Publications & Testimony

Glynn Simmons, who was convicted and sentenced to death in Oklahoma in 1975, has been exonerated after Oklahoma County District Attorney Vicki Behenna dropped charges against him. Mr. Simmons told The Black Wall Street Times, “I’m happy, and I’m free. It’s a long, long struggle. … We need to reimagine justice and how we do it.” DA Behenna said of the case, “One of the things that I stand by very strongly is a defendant’s right to a fair trial, where he has all the evidence to defend himself.

On September 14^th, 2023, the American Bar Association’s Death Penalty Representation Project held its annual Volunteer Recognition & Awards Program, honoring Venable LLP for its pro bono representation of death row prisoners, and capital defense attorney and Florida State University College of Law professor Mark E. Olive, for his lifetime commitment to providing those on death row with quality representation. Director of the ABA’s Death Penalty Representation Project Emily Olson-Gault noted…

According to a September 14, 2023, article from The Intercept, four medical supply manufacturers are refusing to sell their equipment for use in lethal injection executions. This limitation may further hamper the ability of states to carry out executions, as a multitude of pharmaceutical companies have already placed restrictions on selling their drugs to departments of correction. Joining these companies are Baxter International Inc., B. Braun Medical Inc., Fresenius Kabi, and Johnson &…

On September 12, 2023, East Baton Rouge District Attorney Hillar Moore filed a request for injunctive relief, asking the 19^th Judicial District Court to vacate hearings scheduled for three East Baton Rouge Parish prisoners who have requested clemency. In June 2023, 51 death-sentenced individuals filed clemency applications with the Louisiana Board of Pardons and Committee on Parole, requesting a commutation of their death sentences to life without parole. Five additional applications from death…

In most states, a death sentence may only be imposed by a jury in unanimous agreement. But in two recent cases, defendants faced the possibility of a death sentence despite the objections of jurors. Under Missouri law, a judge may impose a death sentence when the jury deadlocks in the penalty phase. Ian McCarthy, whose jury deadlocked on sentencing in June, recently challenged this provision as unconstitutional, arguing that “unanimous jury agreement is necessary to ensure that death sentences…

On September 6, 2023, a bipartisan group of Ohio state representatives reintroduced a bill that would abolish the death penalty and replace the punishment with life in prison without parole. Legislators in Ohio have debated the use of capital punishment for nearly a decade, but this renewed effort comes after state senators introduced Senate Bill 101 earlier in the year, which would also abolish the use of capital punishment. Among the primary sponsors of these bills is Representative Jean…

In an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, novelist John Grisham recounts the flawed science that led to the conviction of Robert Roberson (pictured, with his daughter Nikki) and the inadequate legal process that has maintained that conviction. Mr. Roberson was convicted and sentenced to death for the 2002 death of his 2‑year-old daughter Nikki. His conviction relied on a theory of “shaken baby syndrome” that has since been discredited. After a hearing ordered by the Texas Court of Criminal…

On September 5, 2023, Jesse Johnson (pictured) was released from Marion County Jail in Oregon when prosecutors formally declined to retry him for the 1998 murder of Harriet Thompson. Mr. Johnson was convicted of Ms. Thompson’s murder in 2004 and sentenced to death. In asking the Marion County Circuit Court to dismiss the case against Mr. Johnson, the county District Attorney’s office stated that “based upon the amount of time that has passed and the unavailability of critical evidence in this…

Family members of some of the victims of 9/11 have asked the Biden Administration to abandon current plea negotiations with Guantánamo detainees that would remove the possibility of death sentences for the men accused of planning the 9/11 terror attacks. Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and his four co-defendants have been held for more than twenty years, first at CIA black sites where they were subject to “enhanced interrogation techniques” and then at Guantánamo, but none has proceeded to trial. The…

On August 4, a South Korean national convicted of drug-trafficking was executed in China, according to South Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who added during a press conference that this execution was “unrelated to the current bilateral relations” between the two nations. This was the first time a South Korean national was executed in China for drug-trafficking since 2014, when four were executed. Indonesia On August 8, the Supreme Court commuted the death sentence of Fredy Sambo, a…