Publications & Testimony

In the February 2022 episode of Discussions with DPIC, fed­er­al pub­lic defend­er, Amanda Bass (pic­tured, right), and Justice for Julius advo­cate Cece Jones-Davis (pic­tured, left) speak with Death Penalty Information Center Managing Director Anne Holsinger about the ques­tion­able con­vic­tion and near exe­cu­tion of for­mer Oklahoma death-row pris­on­er, Julius Jones. They dis­cuss how incom­pe­tent rep­re­sen­ta­tion and…

Despite the absence of evi­dence that the death penal­ty pro­tects police or pro­motes pub­lic safe­ty, law­mak­ers in sev­er­al states that have abol­ished cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment have intro­duced bills to rein­state cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment for the mur­ders of police…

Bills that would exempt indi­vid­u­als with severe men­tal ill­ness from the death penal­ty have tak­en major steps for­ward in the Kentucky and South Dakota leg­is­la­tures. The Kentucky House of Representatives vot­ed over­whelm­ing­ly (76 – 19) on February 9, 2022, to advance its severe men­tal ill­ness exemp­tion, HB 269, to the state sen­ate. The South Dakota Senate fol­lowed on February 22, vot­ing 21 – 14 to pass SB 159. Both bills have Republican spon­sors and received…

Members of the Arizona Jewish com­mu­ni­ty have filed suit to bar the state from exe­cut­ing pris­on­ers in its gas cham­ber, using the same sub­stance employed by the Nazis dur­ing the Holocaust to mur­der more than one million…

Calling cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the U.S. ​“bro­ken,” 56 elect­ed pros­e­cu­tors from across the coun­try have issued a joint state­ment urg­ing sys­temic changes to end the death penal­ty nation­wide. As an ini­tial step, the pros­e­cu­tors pledged to not seek the death penal­ty ​“against peo­ple with intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ties, post-trau­mat­ic stress dis­or­der, his­to­ries of trau­mat­ic brain injury, or oth­er intel­lec­tu­al or cog­ni­tive chal­lenges that dimin­ish their abil­i­ty to ful­ly under­stand and reg­u­late their own…

When Oklahoma exe­cut­ed Gilbert Postelle on February 17, 2022, it came with a dubi­ous dis­tinc­tion. The intel­lec­tu­al­ly impaired man who was 18 years old at the time of his offense became the 44^th per­son pros­e­cut­ed in Oklahoma County to be put to death since exe­cu­tions resumed in the U.S. in 1977. His death made the coun­ty the nation’s third-most pro­lif­ic coun­ty exe­cu­tion­er over the past half-cen­tu­ry, tied with Tarrant and Bexar coun­ties in…

A high-pro­file Republican-led effort to abol­ish the death penal­ty in Utah has failed in com­mit­tee by a sin­gle vote. State rep­re­sen­ta­tives in the House Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Committee vot­ed 6 – 5 on February 14, 2022 not to advance a pro­pos­al that would repeal Utah’s death penal­ty and replace it with a new non-cap­i­tal sen­tenc­ing alter­na­tive of 45 years to…

Nevada pros­e­cu­tors have failed to meet a dead­line to obtain a death war­rant to exe­cute Zane Floyd before its sup­ply of a key lethal-injec­tion drug expires, indef­i­nite­ly extend­ing the near 16-year pause between exe­cu­tions in the…

In what one ana­lyst described as ​“an impor­tant step to restore the rule of law,” the U.S. Department of Justice has pledged not to use state­ments obtained by tor­ture in its Guantánamo Military Commissions pros­e­cu­tion of Abd Al-Rahim Hussein Al-Nashiri. Al-Nashiri is accused of mas­ter­mind­ing the Al Qaeda sui­cide bomb­ing of the U.S.S. Cole that killed 17 U.S. sailors in October 2000. The U.S. gov­ern­ment is seek­ing the death penal­ty against…

Autopsy results for an Oklahoma death-row pris­on­er whose exe­cu­tion state offi­cials claimed ​“was car­ried out … with­out com­pli­ca­tion” have con­firmed eye­wit­ness reports that John Grant like­ly suf­fered a tor­tur­ous death. The autop­sy, con­duct­ed by Tulsa Medical Examiner Jeremy Shelton, M.D., the morn­ing after Grant was exe­cut­ed on October 28, 2021, revealed that Grant suf­fered pul­monary ede­ma and intra­mus­cu­lar hem­or­rhag­ing, and aspi­rat­ed on his vom­it as a result…