Publications & Testimony

On April 16, 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Kentucky’s lethal injec­tion process in Baze v. Rees, there­by open­ing the door to a resump­tion of exe­cu­tions which had been on hold since September 2007. Since then, there have been 18…

In a 5 – 4 vote on August 5, the U.S. Supreme Court reject­ed a stay of exe­cu­tion for Jose Medellin, a Mexican cit­i­zen, who was then exe­cut­ed in Texas that night. On August 7, Heliberto Chi, an Honduran cit­i­zen, was also exe­cut­ed in Texas. Medellin’s case had come before the Supreme Court on two pre­vi­ous occa­sions because the International Court of Justice had ruled that the U.S. had vio­lat­ed the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations by not informing…

An inmate in Alabama came with­in hours of exe­cu­tion despite the fact that seri­ous doubts arose about whether he had even com­mit­ted the crime that put him on death row. Thomas Arthur had been sched­uled to die in Alabama on July 31, but the Alabama Supreme Court vot­ed 5 – 4 on July 30 to stay his exe­cu­tion after anoth­er inmate con­fessed to the mur­der for which Arthur had been sen­tenced to death. In a sworn state­ment, Bobby Ray Gilbert con­fessed to killing Troy Wicker Jr. more than…

In a 4 – 3 vote, the Arkansas Parole Board rec­om­mend­ed that Frank Williams’ death sen­tence be com­mut­ed to life with­out parole. The Board had received peti­tions for clemen­cy from 13 state, nation­al, and inter­na­tion­al orga­ni­za­tions and devel­op­men­tal dis­abil­i­ties experts which con­clud­ed that Mr. Williams suf­fers from men­tal retar­da­tion based on his sub-aver­age adap­tive func­tion­ing and the diag­no­sis of psy­cho­log­i­cal experts. The requests for clemen­cy empha­sized the fact that executing…

Argument: April 16, 2008 Decision: June 25, 2008Modified: Oct. 1,…

Arkansas’ lead­ing advo­ca­cy orga­ni­za­tion for peo­ple with men­tal retar­da­tion, Arc Arkansas, deliv­ered a let­ter to Governor Mike Beebe and the Arkansas Parole Board urg­ing clemen­cy for Frank Williams, Jr. because of his men­tal retar­da­tion. He is sched­uled for exe­cu­tion on September 9 and the Arkansas Parole Board is hold­ing a clemen­cy hear­ing on his case on August 4. The let­ter notes that exe­cut­ing a men­tal­ly retard­ed per­son is uncon­sti­tu­tion­al based on both Arkansas’ 1993…

Professor Celestine Richards McConville explores the plight of inmates on Alabama’s death row who face exe­cu­tion despite being denied ade­quate rep­re­sen­ta­tion for key parts of their appeal in her law review arti­cle, ​“The Meaninglessness of Delayed Appointments and Discretionary Grants of Capital Postconviction Counsel.” The arti­cle is part of a University of Tulsa Law Review sym­po­sium issue on ​“The Death Penalty and the Question of Actual Innocence.” The arti­cle points out that Alabama’s…

Oklahoma Governor Brad Henry com­mut­ed the death sen­tence of Kevin Young to life in prison with­out parole on July 24. Henry stat­ed, ​“This was a very dif­fi­cult deci­sion and one that I did not take light­ly.” He explained that, ​“after review­ing all of the evi­dence and hear­ing from both pros­e­cu­tors and defense attor­neys, I decid­ed the Pardon and Parole Board made a prop­er rec­om­men­da­tion to pro­vide clemen­cy and com­mute the death sen­tence.” This is only the sec­ond time the Governor has…

On July 28, 2008, the Maryland Commission on Capital Punishment held the first of sev­er­al pub­lic hear­ings to assess whether Maryland death penal­ty pro­ce­dures meet basic stan­dards of fair­ness and avoid bias and error. Established ear­li­er this year by Maryland’s General Assembly, the 23-mem­ber com­mis­sion is exam­in­ing issues includ­ing racial dis­par­i­ties in the appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty, the costs of lit­i­gat­ing pro­longed cap­i­tal cas­es as com­pared to life impris­on­ment, and the risk of…

The same doc­tor who was banned from exe­cu­tions in Missouri has been dis­cov­ered as a par­tic­i­pant in Arizona’s most recent exe­cu­tion. Dr. Alan Doerhoff’s sig­na­ture was at the bot­tom of the EKG tape for Robert Comer, who was exe­cut­ed in 2007. Eight months ear­li­er, Dr. Doerhoff was pro­hib­it­ed from par­tic­i­pat­ing in fur­ther Missouri exe­cu­tions because of ques­tions about his stan­dards and com­pe­tence. Doerhoff had assist­ed in more than 54 exe­cu­tions in Missouri, devel­oped pro­ce­dures, inserted…