Publications & Testimony

An hour before the scheduled execution of Virginia death row inmate Percy Levar Walton, Governor Tim Kaine (pictured) issued a temporary stay to allow time for an independent inquiry to determine whether Walton is too mentally ill to be executed. ​“Due to the history of judicial concern about his mental status, the claims in Walton’s clemency petition are entitled to serious consideration. It would be imprudent to either proceed with the execution or grant clemency without further review,” Kaine…

The Virginia Supreme Court unanimously overturned a trial court’s determination that Daryl Atkins was not mentally retarded and that he was eligible for the death penalty. Atkins’ 2002 appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court resulted in the Court ruling that the execution of the mentally retarded is unconstitutional, but the ruling left it up to states to define retardation and determine the procedures for establishing this disability. Atkins’ case was then sent back to the York County Circuit Court…

The latest edition of the Amicus Journal is now available and features articles related to death penalty topics such as gender bias and jurors, as well as information on international capital punishment developments in the Caribbean and Africa. The journal features a story on the Middle Temple Library’s Capital Punishment Collection in Great Britain, an archive of textbooks, case-preparation aides, film documentaries, and other primary sources on the death penalty. The Amicus Journal highlights…

On June 6, the Philippine Senate voted with no negative votes to abolish the death penalty. Even senators who supported the death penalty voted for abolition. Life without parole sentences or 40 years in prison will be substituted for execution, depending on the offense. President Arroyo is strongly in favor of the effort to end the death penalty. Under the bill, all death sentences will be commuted to life sentences. One of the senators who was hesitant about ending capital punishment, Sen.

Although Scott Panetti has a long history of mental illness and insists that Texas is working in cooperation with Satan to execute him as a way to keep him from preaching the gospel, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has declared him sane enough to be executed. The panel acknowledged that Panetti is mentally ill and might lack a rational understanding of his fate, but maintained that Panetti is able to understand the basis for his execution. The full court…

A May 2006 Gallup Poll examining American opinion about the death penalty found that when given a choice between the sentencing options of life without parole and the death penalty, only 47% of respondents chose capital punishment, the lowest percentage in two decades. Forty-eight percent favored life without parole for those convicted of murder. The poll also revealed that overall support for the death penalty remains low at 65%, down significantly from 1994 when 80% supported capital…

Reversing its long-standing support for capital punishment, the Spokane Spokesman-Review recently published an editorial calling for an end to capital punishment in the United States. The paper noted that the decision to change its stance on the death penalty came after careful consideration of growing evidence that the newspaper’s ​“expectations of fairness and justice” are not being met and that the death penalty’s ​“drawbacks now outweigh its merits.” The editorial in full: It took Jermaine…

The latest edition of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund’s ​“Death Row USA” shows that the number of people on the death row in the United States is continuing to decline, falling to 3,370 as of April 1, 2006. The size of death row increased every year between 1976 and 2000, but since then it has been in a slow decline. According to the report, the states with the largest decrease in death row population since January 1, 2006 are Texas (down by 5) and South Carolina (down by 3). California continues…

There are currently 120 foreign nationals from 32 countries on death rows across the U.S. These are individuals who have been condemned to death in this country but are not citizens of the U.S. In many cases, these defendants were not informed of their rights under Article 36 of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. This treaty was signed and ratified by the U.S., but many defendants from countries that are also parties to the Vienna Convention were not told of their right to contact the…

Prosecutors in New Jersey announced that they were dropping all charges against Larry Peterson who had been convicted of murder in 1989, saying they could no longer meet their burden of proof in his case. Peterson’s conviction was overturned last year after DNA tests failed to match him with evidence from the scene of the crime. The state had initially sought the death penalty against Peterson, who is now 55 after spending 18 years in prison. The Innocence Project at Cardozo Law School in New…