Publications & Testimony

A for­mer Dallas County pros­e­cu­tor has aban­doned his long­stand­ing sup­port of the death penal­ty and is now opposed to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment based on recent exon­er­a­tions in Texas and else­where. James Fry, who pros­e­cut­ed Charles Chatman – a man recent­ly exon­er­at­ed from prison in Dallas County – said he was​“shak­en to the core” by the high num­ber of exon­er­a­tions through­out the nation and by evi­dence of flawed eyewitness testimony.

In June 2008, the Office of Defender Services of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts pub­lished a report ana­lyz­ing the cost, qual­i­ty and avail­abil­i­ty of defense rep­re­sen­ta­tion in fed­er­al death penal­ty cas­es. The report deter­mined that fed­er­al cap­i­tal tri­als in which the death penal­ty was sought were sub­stan­tial­ly more expen­sive than non-death penal­ty fed­er­al tri­als; how­ev­er, a death sen­tence was hand­ed down in only one-quarter…

As many coun­tries pre­pare to mark the inter­na­tion­al World Day Against the Death Penalty on October 10, recent trends indi­cate that the world is shift­ing away from cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. According to a report pub­lished by Reprieve, an orga­ni­za­tion that rep­re­sents death row pris­on­ers around the world, 91 coun­tries had abol­ished the death penal­ty for all crimes by the end of 2007, fol­lowed by three more so far in 2008. Even in Central Asia where executions are…

In her new book, Execution’s Doorstep: The True Stories of the Innocent and Near Damned, author Leslie Lytle pro­vides a com­pelling nar­ra­tive recount­ing the har­row­ing jour­neys of five inno­cent men who spent many years on death row. Through exten­sive research and inter­views, Lytle has suc­ceed­ed in reveal­ing the deep pain and suf­fer­ing that such injus­tice yields, putting a human face to the recur­ring prob­lem of inno­cence on death row. The book explores all aspects of…

The United States Supreme Court is cur­rent­ly con­sid­er­ing whether to hear the case of Troy Davis or to allow his exe­cu­tion to go for­ward. The Court stayed his exe­cu­tion on September 23, less than two hours before it was to take place. The for­mal term for agree­ing to hear a case is​“grant­i­ng a peti­tion for cer­tio­rari.” Davis’ attor­neys sub­mit­ted such a peti­tion, rais­ing a num­ber of ques­tions on which the Court could grant a hearing.

There have been 24 exe­cu­tions so far in 2008. Executions resumed on May 5 after the U.S. Supreme Court approved Kentucky’s lethal injec­tion process in Baze v. Rees. One hun­dred per­cent of the exe­cu­tions have been in the South, includ­ing 9 in Texas, 4 in Virginia, and 3 in Georgia. At least 12 cas­es have been grant­ed stays of exe­cu­tions in the past two months, includ­ing Troy Davis, whose exe­cu­tion in Georgia was halt­ed by the…

Notable inter­na­tion­al law experts cit­ed in a recent arti­cle in the Washington Lawyer crit­i­cized the Supreme Court’s 2008 deci­sion on whether an inter­na­tion­al treaty was bind­ing on Texas in the case of death row inmate Jose Medellin. Carolyn Lamm, an attor­ney at White & Case spe­cial­iz­ing in inter­na­tion­al dis­pute res­o­lu­tion, stat­ed that “[T]he fail­ure to com­pel our state court organs to com­ply with the deci­sion of the ICJ [International Court…

The for­mer war­den of San Quentin prison in California, Jeanne Woodford, regrets hav­ing tak­en part in exe­cu­tions and has called for replac­ing the death penal­ty with life with­out the pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole. In an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, Woodford notes that after each exe­cu­tion,​“some­one on the staff would ask,​‘Is the world safer because of what we did tonight?’ We knew the answer: No.” The full article can…

On October 1, the U.S. Supreme Court denied Louisiana’s request for a rehear­ing of the Court’s rul­ing strik­ing down the death penal­ty for non-homi­­ci­­dal offens­es against indi­vid­u­als. Louisiana con­tend­ed that a recent adjust­ment to mil­i­tary law that con­tin­ued to allow the death penal­ty for child rape should have been tak­en into account by the Court, result­ing in a dif­fer­ent opin­ion. The Court slight­ly mod­i­fied both the major­i­ty and dis­sent­ing opinions to…

Leading attor­ney, law pro­fes­sor, and advo­cate Anthony Amsterdam is being hon­ored by the Southern Center for Human Rights with the Frederick Douglass Human Rights Award in Washington, DC on October 2. Professor Amsterdam con­ducts the Capital Defender Clinic at New York University Law School and is rec­og­nized for his four decades of promi­nent work in cas­es rang­ing from death penal­ty defense to claims of free speech and the press, pri­va­cy, and equal­i­ty of opportunity…