Publications & Testimony

Professor Michael Meltsner, who worked as an attor­ney with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund in its efforts to chal­lenge the death penal­ty in the 1960s and 70s, recent­ly assessed the U.S.‘s appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty over the past 30 years. He not­ed that today’s death penal­ty sys­tem is​“bro­ken” and fails to make the nation a safer soci­ety. Writing in the Boston Globe,…

In a recent op-ed, Jack Fuller, for­mer edi­tor and pub­lish­er of the Chicago Tribune, called for an end to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Citing a series of mis­takes by eye­wit­ness­es, police and foren­sic experts, he stat­ed that the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem is too deeply flawed to entrust with car­ry­ing out exe­cu­tions. Pointing to the like­ly inno­cence of Carlos DeLuna, a Texas man who was exe­cut­ed in 1989, Fuller con­clud­ed that the death penal­ty should be abol­ished because​“no…

Dr. Orin Guidry, pres­i­dent of the 40,000-member American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA), issued a pub­lic state­ment strong­ly urg­ing mem­bers to​“steer clear” of any par­tic­i­pa­tion in exe­cu­tions by lethal injec­tion. In a four-page​“Message from the President,” Guidry not­ed that anes­the­si­ol­o­gists have been​“reluc­tant­ly thrust into the mid­dle” of the legal con­tro­ver­sy over lethal injec­tions. In recent months, the pro­ce­dures being used around the United States…

The Anniston StarSection: OpinionJuly 2, 2006Author: Richard C. DieterSpecial to The StarIn decid­ing a nar­row issue about an obscure part of Kansas’ death penal­ty law, the Supreme Court last week revealed a chasm of dif­fer­ing opin­ions regard­ing the fun­da­men­tal reli­a­bil­i­ty of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in this coun­try. Although the oppos­ing views were wide­ly diver­gent and sharply expressed, the court did us all a ser­vice by iden­ti­fy­ing the key prob­lem that may decide the…

The Chicago Tribune Investigates the Execution of a Likely Innocent Man in​“Did this man die…for this man’s crime?” In 1989, defen­dant Carlos DeLuna was exe­cut­ed in Texas for the fatal stab­bing of Texas con­ve­nience store clerk Wanda Lopez. The three-part series by reporters Maurice Possley and Steve Mills can be found here. A news piece on ABC’s​“World News Tonight” also cov­ered this sto­ry. Watch it here. (Requires Real Player. For oth­er media versions including…

On June 28, 2006, the U.S. Supreme Court decid­ed two con­sol­i­dat­ed cas­es involv­ing the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. In both cas­es, the for­eign nation­als were arrest­ed but not informed by police offi­cers of their con­sular rights under the Convention to ask that their respec­tive con­sulates be noti­fied of their deten­tion. The Court con­clud­ed that state­ments made by for­eign nation­als do not need to be sup­pressed, even though the defen­dants were not…

Just weeks after Ohio strug­gled for more than 90 min­utes to find a suit­able vein in Joseph Clark​’s arm to admin­is­ter lethal injec­tion drugs, the state has decid­ed to imple­ment new reg­u­la­tions aimed at ensur­ing smoother pro­ce­dures dur­ing exe­cu­tions. In a report prompt­ed by prob­lems encoun­tered dur­ing Clark’s exe­cu­tion, Ohio pris­ons Director Terry Collins told Gov. Bob Taft that exe­cu­tion teams will now make every effort to locate two injection…

Below are sum­maries from two U.S. District Court deci­sions regard­ing prob­lems with lethal injec­tion pro­ce­dures in Arkansas and Missouri. The court in Arkansas grant­ed a stay of exe­cu­tion for Don Davis to allow fur­ther inves­ti­ga­tions into the lethal injec­tion pro­ce­dures. In Missouri, in Michael Taylor’s case, the District judge put all exe­cu­tions in the state on hold until changes are made in the state’s exe­cu­tion pro­to­cols.Nooner v. Norris, No.

Dr. Deepak Chopra recent­ly wrote that con­tin­u­ing use of the death penal­ty in the U.S. is irra­tional because it does not deter crime, risks inno­cent lives, and iso­lates the U.S. among the major­i­ty of First World nations that have cho­sen to aban­don cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment:The U.S. has iso­lat­ed itself among First World coun­tries by allow­ing the death penal­ty — 123 coun­tries have abol­ished it com­plete­ly, or in prac­tice nev­er use it, a few per­mit­ting it under extreme…

In a 5 – 4 deci­sion that revealed a deep divi­sion among the Justices over the fair­ness of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Kansas’s death penal­ty statute on June 26. In Kansas v. Marsh, the Court held that juries may be required to sen­tence a defen­dant to die when there is an equal weight of mit­i­gat­ing and aggra­vat­ing evi­dence. The rul­ing over­turns a Kansas Supreme Court deci­sion that found the prac­tice uncon­sti­tu­tion­al because it vio­lat­ed the Eighth…