Publications & Testimony

Testimony and Statements on the Death Penalty

FROM DPIC

For tes­ti­mo­ny by for­mer Executive Director Robert Dunham and for­mer Executive Director Richard C. Dieter, please vis­it our page DPIC Testimony.
 

FROM RELIGIOUS LEADERS AND ORGANIZATIONS

FROM THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY 

FROM ADVOCACY GROUPS

FROM JUDGES, LEGISLATORS, AND OTHER ORGANIZATIONS

FROM MURDER VICTIMSFAMILY MEMBERS

Latest


Jul 10, 2025

Federal Court Excoriates Prosecutors in Grant of Relief to Former Virginia Death-Sentenced Prisoner Who Has Always Maintained His Innocence

On July 7, 2025, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of for­mer Virginia death-sen­­tenced pris­on­er Justin Wolfe, vacat­ing a low­er court dis­missal of his most recent habeas peti­tion, and paving the way for a new hear­ing where Mr. Wolfe will have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to pro­vide new evi­dence in sup­port of his inno­cence. Mr. Wolfe was con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death in 2002 for the 2001 mur­der-for-hire of his cannabis sup­pli­er in Northern Virginia. In his most…

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Jul 07, 2025

Mid-Year Review 2025: New Death Sentences Remain Low Amidst Increase in Executions

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 infor­ma­tion about the death penal­ty. Its care­ful track­ing and analy­sis of death sen­tences, exe­cu­tions, leg­is­la­tion, and news­wor­thy events pro­vides crit­i­cal con­text to inform meaningful…

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Jul 03, 2025

DPI’s Podcast 12:01 The Death Penalty in Context: Journalists Reflect on the Challenges and Importance of Media Reporting on the Death Penalty

In this month’s pod­cast episode of 12:01 The Death Penalty in Context, DPI’s Managing Director Anne Holsinger speaks with Sam Levin, a cor­re­spon­dent with The Guardian who cov­ers crim­i­nal jus­tice and the legal sys­tem, and Jimmy Jenkins, a crim­i­nal jus­tice reporter for The Arizona Republic, about the chal­lenges they encounter when report­ing on the increas­ing secre­tive use of the death penal­ty. Mr. Jenkins has wit­nessed exe­cu­tions in Arizona and Mr. Levin has recently…

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Jul 02, 2025

DPI Series: Facts About the Death Penalty — Does the Death Penalty Make Communities Safer?

Deterrence is one of the most com­mon­ly expressed rea­sons for use of the death penal­ty, both as a con­sti­tu­tion­al jus­ti­fi­ca­tion and as a pub­lic pol­i­cy ratio­nale. Elected offi­cials have recent­ly called the death penal­ty an​“essen­tial” deter­rent to crime. The argu­ment goes that if some­one knows they could face the death penal­ty, they will not com­mit the crime. Following that rea­son­ing would sug­gest that states with the death penal­ty are safer than states without…

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Jun 26, 2025

Arizona Legislature Moves Towards Compensating Exonerated Individuals, Including Eleven People Wrongfully Death Sentenced

The Arizona leg­is­la­ture is con­sid­er­ing new leg­is­la­tion that will com­pen­sate exon­er­at­ed indi­vid­u­als. HB 2813 was intro­duced in February by Republican Representative Khyl Powell and eas­i­ly passed in the Arizona House of Representatives in a 591 vote two weeks lat­er. The bill is now await­ing con­sid­er­a­tion by the Senate Judiciary and Elections Committee, and accord­ing to report­ing by the Daily Independent it is being​“con­sid­ered for inclu­sion as part of a final…

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Jun 23, 2025

In Unusual Move, Texas Attorney General Requests Execution Date for Robert Roberson Before a Court Has Heard New Evidence of His Actual Innocence

On June 16, 2025, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed a motion in the Anderson County District Court request­ing a new exe­cu­tion date for Robert Roberson, despite the fact that a motion from defense coun­sel with new evi­dence in sup­port of Mr. Roberson’s actu­al inno­cence remains pend­ing. As the Dallas Morning Editorial Board notes, it is​“unusu­al” that “[AG] Paxton’s office is involved” in request­ing the exe­cu­tion date. AG Paxton has active­ly sought Mr. Roberson’s…

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Jun 18, 2025

Iran, Saudi Arabia Lead the World in Use of Death Penalty for Drug Offenses

Nearly half of all known exe­cu­tions to date in 2025 in Iran (244) and Saudi Arabia (50) have been for drug-relat­ed crimes, track­ing close­ly pat­terns doc­u­ment­ed by Harm Reduction International (HRI) for 2024. According to HRI’s new report, The Death Penalty for Drug Offenses: Global Overview 2024, the use of the death penal­ty for drug-relat­ed crimes reached​“cri­sis lev­els” in 2024. At least 615 peo­ple were known to be exe­cut­ed on drug-relat­ed charges world­wide, 607 of…

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Jun 17, 2025

Article of Interest: Maricopa County Investigation: Capital Cases are Costly, Lack Transparency in Charging Decisions, and Rarely End in Death Sentences

A joint inves­ti­ga­tion by ProPublica and ABC15 Arizona reviewed more than 300 cas­es over the past two decades where Maricopa County pros­e­cu­tors sought the death penal­ty and found that only 13% result­ed in death sen­tences. In most cas­es a jury nev­er got close to con­sid­er­ing whether to sen­tence some­one to death: in more than three-quar­ters of cas­es, defen­dants pled guilty in exchange for less­er pun­ish­ment, or pros­e­cu­tors reversed course before tri­al. In only 41 of…

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Jun 11, 2025

Anthony Wainwright, Executed June 10 in Florida, Lost Federal Appeals Due to Lawyers’ Mistakes and Indifference and Was Denied Counsel of His Choice

When a lawyer makes a mis­take, who suf­fers the con­se­quences? The​“agency prin­ci­ple” says the client does, under the ratio­nale that clients choose their lawyers and autho­rize their actions. But courts uni­ver­sal­ly apply this prin­ci­ple to all attor­ney-client rela­tion­ships, includ­ing when indi­gent, iso­lat­ed death-sen­­tenced pris­on­ers are appoint­ed attor­neys by the state, with lit­tle or no means of con­trol­ling their lawyers’ actions. Many com­men­ta­tors have noted the…

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Jun 05, 2025

Remembering Death Row Survivor and Advocate Sonia Sunny” Jacobs

Sonia​“Sunny” Jacobs, a for­mer death row pris­on­er whose sto­ry of wrong­ful con­vic­tion was fea­tured in the off-Broadway play​“The Exonerated)” and who became a promi­nent advo­cate for for­mer­ly incar­cer­at­ed pris­on­ers, died in a house fire, along with her care­giv­er, in County Galway, Ireland, on June 3, 2025. Ms. Jacobs was con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death in 1976 for the mur­ders of two law enforce­ment offi­cers at a Florida rest stop. She and Jesse Tafero, the father of…

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