Publications & Testimony

Walter Schwimmer, Secretary General of the Council of Europe, recent­ly praised the deci­sion of Armenian President Robert Kocharyan to com­mute all remain­ing death sen­tences in the nation to life in prison.​“I am delight­ed that President Kocharyan has tak­en such a pos­i­tive and com­mend­able step for­ward. The death penal­ty is an affront to all notions of dig­ni­ty and human rights, and has no place in the Europe of today,” Schwimmer said. The President’s deci­sion to commute the…

In​“Why Do White Americans Support the Death Penalty?,” American University researchers Joe Soss, Laura Langbein, and Alan Metelko exam­ined whether racial atti­tudes play a role in white sup­port for the death penal­ty. The researchers found that white sup­port for the death penal­ty in the United States has strong ties to anti-black prej­u­dice, and in some geo­graph­ic areas racial prej­u­dice emerges as the strongest pre­dic­tor of white death penal­ty sup­port. Soss, Joe, et al.:​“Why…

In an op-ed that appeared in the Los Angeles Times on the day Indiana death row inmate Darnell Williams received a stay of exe­cu­tion to allow test­ing of cru­cial DNA evi­dence that could save his life, the pros­e­cu­tor from the case, Thomas Vanes, expressed sec­ond thoughts about seek­ing the death…

Legislation to bar doc­tors and nurs­es from par­tic­i­pat­ing in exe­cu­tions was recent­ly signed into law by Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich on July 24, 2003. The bill states,​“The Department of Corrections shall not request, require, or allow a health care prac­ti­tion­er licensed in Illinois, includ­ing but not lim­it­ed to physi­cians and nurs­es, regard­less of employ­ment, to par­tic­i­pate in an exe­cu­tion.” (SB 0277) The bill is in-step with guide­lines estab­lished under the…

A recent arti­cle in Time looks at the career of Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle. The arti­cle traces Earle’s evolv­ing opin­ion on the death penal­ty since he was first elect­ed D.A. in Texas in 1976, the year the U.S. Supreme Court rein­stat­ed the death penal­ty. Among oth­er con­cerns, ques­tions of inno­cence have caused Earle to grow increas­ing­ly skep­ti­cal about the death penal­ty. The…

Baltimore County Judge Dana M. Levitz recent­ly sen­tenced a man con­vict­ed of mur­der to two life terms with­out parole, in part because of its pos­si­ble effects on the vic­tims’ fam­i­lies. Levitz said,​“The dev­as­tat­ing effect that this unend­ing lit­i­ga­tion has on the inno­cent fam­i­lies of the vic­tims is incal­cu­la­ble. By impos­ing a death sen­tence, I ensure that the vic­tim’s fam­i­lies will be sub­ject­ed to many more years of appeals.” Family mem­bers also not­ed that the…

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a Republican, reit­er­at­ed his oppo­si­tion to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Bloomberg not­ed,​“The death penal­ty I’ve always had a prob­lem with, because too many times in the past you’ve seen inno­cent peo­ple incar­cer­at­ed and, trag­i­cal­ly, every once in a while they’ve been exe­cut­ed. And until you can show me that the process nev­er would ever con­vict some­body that lat­er on we find out was inno­cent of a crime, mur­der is mur­der no matter who…

A new report by Amnesty International,​“The Exclusion of Child Offenders from the Death Penalty Under General International Law,” exam­ines the evi­dence sup­port­ing the con­clu­sion that the use of the death penal­ty against juve­nile offend­ers is pro­hib­it­ed under cus­tom­ary inter­na­tion­al law. The prac­tice is already pro­hib­it­ed by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child. William F. Schulz, Executive Director of Amnesty…

In a 7 – 2 deci­sion, the United States Supreme Court reversed and remand­ed the sen­tence of Maryland death row inmate Kevin Wiggins on the basis of inad­e­quate rep­re­sen­ta­tion by his orig­i­nal tri­al attor­neys. Standard pro­ce­dure in Maryland at the time of the tri­al includ­ed prepa­ra­tion of a​“social his­to­ry” report that would con­tain mit­i­ga­tion inves­ti­ga­tions regard­ing the case. As no such report was pre­pared or even request­ed, Justice O’Connor, writ­ing for the…

In addi­tion to arti­cles about juve­nile jus­tice and mur­der vic­tims’ fam­i­ly mem­bers, the lat­est edi­tion of The Angolite — a prison news mag­a­zine pub­lished by Angola Prison in Louisiana — fea­tures a sec­tion on film­mak­ing with­in prison walls. Angola Prison has host­ed dozens of film crews over the years, and has been the shoot­ing site for award-win­n­ing films such as​“Dead Man Walking,”​“Monster’s Ball,” and​“The Farm.” (The Angolite, November/​December 2002) See…