Publications & Testimony

The U.S. Supreme Court re-instat­ed the death sen­tence of Ronald Sanders in a 5 – 4 rul­ing over­turn­ing a deci­sion by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. After Sanders had been sen­tenced to death in California, the state’s supreme court held that two of the aggra­vat­ing fac­tors used by the jury in its sen­tenc­ing deter­mi­na­tion were invalid. The 9^th Circuit had held that California is a​“weigh­ing state” and hence the use of these invalid aggravating…

THREE NEW RESOURCES NOW AVAILABLE: The American Bar Association’s Death Penalty Moratorium Implementation Project’s Assessment of Georgia’s Death Penalty Released: January 31, 2006. Amnesty International’s Report on​“The Execution of Mentally Ill Offenders” Released: January 31, 2006. The Constitution Project’s fol­low-up report:​“Mandatory Justice: The Death Penalty Revisited”…

Concerned that a fin­ger­print iden­ti­fi­ca­tion error could lead to the exe­cu­tion of an inno­cent per­son, the Federal Bureau of Investigation is exam­in­ing all cas­es of state and fed­er­al pris­on­ers sched­uled for exe­cu­tion to deter­mine whether FBI fin­ger­print experts made mis­takes that led to death sen­tences. Eighteen months ago, the FBI dis­cov­ered that a fin­ger­print exam­in­er for the Bureau had mis­tak­en­ly matched a print found near the site of terrorist bombings…

As California law­mak­ers con­sid­er leg­is­la­tion that would put exe­cu­tions on hold for two years while a 13-mem­ber com­mis­sion reviews the prob­lem of wrong­ful con­vic­tions in the state, a group of cur­rent and for­mer pros­e­cu­tors have sent mem­bers of the state Assembly a let­ter urg­ing pas­sage of the mea­sure.​“The exe­cu­tion of an inno­cent per­son is unac­cept­able, and it is imper­a­tive that California takes every pre­cau­tion that it nev­er hap­pens. This is not just…

New Jersey law­mak­ers have vot­ed to sus­pend exe­cu­tions in the state while a task force stud­ies the fair­ness and costs of impos­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. After pass­ing the Senate in December and the Assembly on January 9 by a vote of 55 – 21, the mea­sure now goes to Governor Richard Codey for his sig­na­ture into law. Codey has indi­cat­ed that he will sign the bill, an act that will make New Jersey the first state to pass a death penal­ty mora­to­ri­um into law through…

New Hampshire House Criminal Justice and Safety Committee: Testimony of Richard C. Dieter (Jan.

Virginia Governor Mark Warner has ordered DNA evi­dence retest­ed to deter­mine whether Roger Keith Coleman, who was exe­cut­ed in 1992, was actu­al­ly inno­cent. Warner said he ordered the tests because of tech­no­log­i­cal advances that could prove a lev­el of cer­tain­ty that was not avail­able at the time of Coleman’s exe­cu­tion. Warner, who will leave office on January 14, not­ed,​“This is an extra­or­di­nar­i­ly unique cir­cum­stance, where tech­nol­o­gy has advanced…

An ongo­ing review of DNA tests con­duct­ed by the Houston Police Department has revealed ​“severe and per­va­sive prob­lems” with the lab’s find­ings in more than two dozen cas­es, includ­ing three death penal­ty cas­es. The new report released by inde­pen­dent inves­ti­ga­tor Michael Bromwich, who is review­ing more than 1,100 Houston Police Department DNA cas­es ana­lyzed between 1987 and 2002, also linked the DNA lab’s trou­bles to​“very dis­turb­ing prob­lems” with­in the Houston…

Support for restora­tion of the death penal­ty in Great Britain, even when the mur­der vic­tim is a police offi­cer, has fall­en below 50% for the first time since its abo­li­tion four decades ago. According to a YouGov poll con­duct­ed for The Daily Telegraph, the num­ber of peo­ple who oppose cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment even when the vic­tim is a police offi­cer has risen to 43%. The fig­ure is a dra­mat­ic changed from the 20% who voiced oppo­si­tion to the death penal­ty in a 1960 poll…

A Virginia judge ruled that pros­e­cu­tors may not seek the death penal­ty against a Vietnamese man accused of mur­der­ing two peo­ple because police vio­lat­ed the man’s rights under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations by not inform­ing him that he could con­tact his coun­try’s con­sulate. “[T]he duty to give notice is absolute.… [T]he idea that the state can com­plete­ly ignore its treaty oblig­a­tions with­out con­se­quence essen­tial­ly oblit­er­ates the pur­pose for which the…