Publications & Testimony

40 active death war­rants have been issued in the United States thus far in 2025 — more than a third of them were issued by one indi­vid­ual, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, in a process cloaked in secre­cy. The only two states that place author­i­ty sole­ly in the hands of the gov­er­nor to issue an exe­cu­tion war­rant are Florida, which has exe­cut­ed more indi­vid­u­als in 2025 than any oth­er state, and Pennsylvania, which has not exe­cut­ed any­one in over 25 years and where a…

This week we are fea­tur­ing some arti­cles from the first part of 2025 that we think are worth anoth­er look. We’ll be back with new arti­cles next week. This arti­cle orig­i­nal­ly ran on February 11, 2025. In June 2025, Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman request­ed that Governor Andy Beshear set an exe­cu­tion date for death row pris­on­er Ralph Baze. In a late June 2025 reply, Gov. Beshear declined to do so because of an April 2025 Franklin County Circuit Court ruling that…

This week we are fea­tur­ing some arti­cles from the first part of 2025 that we think are worth anoth­er look. We’ll be back with new arti­cles next week. This arti­cle orig­i­nal­ly ran on July 7, 2025. At the mid­point of 2025, the Death Penalty Information Center (DPI) offers this detailed analy­sis of the key facts and themes emerg­ing in the use of the death penal­ty across the U.S. For more than 30 years, DPI has been the pre­em­i­nent nation­al resource for time­ly and trustworthy…

This week we are fea­tur­ing some arti­cles from the first part of 2025 that we think are worth anoth­er look. We’ll be back with new arti­cles next week. This arti­cle was orig­i­nal­ly post­ed on April 30, 2025. In com­mem­o­ra­tion of the 20^th anniver­sary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s land­mark deci­sion end­ing the juve­nile death penal­ty, the Death Penalty Information Center (DPI) today released a new report: Immature Minds in a​“Maturing Society”: Roper v. Simmons at 20, detailing…

On August 19, 2025, the Utah Pardons Board denied Ralph Menzies’ peti­tion for com­mu­ta­tion, despite his wors­en­ing demen­tia, fail­ing health, and evi­dence that his 1988 death sen­tence​“was imposed in error” and​“obtained using per­jured tes­ti­mo­ny.” The Pardons Board was asked to com­mute his sen­tence to life with­out the pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole (LWOP). According to report­ing by the Utah News Dispatch, Utah’s Pardon Board has nev­er grant­ed clemen­cy to a death-sentenced…

Over the past two weeks, two Florida death row pris­on­ers filed fresh chal­lenges to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ deci­sions to sign his tenth and eleventh death war­rants of 2025. On July 29, 2025, Kayle Barrington Bates (also known as Maud Dib Al Sharif) brought a civ­il suit against Gov. DeSantis alleg­ing Florida’s exe­cu­tion war­rant process​“is infect­ed with racial dis­crim­i­na­tion and uncon­sti­tu­tion­al arbi­trari­ness.” Included in the claim is a statistical analysis…

On July 31, 2025, the state of Florida exe­cut­ed its ninth per­son this year, Edward Zakrzewski, mark­ing the high­est num­ber of exe­cu­tions in a sin­gle year in Florida in mod­ern death penal­ty his­to­ry. The haste with which Governor DeSantis is sched­ul­ing exe­cu­tions has prompt­ed many ques­tions and addi­tion­al scruti­ny about a process that is cloaked in secre­cy and a deci­­sion-mak­er who is untrou­bled by the seri­ous issues in many of the cas­es set for execution. ###…

An unde­ni­able truth of the death penal­ty is that it car­ries the inher­ent risk of exe­cut­ing inno­cent indi­vid­u­als. Many may believe that the exe­cu­tion of an inno­cent per­son is an anom­aly and that the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem has ade­quate safe­guards in place to rec­ti­fy wrong­ful con­vic­tions. Unfortunately, this is often not the case. Fact: For Every 8 Individuals Executed in the Modern Era, One Other Death-Sentenced Person has been Found Innocent. Since 1973, 200…