Publications & Testimony

At least 40 death row inmates, some on the day of their execution, were granted stays lasting beyond their scheduled dates in 2006-08 based in whole or in part on challenges to the lethal injection process. Some stays were lifted and the inmates eventually executed. In many states, all executions were effectively on hold until the lethal injection controversy is resolved. At the same time, other executions were allowed to go forward with no stays. Almost all of the executions have been by…

Below are examples of state media coverage of Baze v. Rees regarding the constitutionality of lethal injection. In many instances, the articles discuss the possible impact of the decision on specific states: Alabama — From the Gadsen Times Arkansas — From the Arkansas Democrat Gazette California — From the San Jose Mercury News Florida — From the Gainesville Sun Georgia — From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution Kentucky — From the Courier-Journal Maryland — From the Baltimore Sun…

The Dallas Morning News renewed its call for a moratorium on executions in Texas because of the numerous errors in the state’s death penalty system. The paper highlighted the cases of Michael Blair and Charles Hood as examples of how the system has broken down. Blair was exonerated in 2008 after 14 years on death row. DNA evidence revealed that he had not been the murderer of 7‑year-old Ashley Estel in 1993, despite the fact that the jury had taken only 27 minutes to convict him, and that he…

The top medical officer for the Department of Corrections in the state of Washington has resigned in order to avoid any participation in the state’s execution process. As the doctor responsible for preparing others to carry out lethal injections, Dr. Marc Stern concluded that his ethical obligations as a physician required that he recuse himself from such actions and that resigning was the only way to fully remove himself from this process. Dr. Stern, who supervised 700 employees around the…

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld a $14 million award to John Thompson, a former death row inmate in Louisiana who was exonerated after withheld evidence was revealed. Thompson spent 18 years in prison, including 14 years in the solitary confinement of death row in Angola Prison. He came within one month of being executed in 1999 when his attorneys discovered blood evidence that should have been turned over to the defense years ago. The new evidence cleared Thompson of an…

Ray Samuels, a police officer for 33 years and Chief of Police in Newark, California, for 5 years, recently expressed concern that state budget cuts will prevent important crime-fighting measures from being passed, while an expensive death penalty continues to drain the state’s finances. In an op-ed in the Contra Costa Times, Samuels wrote: Local jurisdictions are likely to lose a significant amount of state funding this year because of the severe financial crisis. This funding helps cities…

The Presiding Justice of the Mississippi Supreme Court, Oliver Diaz, dissented in a recent capital case, Doss v. Mississippi, stating he had come to the conclusion that the death penalty is unconstitutional: [A]ll that remains to justify our system of capital punishment is the quest for revenge, and I cannot find, as a matter of law, that the thirst for vengeance is a legitimate state interest. Even if it is, capital punishment’s benefit over life imprisonment in society’s quest for revenge is…