Publications & Testimony

Administrative Judge Fred G. Morrison Jr. has ruled that North Carolina prison officials failed to live up to their promise that a doctor would monitor Willie Brown’s vital signs during his 2006 execution. Morrison, in his ruling, stated that the prison officials’ assurances that a doctor would participate in the execution had “persuaded the judge to let them execute Willie Brown.” He went on to note, “The doctor did not observe the inmate nor did he monitor vital signs.” Morrison’s ruling…

Former Georgia Congressman Bob Barr, a well-known conservative voice and a death penalty supporter, recently questioned the fairness and accuracy of capital punishment in an opinion piece published by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Barr noted that a recent University of Virginia study of wrongful conviction cases has raised serious questions about the reliability of eyewitness identification. He also applauded the Georgia Supreme Court’s recent decision to grant a hearing to death row inmate…

Less than a month after the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles temporarily halted the July 17 execution of Troy Davis (pictured) based on concerns about his possible innocence, the Georgia Supreme Court has agreed to consider Davis’s appeal. By a vote of 4 to 3, the Court agreed to hear oral arguments in the case and consider whether eyewitness recantations and other evidence discovered since Davis’s 1991 conviction and death sentence are sufficient grounds for a new trial. Davis was…

A June 2007 Gallup Poll revealed that, during the past decade, there has been a significant drop in the percentage of whites and blacks who support capital punishment. Among black respondents, opposition to the death penalty has grown from 37% in the mid-1990s to a majority of 56% today. Responses given by white respondents have also shifted during the past decade. In the mid-1990s, 80% of white respondents said that they favored the death penalty, but today that percentage has dropped to 70%.

When weighing whether to seek the death penalty, Tulsa County First Assistant District Attorney Doug Drummond says that he tries to determine how future juries will assess the evidence, as well as how a death penalty case will impact victims’ family members. He observes, “Life without parole without appeals might be a better situation for a lot of victims’ families. There are some positive things about that… . A lot of people, at first blush when a loved one is killed, want the death penalty.

A new Ohio State University study has found that blacks convicted of killing whites are not only more likely than non-whites to receive a death sentence, but also more likely to be executed. Blacks on death row for killing non-whites are less likely to be executed than others on death row. “Examining who survives on death row is important because less than 10% of those given the death sentence ever get executed,” said David Jacobs (pictured), co-author of the study and professor of sociology at…

Argued: April 18, 2007 Decided: June 28, 2007 In 1986, the Supreme Court held in Ford v. Wainwright that it is unconstitutional to execute an inmate who is presently insane. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5^th Circuit ruled that Scott Panetti, who was allowed to defend himself in his Texas trial despite his schizophrenia and 14 stints in mental hospitals, and who said the devil compelled his actions, was aware that he committed a crime and that he was to be punished and that was sufficient…

On August 30, Texas has scheduled the execution of Kenneth Foster Jr. (pictured), despite the fact that all parties agree that Foster did not personally kill anyone. Foster was sentenced to death under the Texas Law of Parties that permits a person involved in a crime to be held accountable for the actions committed by someone else. In this case, Texas maintains that Foster deserves the death penalty because he “should have anticipated” that a passenger in his vehicle would exit the car with a…

Billy Hill spent seven years as a district attorney in Shelby, Coosa, and Clay counties in Alabama, and has reconsidered his stance on capital punishment. Mr. Hill says that he would welcome a moratorium on executions in Alabama while a study commission examines the state’s death penalty to evaluate whether it is “a wise and humane use of our resources.” Wrongful convictions, the arbitrary nature of capital punishment, poor representation, and the long-term suffering of victims’ family members…

“Dead Innocent: The Death Penalty Abolitionist Search for a Wrongful Execution” by Professor Jeffrey L. Kirchmeier was recently published in the Tulsa Law Review. The article examines the potential impact that the confirmed execution of an innocent person would have on the U.S. death penalty debate. The author states that identifying those who have been wrongly convicted and later freed — as well as individuals who may have been innocent and executed — provides clear reason for lawmakers and…