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct. The Brady Database focus­es on the prin­ci­ple stat­ed in the 1963 U.S. Supreme Court case Brady v. Maryland: that the gov­ern­men­t’s with­hold­ing of evi­dence that is mate­r­i­al to the deter­mi­na­tion of either guilt or pun­ish­ment of a crim­i­nal defen­dant vio­lates the defen­dan­t’s con­sti­tu­tion­al right to due process. While the arti­cle focuses on…

June 28, 2023 marks the 30^th anniver­sary of the exon­er­a­tion of Kirk Bloodsworth (pic­tured), the first per­son exon­er­at­ed from death row with DNA evi­dence. In the three decades since he was exon­er­at­ed from Maryland’s death row, Mr. Bloodsworth has been a vocal advo­cate for crim­i­nal jus­tice reform. He played an essen­tial role in end­ing the death penal­ty in Maryland in 2013 and served as direc­tor of Witness to Innocence, an orga­ni­za­tion of death…

The resen­tenc­ing hear­ings of sev­er­al death-sen­­tenced men in Florida came to an abrupt halt last week as the Florida Supreme Court con­sid­ers the effect of the state’s new cap­i­tal sen­tenc­ing law. Earlier this year, the Florida leg­is­la­ture passed a new cap­i­tal sen­tenc­ing law to allow juries to impose a death sen­tence if at least 8 out of 12 jurors vote in favor. But sev­er­al death row defen­dants who were sched­uled to be resen­tenced object­ed that the new law unfairly…

In the June 2023 episode of Discussions with DPIC, Death Penalty Information Center Managing Director Anne Holsinger and Data Storyteller Tiana Herring dis­cuss the lat­est Racial Justice Storytelling Report, Doomed to Repeat: The Legacy of Race in Tennessee’s Contemporary Death Penalty. The report exam­ines the his­to­ry of Tennessee’s cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem, doc­u­ment­ing the con­tin­ued impact of racial dis­crim­i­na­tion and racial vio­lence on the admin­is­tra­tion of the…

On June 15, 2023, Ohio death-sen­­tenced pris­on­er Lamont Hunter (pic­tured) was released after serv­ing near­ly 18 years for alleged­ly caus­ing the death of his 3‑year-old son, Trustin Blue. To obtain his free­dom, he plead­ed guilty to less­er charges of invol­un­tary manslaugh­ter and child endan­ger­ment. Prosecutors agreed to offer a plea deal after Hamilton County Common Pleas Court Judge Christian A. Jenkins set bond for Mr. Hunter and dis­missed pros­e­cu­tors’ request to…

The Death Penalty Information Center’s new report on race and the death penal­ty in Tennessee places the state’s death penal­ty sys­tem in his­tor­i­cal con­text, doc­u­ment­ing how racial dis­crim­i­na­tion and racial vio­lence con­tin­ue to influ­ence the admin­is­tra­tion of the death penal­ty. Doomed to Repeat: The Legacy of Race in Tennessee’s Contemporary Death Penalty, released June 22, 2023, notes that as the Tennessee Department of Correction…

Seventy years after the exe­cu­tions of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, their sons, Michael and Robert Meeropol, have renewed their efforts to clear their mother’s name. Just ten and six years old when their par­ents were exe­cut­ed for fed­er­al charges of con­spir­a­cy to com­mit espi­onage, both men grew up believ­ing in their par­ents’ inno­cence. The Rosenbergs remain the only indi­vid­u­als put to death for peace­time espionage in…

Juneteenth is a cel­e­bra­tion and remem­brance of the end of slav­ery in the United States fol­low­ing the Union’s vic­to­ry in the Civil War. In June 2021, President Joseph Biden signed leg­is­la­tion estab­lish­ing Juneteenth as a fed­er­al hol­i­day, for­mal­ly com­mem­o­rat­ing the end of slav­ery. According to President Biden,​“Juneteenth marks both the long, hard night of slav­ery and sub­ju­ga­tion, and the promise of a greater morn­ing to come.” Among the many groups…