Publications & Testimony

The American Bar Association (ABA) renewed its call for a nation­wide halt to exe­cu­tions fol­low­ing a series of state stud­ies that found seri­ous prob­lems in their death penal­ty sys­tems.​“After care­ful­ly study­ing the way states across the spec­trum han­dle exe­cu­tions, it has become crys­tal clear that the process is deeply flawed. The death penal­ty sys­tem is rife with irreg­u­lar­i­ty,” said Stephen F. Hanlon (pic­tured), chair­man of the ABA Death Penalty Moratorium…

The New Mexico Supreme Court halt­ed a death penal­ty case against 2 prison inmates charged with killing a guard dur­ing a 1999 riot because the defense has received insuf­fi­cient fund­ing to pro­ceed.​“Defense coun­sels’ com­pen­sa­tion is inad­e­quate under the facts of this case, vio­lat­ing defen­dants’ Sixth Amendment right to effec­tive assis­tance of coun­sel,” the court said in a unan­i­mous rul­ing. The court held that an addi­tion­al $200,000 must be appro­pri­at­ed by the…

A recent Washington Post opin­ion poll found that Marylanders pre­fer the sen­tence of life in prison over the death penal­ty. In the October 2007 poll of 1,103 Maryland adults, respon­dents were asked to choose between the sen­tence of life in prison with­out parole or the death penal­ty for the crime of mur­der: 52% said they favored life with­out parole and 43% sup­port­ed cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Among black respon­dents, sup­port for life with­out parole was even stronger, with 65%…

By Sujoy DharOct 29, 2007IPSBRUSSELS — On March 23, 1931, an Indian Sikh named Bhagat Singh attained mar­tyr­dom when he was hanged by the British for his role in the mil­i­tant free­dom strug­gle against the colo­nial rulers.About 75 years lat­er, Professor Jagmohan Singh, a nephew of the lib­er­a­tion hero, preach­es peace and mer­cy as he joins a world­wide cam­paign, espe­cial­ly in Europe, by his Sikh com­mu­ni­ty against death penal­ty. The life and work of Indian…

By ALISON LEIGH COWAN October 28, 2007New…

The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL) has filed a judi­cial com­plaint against the Presiding Judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, Sharon Keller (pic­tured), the first time the group says it has ever filed a com­plaint against a judge. NACDL has asked the Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct to review Judge Keller’s deci­sion to turn away the last appeal of a death row inmate because the rushed fil­ing was sub­mit­ted past the court’s 5 p.m. closing…

The Spring 2007 edi­tion of the American Bar Association​’s Human Rights quar­ter­ly fea­tures a series of arti­cles by out­stand­ing authors about the death penal­ty, includ­ing a 30-year ret­ro­spec­tive on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the U.S. The arti­cles con­tained in the pub­li­ca­tion are: A Thirty-Year Retrospective of the Death Penalty By Stephen F. Hanlon Monitoring Death Sentencing Decisions: The Challenges and Barriers to Equity By Glenn L. Pierce and Michael L. Radelet …

Funds for com­mu­ni­ty polic­ing pro­grams have been sig­nif­i­cant­ly slashed in recent years, a devel­op­ment that experts link to the gov­ern­men­t’s new focus on fight­ing ter­ror­ism. The U.S. Department of Justice pro­vid­ed $7 bil­lion in fed­er­al funds for com­mu­ni­ty polic­ing pro­grams between 1994 and 2001, but it has award­ed only $208 mil­lion for local depart­ments this year.​“Many of those funds have been shift­ed to home­land secu­ri­ty, which also is very important in…

The New York Court of Appeals ruled today (October 23, 2007) that the death sen­tence of the last remain­ing inmate on the state’s death row was uncon­sti­tu­tion­al under state law. John Taylor​’s sen­tence will be changed to life in prison with­out parole. An ear­li­er deci­sion by the state’s high court in 2004 over­turned the state’s statute because of flaws in the jury instruc­tions. (People v. LaValle). Following hear­ings on the prob­lems with cap­i­tal punishment in…

Following the release of a new study pub­lished in the Journal of Adolescent Health con­cern­ing the fail­ure of deter­rence in drug use, med­ical experts com­ment­ed that deter­rence also fails in the area of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment.​“It is very clear that deter­rents are not effec­tive in the area of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment,” said Dr. Jonathan Groner, an asso­ciate pro­fes­sor of surgery at Ohio State University College of Medicine and Public Health who research­es the deter­rent effect of…