Publications & Testimony

B. Orser, ​“Lifting the Fog Around Anesthesia,” Scientific American, June 2007Thomas, Evan and Brant, Martha ​“Injection of Reflection,” Newsweek, November 10, 2007Weinstein, Harry and Dolan, Maura ​“The Chaos Behind California Executions” Los Angeles Times (October 2, 2006)Guidry, Orin ​“Message From the President: Observations Regarding Lethal Injection” American Society of Anesthesiologists (June 30,…

DNA Exonerations Lead to Key Policy Changes Throughout the U.S. In the wake of more than 200 exon­er­a­tions based on DNA evi­dence, includ­ing some wrong­ful­ly con­vict­ed death row pris­on­ers, juris­dic­tions through­out the U.S. are enact­ing key pol­i­cy reforms that add safe­guards to pro­tect against wrong­ful con­vic­tions and pro­vide inmates with bet­ter access to cru­cial evi­dence dur­ing appeals. All but eight states now give inmates vary­ing degrees of access to DNA evi­dence that might…

Author of Wisconsin Death Penalty Referendum Says Law Has No Chance of Passing Sen. Al Lasee (R‑DePere) of Wisconsin was the author of leg­is­la­tion that placed a non-bind­ing ref­er­en­dum on the death penal­ty on the state’s bal­lot in Tuesday’s elec­tion. Although 56% of the vot­ers approved the death penal­ty pro­pos­al, which required that DNA evi­dence con­firm the con­vic­tion, Lasee said there was no chance of such a law pass­ing in the near future: ​“I am a real­ist. There is no…

The Washington Supreme Court has unan­i­mous­ly adopt­ed high­er stan­dards for death penal­ty attor­neys after a 2001 Seattle Post-Intelligencer news series revealed that 20% of the defense attor­neys who han­dled cap­i­tal cas­es in the state had been, or were lat­er, dis­barred, sus­pend­ed or arrest­ed. The reforms, enact­ed by the Court under Chief Justice Gerry Alexander, require Washington judges pre­sid­ing over death penal­ty cas­es to appoint defense attor­neys who have been screened by a…

2007: Virginia leg­is­la­ture passed 5 death-penal­ty expan­sion bills, which were vetoed by Gov. Tim Kaine. The leg­is­la­ture over­rode his vetoes for bills mak­ing mur­der of a wit­ness or a judge a cap­i­tal offense.Virginia Legislators And Victims Speak Against Death Penalty Two Virginia law­mak­ers who have had a fam­i­ly mem­ber mur­dered recent­ly spoke in oppo­si­tion to the death penal­ty. During a sen­ate com­mit­tee hear­ing on a bill to impose a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions, Senators Henry L.

2007: passed a bill mak­ing mur­der of a child under 14 a death-eli­gi­ble offense.Passed a bill in March 2003, exempt­ing the men­tal­ly retard­ed from the death penal­ty in which retar­da­tion, described as ​“sig­nif­i­cant­ly sub­av­er­age gen­er­al intel­lec­tu­al func­tion­ing,” will be deter­mined before the tri­al. For more infor­ma­tion regard­ing this leg­is­la­tion, Click Here.In February 2003, the Utah Legislature unan­i­mous­ly approved a bill to pro­hib­it the exe­cu­tion of those with…

Victims’ Advocates, Prosecutors Caution Against Expansion of Texas Death Penalty Victims’ advo­cates and pros­e­cu­tors are urg­ing Texas leg­is­la­tors to exclude the death penal­ty from new leg­is­la­tion designed to tough­en penal­ties for repeat child moles­ters. Those opposed to the mea­sure fear that threat­en­ing death sen­tences for sex offend­ers could lead to few­er report­ed cas­es of sex crimes and might even give incen­tive to offend­ers to kill their vic­tims to pre­vent the child from…

Tennessee Legislature Overwhelmingly Approves Death Penalty Study By a vote of 79 – 14, the Tennessee House of Representatives passed bipar­ti­san leg­is­la­tion cre­at­ing a study com­mis­sion to exam­ine the state’s death penal­ty sys­tem. A sim­i­lar mea­sure unan­i­mous­ly passed the state’s Senate in May, just one month after the American Bar Association issued a report find­ing that the state was not in full com­pli­ance with most of the benchmarks…

South Carolina and Oklahoma Governors Sign Bills Expanding Death Penalty South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford and Oklahoma Governor Brad Henry have signed into law leg­is­la­tion that allows proseuc­tors to seek the death penal­ty for repeat child moles­ters. The new South Carolina law allows a death sen­tence if the accused has been twice con­vict­ed of rap­ing a child younger than 11-years-old. It also sets a 25-year manda­to­ry min­i­mum prison sen­tence for some sex offend­ers, mandates…

Pennsylvania Commission to Study Wrongful Convictions Pennsylvania has con­vened a com­mis­sion of judges, pros­e­cu­tors, defense attor­neys, law enforce­ment offi­cers and vic­tims’ advo­cates to study the caus­es of wrong­ful con­vic­tions and make rec­om­men­da­tions for pre­vent­ing them in the state. Forensic errors, mis­tak­en eye­wit­ness iden­ti­fi­ca­tions and false con­fes­sions have led to wrong­ful con­vic­tions around the nation, includ­ing 9 peo­ple from Pennsylvania who have…