Studies

The U.S. Department of Justice recent­ly released its annu­al FBI Uniform Crime Report for 2012. The nation­al mur­der rate remained approx­i­mate­ly the same in 2012 as in 2011. The Northeast, the region with the fewest exe­cu­tions, had the low­est mur­der rate of any region, and its mur­der rate decreased 3.4% from the pre­vi­ous year. The South, which car­ries out the most exe­cu­tions of any region, again had the high­est mur­der rate in 2012. The mur­der rate in the West remained about the same, while the rate in the Midwest increased…

Former Virginia attor­neys gen­er­al Mark L. Earley Sr. (pic­tured) and Anthony F. Troy recent­ly called for changes to the state’s death penal­ty based on a September report from the American Bar Association. Writing in the Washington Post, the past law enforce­ment lead­ers called for changes to the restric­tive laws gov­ern­ing the shar­ing of evi­dence pri­or to tri­als, amend­ments to jury instruc­tions so that jurors in death cas­es could bet­ter under­stand their respon­si­bil­i­ties, and the eas­ing of restric­tions on DNA test­ing. The op-ed not­ed, ​“As for­mer attor­neys gen­er­al of Virginia, we…

Since DPIC released its new report, The 2% Death Penalty, on October 2, both nation­al and inter­na­tion­al media have been report­ing on its find­ings. The Washington Post not­ed, ​“Two per­cent of the coun­ties in the coun­try were respon­si­ble for [most] 685 of 1,320 exe­cu­tions from 1976, when the Supreme Court rein­stat­ed the death penal­ty, to 2012.” The Los Angeles Times, quot­ed DPIC’s Executive Director, “ ​‘The death penal­ty is not as American or as wide­spread as peo­ple might assume. It is clus­tered in a few coun­ties,’ said Richard Dieter, the group’s…

On October 2 the Death Penalty Information Center released a new report, The 2% Death Penalty: How a Minority of Counties Produce Most Death Cases at Enormous Costs to All. The report shows that, con­trary to the assump­tion that the death penal­ty is wide­ly used in the U.S., only a few juris­dic­tions employ cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment exten­sive­ly. Only 2% of the coun­ties in the U.S. have been respon­si­ble for the major­i­ty of cas­es lead­ing to exe­cu­tions since 1976. Likewise, only 2% of the coun­ties are respon­si­ble for the major­i­ty of today’s…

On September 26, the Joint Task Force to Review the Administration of Ohio​’s Death Penalty vot­ed 15 – 2 to rec­om­mend a ban on death sen­tences for peo­ple with severe men­tal ill­ness. The pan­el of legal experts was cre­at­ed by the Ohio Supreme Court and the Ohio State Bar Association and includes judges, attor­neys, and leg­is­la­tors. Their pro­pos­al will be sub­mit­ted with oth­er rec­om­men­da­tions to the gov­er­nor and the General Assembly in 2014. Terry Russell, exec­u­tive direc­tor of the National Alliance on Mental Illness Ohio, said his orga­ni­za­tion has been advo­cat­ing for…

On September 18, the American Bar Association​’s Death Penalty Due Process Review Project released its lat­est report, focus­ing on the fair­ness and accu­ra­cy of Texas​’s death penal­ty sys­tem. The report found: ​“In many areas, Texas appears out of step with bet­ter prac­tices imple­ment­ed in oth­er cap­i­tal juris­dic­tions, fails to rely upon sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly reli­able meth­ods and process­es in the admin­is­tra­tion of the death penal­ty, and pro­vides the pub­lic with inad­e­quate infor­ma­tion to under­stand and eval­u­ate cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the state.” (Exec. Sum.) The assess­ment made sev­er­al rec­om­men­da­tions to help pre­vent wrongful…

In a recent op-ed, the co-author of a key study on the via­bil­i­ty of California’s death penal­ty ana­lyzed the recent dra­mat­ic shift in pub­lic opin­ion on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the state. According to Paula Mitchell, adjunct pro­fes­sor at Loyola of Los Angeles Law School, decades of polling showed about two-thirds of Californians sup­port­ed the death penal­ty, but the 2012 ref­er­en­dum to repeal the law lost by just 4 per­cent­age points (52%-48%). Moreover, in coun­ties that used the death penal­ty the most, sup­port for the death penal­ty was even low­er. In…

The lat­est edi­tion of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund’s Death Row, USA shows a con­tin­u­a­tion of the down­ward trend in the over­all death row pop­u­la­tion, though California (731 inmates) – the state with the largest death row – record­ed an increase. The next lead­ing states were Florida (412), Texas (298), Pennsylvania (198), and Alabama (197), all of which reg­is­tered decreas­es on death row. The total pop­u­la­tion of 3,108 inmates as of April 1, 2013, rep­re­sents a 12% decline from the same date 10 years ago, when there were 3,525 inmates on death row. Since…

A recent arti­cle in the ABA Journal drew atten­tion to prob­lems in crime labs across the coun­try that have result­ed in wrong­ful con­vic­tions, includ­ing some in death penal­ty cas­es. Investigations in many states and of the nation­al FBI lab revealed a lack of writ­ten pro­ce­dures, improp­er mix­ing of sam­ples from dif­fer­ent cas­es, improp­er tes­ti­mo­ny, and even fal­si­fi­ca­tion of test results. An Oklahoma City chemist who tes­ti­fied in 23 death penal­ty cas­es was lat­er fired for giv­ing false or mis­lead­ing tes­ti­mo­ny. Twelve of the defen­dants in whose cas­es she had testified…

On September 5, the American Bar Association’s Death Penalty Due Process Review Project released its lat­est report, focus­ing on the fair­ness and accu­ra­cy of Virginia​’s death penal­ty sys­tem. The assess­ment rec­om­mend­ed changes to the way the state han­dles defen­dants with men­tal retar­da­tion and severe men­tal ill­ness. It also rec­om­mend­ed requir­ing pros­e­cu­tors to dis­close addi­tion­al infor­ma­tion about tes­ti­fy­ing wit­ness­es and allow­ing pros­e­cu­tors to with­draw the death penal­ty even after charg­ing a defen­dant with cap­i­tal mur­der. The report was crit­i­cal of the state’s prac­tice of set­ting an exe­cu­tion date before all appeals…