Publications & Testimony

A recent Alabama opin­ion poll found that less than half of those sur­veyed believe Alabama’s death penal­ty is applied fair­ly and 57% of respon­dents sup­port a tem­po­rary halt to exe­cu­tions in the state until ques­tions about fair­ness and reli­a­bil­i­ty are stud­ied. In oth­er find­ings, 96% of those sur­veyed sup­port the use of DNA in cas­es where it might prove guilt or inno­cence and 62% said they would be more like­ly to vote for a can­di­date who sup­port­ed sus­pen­sion of the…

Decided: June…

DPIC PRESENTS ANNUAL THURGOOD MARSHALL JOURNALISM AWARDS On Monday, July 25, 2005, DPIC pre­sent­ed its Ninth Annual Thurgood Marshall Journalism Awards at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. This year’s pro­gram fea­tured a keynote address by New York Assemblyman Joseph Lentol and hon­ored the fol­low­ing jour­nal­ists: CARLA CROWDER The Birmingham News Award for Excellence in Print Journalism STEVE MILLS & MAURICE POSSLEY The Chicago Tribune Award for Excellence in the Postumous…

The ded­i­ca­tion of the National Death Penalty Archive at the State University of New York at Albany will take place on August 9, 2005. Hugo Bedau of Tufts University will keynote the pro­gram, which will also fea­ture William J. Bowers, Scott Christianson, David Kaczynski, and Michael Radelet. The Archive is a part­ner­ship between the Capital Punishment Research Initiative at the School of Criminal Justice and the M.E. Grenander Department of Special Collections and Archives at the…

The fol­low­ing arti­cle by Henry Weinstein appeared in the Los Angeles Times, July 28, 2005:(DPIC Note: The Senate Judiciary Committee put off markup of the Streamlined Procedures Act, prob­a­bly until September. Also, see Letter from for­mer Attorneys General and pros­e­cu­tors oppos­ing this leg­is­la­tion.)THE NATIONBid to Speed Death Penalty Appeals Under FireConservatives and for­mer pros­e­cu­tors are among foes of a bill, before aSenate pan­el today, to curtail…

In a recent Washington Post col­umn, Richard Cohen com­pared the deep objec­tions voiced by many Americans after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that com­mu­ni­ties can con­demn prop­er­ty in dis­tressed areas to make way for eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment to the tepid reac­tion to strong evi­dence that a Missouri man may have been wrong­ly exe­cut­ed for a crime he did not com­mit. Cohen, not­ing that it seems​“far eas­i­er for the gov­ern­ment to wrong­ful­ly take a life than a par­cel of run-down…

The par­ents and three chil­dren of Louisiana mur­der vic­tim Kim Groves have asked the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment to for­go seek­ing the death penal­ty for co-defen­­dants Paul Hardy and Len Davis. In a let­ter to pros­e­cu­tors, the Groves fam­i­ly urged U.S attor­neys to halt pro­ceed­ings that might lead to death sen­tences in rehear­ings for both defen­dants.​“Executing these two men will not bring Kim Groves back to life. It will not ease the deep sor­row and loss that her fam­i­ly has and…

Even though the state of Virginia admits that the ques­tion of Daryl Atkins’ men­tal retar­da­tion is a​“close case,” it is still pur­su­ing a lengthy jury tri­al to ensure his exe­cu­tion. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Atkins v. Virginia in 2002 that those with men­tal retar­da­tion must be exclud­ed from the death penal­ty, but they issued no opin­ion with regard to Mr. Atkins’ men­tal sta­tus. As the tri­al in Virginia began this week, Atkins’ moth­er and for­mer teachers testified…

A North Carolina Superior Court judge orderd a new tri­al for death row inmate Rex Penland fol­low­ing DNA test­ing that dis­cred­it­ed the state’s case. Penland was con­vict­ed of a rape and mur­der 11 years ago, but DNA test­ing at the time of his tri­al was incon­clu­sive. More recent test­ing was favor­able to Penland and did not place him at the scene of the crime. Penland was con­vict­ed large­ly on the basis of tes­ti­mo­ny from his two nephews who were also involved in the…

A recent Philadelphia Inquirer edi­to­r­i­al crit­i­cized the pro­posed​“Streamlined Procedures Act,” fed­er­al leg­is­la­tion that would deny or sharply restrict the reach of fed­er­al judges in hear­ing habeas-cor­­pus claims from those on death row. Noting that the mea­sure would increase the pos­si­bil­i­ty of exe­cut­ing an inno­cent per­son, the edi­to­r­i­al stat­ed: Amid Washington law­mak­ers’ lat­est dri­ve to fur­ther restrict the appeals of (cap­i­tal) defen­dants, they need to…