Publications & Testimony

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 death penalty. Some commentators say that the increased…

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 this, as a close relative of mine was murdered back in the 1980s. It took…

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 capital punishment: The United States is a death penalty nation. Garland contends that, in fact, the death penalty is rarely imposed today. It has been abolished in 15 states and in the District of Columbia. Of the 35 states that have the death…

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 Webster had exhausted all his appeals and that the court could not…

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 prison with no possibility of parole. Only 32%…

An inmate who spent 27 years on Oklahoma’s death row was released earlier in July after he accepted a plea agreement with prosecutors. James Fisher was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in 1983. A federal appeals court overturned his death sentence because of inadequate attorney representation, thus sending the case back to trial. In 2005, Fisher was again convicted and sentenced to death. The second death sentence was also overturned, this time by the Oklahoma Court of Criminal…