Publications & Testimony

Bestselling author Thomas Cahill has written a new book, “A Saint on Death Row: The Story of Dominique Green,” about his encounter and gradual understanding of the life of a Texas death row inmate named Dominique Green. Green, who was only 18 at the time of his arrest, was executed in 2004. Cahill’s story of Green’s life highlights issues of race, poverty, and abuse, tracing details of his childhood through his years on death row. Thomas Cahill is probably best known for his New York Times…

The Ohio Parole Board unanimously recommended that Jeffrey Hill’s death sentence be commuted to life in prison with the possibility of parole. Hill, who is scheduled to be executed on March 3, was convicted of murdering his mother while under the influence of drugs. The parole board noted the “compelling and unanimous opinion” of the victim’s family that her son and killer should not be executed. The board said, “They have suffered tremendous loss, and execution would add further to their…

A new book on international developments in capital punishment, The Next Frontier: National Development, Political Change, and the Death Penalty in Asia, is now available from Oxford University Press. Authors David Johnson, an expert on law and society in Asia, and Franklin Zimring, a senior authority on capital punishment, utilize their research to identify the critical factors affecting the future of the death penalty in Asia. They found that when an authoritarian state experienced democratic…

A former state court administrator in Montana recently wrote that the death penalty is too expensive for a “court system that was underfunded, understaffed, and had more work to do than was humanly possible.” Jim Oppedahl, who worked with the Montana courts for ten years, offered his views in the Helena Independent Record: “The reality is that the death penalty pumps millions of dollars of very scarce public resources into a handful of executions and then buries those costs in a thicket of…

Before his retirement from the court, Judge Ronald Reagan had sentenced a defendant to death and kept his views on the death penalty to himself. However, as Nebraska is considering a bill to abolish capital punishment, he spoke in favor of its repeal. “I’m a citizen here. I’d just as soon not have a death penalty,” Judge Reagan testified. “It just seems to me that people are recognizing that the death penalty is not an appropriate punishment in a civilized society.” Calling capital punishment…

Life and Death Matters: Seeking the Truth About Capital Punishment is a new book that documents author Robert Baldwin’s personal journey in confronting racism and the death penalty in the Deep South. Baldwin shares his evolution in a conversational, first-person style with a declared faith perspective. Written for people of all beliefs and backgrounds, he focuses on the myths and misconceptions about prisons and the death penalty discovered through his personal experiences. Baldwin began his…

A bill is being introduced in Colorado to end the state’s death penalty and to use the resultant savings to investigate the state’s more than 1,300 unsolved crimes. More than 500 residents who have lost friends and family to unsolved murders are pushing for the bill, which is expected to be introduced by House Majority Leader Paul Weissmann. The proponents estimate that 3 in 10 killers in the state walk free, and catching more killers would be a more effective deterrent than capital punishment…

Five people in Nebraska were recently pardoned for a 1985 murder after new DNA evidence excluded their participation in the crime. The group was also known as the “Beatrice Six.” The sixth man, the only one who had insisted on a jury trial, was exonerated in October 2008 when prosecutors declined to seek a new trial. The State Board of Pardons voted unanimously on January 26 to pardon the five people who had pleaded guilty or no contest in relation to the rape-murder. Nebraska Attorney General…