Publications & Testimony

On May 28^th, Virginia is scheduled to electrocute Percy Levar Walton, a Virginia death row inmate who does not know what year it is or that he cannot eat at Burger King once he has been executed. In a pending clemency petition to Virginia Governor Mark Warner and in an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, Walton’s attorneys presented expert medical evidence, including tests by prison doctors, showing that their client suffers from schizophrenia and psychosis. They note that prison guards call…

In “Forced Medication of Legally Incompetent Prisoners: A Primer,” Kathy Swedlow uses cases such as Singleton v. Norris to examine the legal background and heated debate surrounding the issue of involuntary treatment of death row prisoners to make them sane enough for execution. Swedlow notes that many of those who support capital punishment find the holding in Singleton (which allows forcible medication) unsettling. She concludes that “even assuming Singelton’s guilt, the forcible medication…

Dave Lindorff’s article “Unjust Executions” goes beyond the issue of innocence and explores cases where guilty defendants may have been executed despite unconstitutional trials. The article, available on Salon.com (May 6, 2003), features examples of courts barring new evidence and comments from death penalty experts such as Robert Blecker of New York Law School, a staunch death penalty advocate, who nevertheless admits that: “There are definitely plenty of sentencing errors where those who die…

The Texas Senate passed legislation (S.B. 1045) to create a joint interim committee on post-conviction exonerations. The committee will study wrongful convictions in the state and identify appropriate improvements in the criminal justice system to prevent such errors in the future. The nine members of the committee will include a state’s attoney, two members chosen from the Senate Criminal Justice Committee, two members of the House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee, a judge, and two law…

Kentucky Governor Paul Patton said that he will commute the death sentence of Kevin Stanford, a juvenile offender whose 1989 case before the U.S. Supreme Court resulted in a ruling allowing the execution of those who were 16 or 17-years-old at the time of their crime. This will be the first time Patton has commuted a death sentence since he took office, and he noted in his announcement that the justice system “perpetuated an injustice” in Stanford’s case. Stanford has been on Kentucky’s death…

Juries in 15 of the last 16 federal capital trials have declined to impose the death penalty, despite a more aggressive pursuit of this punishment by the Justice Department. Since President George Bush took office, 15% of the capital trials have resulted in death sentences, compared to 46% of cases in which the death penalty was sought from 1988 to 2000. Legal experts believe that overreaching by prosecutors and some jurors’ growing unease with the death penalty may account for the trend.

A recent editorial in The Beacon Journal notes that Ohio Supreme Court Justice Paul Pfeifer, who played a leading role in writing Ohio’s death penalty statute 22 years ago when he was chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, is now calling for passage of legislation to analyze the state’s death penalty system. The review, which also has the endorsement of the Ohio State Bar Association, would create a Capital Case Commission to study the state’s death penalty and make reform recommendations to…

“Burden of Proof” is a 32-minute documentary detailing the need for a moratorium on executions in North Carolina. The video was prepared by New Context Video Productions and offers evidence to suggest that North Carolina’s capital punishment system is badly broken and in need of a legislative review. (June 2003) Watch the video. .

In a vote that will dramatically change the way murder investigations are conducted, the Illinois House has overwhelmingly approved legislation requiring audio-or videotaping of most homicide-related interrogations and confessions. The bill, which unanimously passed the Senate last month, now goes to Governor Rod Blagojevich for signature into law. The Governor has vowed to sign the legislation. Attorney Thomas Sullivan, who co-chaired the Illinois Commission on Capital Punishment that made…

NEW VOICES: Former FBI Chief Sessions Calls for Innocence Commission in Texas In a recent op-ed, William Sessions called on state legislators in Texas to pass a measure to create an Innocence Commission. The Commission would examine the Texas criminal justice system in an effort to protect against wrongful convictions. Sessions, a former director of the FBI and federal judge, noted that numerous exonerations , recent crime lab scandals (see below) in the state, and other troubling events should…