Publications & Testimony
Items: 4821 — 4830
Jul 01, 2007
A Crisis of Confidence: Americans’ Doubts About the Death Penalty — MEDIA COVERAGE REPORT
On June 9, 2007 the Death Penalty Information Center released its new report,“A Crisis of Confidence: Americans’ Doubts About the Death Penalty.” The report, based on results from DPIC’s national public opinion poll, received extensive national media coverage in major papers and electronic media. In addition, the report was discussed extensively on more than 25 Internet blogs, including many online criminal justice groups. Among the news organizations that featured this…
Read MoreJun 28, 2007
NEW VOICES: Scientific American on the Death Penalty: “Bad Execution”
The July 2007 issue of Scientific American magazine contains both an article discussing the medical implications of lethal injection and an editorial discussing the humaneness of capital punishment generally. The editorial suggests that capital punishment“can never be anything but inhumane,” and offers the opinion that it is“wrong” and an“outrage.” But it further states that even those who believe the death penalty is acceptable, should agree that…
Read MoreJun 28, 2007
Thurgood Marshall Journalism Awards 2007
Thurgood Marshall Journalism Awards — 2007 The Death Penalty Information Center is proud to announce the winners of the organization’s 11th Annual Thurgood Marshall Journalism Awards. The awards honor journalists who have made an exceptional contribution to coverage of capital punishment issues. This year’s ceremony was held at the National Press…
Read MoreJun 28, 2007
Supreme Court Blocks Execution of Mentally Ill Inmate
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on June 28, 2007, that Scott Panetti, a man with severe mental illness on Texas’s death row, deserves a rehearing on his claim of mental incompetence. The Court’s 5 – 4 ruling overturned a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit that had used an overly restrictive definition of what constitutes insanity. The lower court had held that mere knowledge of one’s crime, without a rational understanding, was…
Read MoreJun 26, 2007
ACLU Releases Report on Racial Disparities in the Federal Death Penalty
The federal death penalty impacts racial minorities differently than it does whites according to a recent report from the American Civil Liberties Union. The report, The Persistent Problem of Racial Disparities in the Federal Death Penalty, notes that defendants of color make up the majority of the federal death row. And the risk of a case being authorized for the death penalty is 84% higher in cases where the victim is white, regardless of the race of the defendant. The…
Read MoreJun 25, 2007
Supreme Court Agrees to Hear Louisiana Case with All-White Jury and References to O.J. Simpson
On June 25, 2007, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review a capital case from Louisiana in which an all-white jury sentenced a defendant to death after the prosecutor urged a death sentence so that the defendant would not“get away with it” like O.J. Simpson. All five qualified African-Americans had been struck from the jury pool by the prosecution using peremptory challenges. The defense has challenged the selection of the jury as a violation of…
Read MoreJun 21, 2007
Pew Poll Shows Modest Decline in Death Penalty Support
The Pew Research Center recently released a poll on a variety of social issues, including the death penalty. The poll found that 64% of the U.S. adults support the imposition of the death penalty for persons convicted of murder. This is a decline of 14 percentage points from 1996, when 78% of respondents said they supported it. The Center reported that support for the death penalty was higher among men than women, and was substantially higher among whites (69%)…
Read MoreJun 21, 2007
Strong Criticism of Tennessee’s Death Penalty System from Federal Appellate Judge
Dissenting from a U.S. Court of Appeals decision denying relief to Gary Cone, Judge Merritt sharply criticized the Tennessee Attorney General for“falsification” of the record, and he referred to the state’s judicial system as“broken” and“inattentive.” Cone had been granted relief on two other occasions by the same Sixth Circuit, but those decisions were reversed by the U.S. Supreme Court. In the present case, Cone claimed that significant mitigating evidence had…
Read MoreJun 20, 2007
BOOKS: DeathQuest III by Robert Bohm
In the third edition of what some have called“the first true textbook on the death penalty,” author Robert Bohm, a correctional officer turned college professor, engages the reader with a full account of the arguments and issues surrounding capital punishment. His book, “DeathQuest III: An Introduction to the Theory & Practice of Capital Punishment in the United States,” begins with the history of the death penalty from colonial to modern times, and then…
Read MoreJun 19, 2007
Texas Scores Poorly in Mental Health Services While Executing Many with Mental Illness
A recent study conducted by the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has revealed that Texas is almost last among states in spending on mental health services and performs poorly in other mental health areas. According to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Texas ranked 47th in the nation in per-capita spending on mental health services, and received a grade of“D” for information access and a grade of…
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