Publications & Testimony

The nation is embroiled in a debate over the death penalty. Each day brings fresh accounts of racial bias, incompetent counsel, and misconduct committed by police officers or prosecutors in capital cases. The public increasingly questions whether the ultimate penalty can be administered fairly — free from the taint of racism; free from the disgrace of counsel sleeping through a client’s trial; free from the risk of executing an innocent person. Support for the death penalty is falling, and…

Philippine President Commutes Over 100 Death Sentences On December 10, 2000, Philippine President Joseph Estrada commuted the death sentences for 105 convicts to life imprisonment. The move came after Estrada was urged by Bishop emeritus Antonio Fortich to release all political prisoners before Christmas. Estrada agreed to release the prisoners, and added that he would commute the sentences of those under sentence of death. Although Estrada announced plans to commute all of the country’s death…

The Georgia Supreme Court granted a stay in the case of Alexander Williams. Georgia, which has not had an execution in over 2 years, was scheduled to execute Alexander Williams in the state’s electric chair on August 24, 2000. Williams was only 17 years old at the time of the crime, and is a diagnosed schizophrenic. Williams was represented by an attorney who could not successfully name two criminal cases, and who was later officially removed from the list of those qualified to handle…

Bibliography of Recent Articles and Programs on the DP Dialogue on the Death Penalty Project Compiled by Professor James Liebman, Columbia University School of Law (see also, Recent Articles on the Death Penalty — with text available on DPIC’s Web site) (alphabetical by author) Adams, Noah et al, Illinois death row releases closely match executions in number, supporting call for moratorium while process is reviewed, All Things Considered, National Public Radio January 27, 2000. (available…

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Friday, December 29, 2000 CONTACT: BRENDA BOWSER (202) 293‑6970 TWO MORE DEATH ROW INMATES CLEARED, CAPPING A RECORD TWO-YEAR SPAN Wrongful convictions of Louisiana inmates illustrate critical death penalty problems WASHINGTON, DC — Two more death row inmates have been exonerated, bringing a tumultuous year of dramatic death penalty developments to a close. The Louisiana Attorney General’s Office announced that charges against Michael Ray Graham, Jr., and Ronnie…

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Wednesday, December 20, 2000 CONTACT: BRENDA BOWSER (202) 293‑6970 2000 REVIEW OF DEATH PENALTY FINDS WATERSHED YEAR OF CHANGE Number of exonerated death row inmates increases to 90 in 2000; Studies find flaws in system and spur political action WASHINGTON, DC — The Death Penalty Information Center (DPIC) today released its annual Year End Report showing that a steady sequence of events — including six releases from death row, numerous reports on the unfairness of the…

A Response to the Initial Report of the United States to the United Nations Ford Foundation Symposium October 17, 2000 by Richard C. Dieter, Esq. Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, which the U.S. has signed and ratified, guarantees “the right to equal treatment before [all] tribunals … administering justice,”1 and this certainly includes the application of the death penalty. Although the…

NEW YORK TIMES August 22, 2000 YOUNG AND CONDEMNED / A SPECIAL REPORT Whether to Kill Those Who Killed as Youths By SARA RIMER and RAYMOND BONNER If the state of Georgia electrocutes Alexander Williams on Thursday, as planned, five people who committed murder when they were 17 will have been put to death this year in the United States. That is more than in any year since 1954, when six teenagers were executed in Florida and Georgia. Mr. Williams, now 32, is one of 80 condemned youthful…

Buchanan v. Angelone, 66 U.S.L.W. 4075, The Eighth Amendment does not require that a capital jury be instructed on the concept of mitigating evidence generally, or on particular statutory mitigating factors. Calderon v. Ashmus, 66 U.S.L.W. 4382, Death row inmates can challenge the applicability of AEDPA only as part of their habeas petition, not as a separate challenge. Calderon v. Thompson, In a 5 – 4 decision issued April 29^th, the Supreme Court overturned a decision by the U.S. Court of…