Publications & Testimony

In his new book, Let the Lord Sort Them: The Rise and Fall of the Death Penalty, jour­nal­ist Maurice Chammah presages the death of America’s cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem. Chammah expert­ly weaves togeth­er sys­temic issues with indi­vid­ual, human­iz­ing case details to illus­trate the efforts of lawyers, orga­ni­za­tions, and activists who are chal­leng­ing the foun­da­tions of the sys­tem with the goal of abol­ish­ing the death penal­ty. The New York Times called it ​“a case…

Inadequate test­ing, resis­tance to con­tact trac­ing, and poor social dis­tanc­ing prac­tices like­ly made the thir­teen fed­er­al exe­cu­tions in 2020 – 2021 COVID-19 super­spread­er events, the Associated Press has con­clud­ed. In the ten days after the December 10, 2020 exe­cu­tion of Brandon Bernard, 70% of pris­on­ers on fed­er­al death row and hun­dreds of oth­ers incar­cer­at­ed in the Terre Haute Correctional Complex where the exe­cu­tions took place test­ed pos­i­tive for COVID-19.

Pennsylvania death-row exoneree Christopher Williams (pic­tured) was released from prison on February 9, 2021, after being exon­er­at­ed in a sec­ond mur­der case. The sec­ond wrong­ful mur­der con­vic­tion had kept Williams incar­cer­at­ed after he was cleared of the mur­der for which he was wrong­ful­ly con­demned to…

Former Florida pub­lic defend­er Matt Shirk (pic­tured), who was defeat­ed for re-elec­tion after scan­dals relat­ed to per­son­al mis­con­duct and under­min­ing crim­i­nal defense ser­vices in one the nation’s most pro­lif­ic death sen­tenc­ing coun­ties, faces sus­pen­sion of his law license after plead­ing guilty to mul­ti­ple ethics vio­la­tions dur­ing his time in office. If the plea is approved by the Florida Supreme Court, Shirk will be sus­pend­ed from prac­tice for six months, and…

Four hours after Alabama was sched­uled to exe­cute death-row pris­on­er Willie B. Smith III on February 11, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court let stand a fed­er­al appeals court injunc­tion bar­ring the exe­cu­tion from going for­ward unless the state per­mit­ted Smith’s pas­tor to be present to pro­vide him reli­gious com­fort in the exe­cu­tion cham­ber. Alabama then announced that it was call­ing off the…

A coali­tion of 82 civ­il rights and advo­ca­cy orga­ni­za­tions have called on President Joe Biden to hon­or his cam­paign promise of ​“ensur­ing equal­i­ty, equi­ty, and jus­tice in our crim­i­nal legal sys­tem” by tak­ing exec­u­tive action to end fed­er­al exe­cu­tions. The groups, led by The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, asked Biden to com­mute the sen­tences of every­one on fed­er­al death row, dis­man­tle the fed­er­al death cham­ber, rescind the fed­er­al execution…

The Harris County District Attorney​’s office has asked the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals to over­turn the death sen­tence imposed on Raymond Riles (pic­tured), the nation’s longest-serv­ing death-row…