• Tennessee Legislature Overwhelmingly Approves Death Penalty Study By a vote of 79 – 14, the Tennessee House of Representatives passed bipar­ti­san leg­is­la­tion cre­at­ing a study com­mis­sion to exam­ine the state’s death penal­ty sys­tem. A sim­i­lar mea­sure unan­i­mous­ly passed the state’s Senate in May, just one month after the American Bar Association issued a report find­ing that the state was not in full com­pli­ance with most of the bench­marks estab­lished to guar­an­tee a fair death penal­ty sys­tem. The new com­mis­sion will con­sist of rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the House, Senate, and Governor’s admin­is­tra­tion, as well as pros­e­cu­tors, defense attor­neys, vic­tims’ advo­cates, and rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the National Alliance on Mental Illness. The com­mis­sion mem­bers are expect­ed to review Tennessee’s death penal­ty sys­tem for one year fol­low­ing their appoint­ment. Stacy Rector, Executive Director the Tennessee Coalition to Abolish State Killing, not­ed, ​“Tennessee’s death penal­ty sys­tem is dan­ger­ous­ly bro­ken, and the leg­is­la­ture should be com­mend­ed for acknowl­edg­ing these flaws and tak­ing steps to fix them.… Tennessee has a death row of over 100 indi­vid­u­als and the largest legal orga­ni­za­tion in the coun­try has said that we do not even have the prop­er mech­a­nisms in place to guar­an­tee that we do not exe­cute an inno­cent per­son. Tennesseans deserve a sys­tem we can trust, and our cur­rent sys­tem doesn’t meet that stan­dard.” (Press Release, Tennessee Coalition to Abolish State Killing, June 7, 2007). Read the TCASK Press Release.
  • Tennessee House Judiciary Committee Unanimously Approves Study Commission Bill The Tennessee House Judiciary Committee unan­i­mous­ly approved a bill that would estab­lish a com­mis­sion to thor­ough­ly review the state’s death penal­ty sys­tem and pro­vide law­mak­ers with reform rec­om­men­da­tions that address any prob­lems iden­ti­fied by mem­bers of the com­mis­sion. The com­mis­sion would con­sist of rep­re­sen­ta­tives appoint­ed by Governor Phil Bredesen (pic­tured), the Senate, and the House, and would include pros­e­cu­tors, defense attor­neys, men­tal health advo­cates, and vic­tims advo­cates. A poll con­duct­ed by the Global Strategies group revealed that 66% of Tennesseans would approve an exten­sion of the tem­po­rary hold on exe­cu­tions imposed ear­li­er by the gov­er­nor, who had received a let­ter from more than 200 faith lead­ers in the state urg­ing him to take steps that would ensure the accu­ra­cy and fair­ness of the state’s death penal­ty. In addi­tion, the American Bar Association urged Governor Bredesen to extend the state’s mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions to allow time for a clos­er exam­i­na­tion of con­cerns iden­ti­fied dur­ing a recent ABA study of Tennessee’s cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem. “[I]t’s encour­ag­ing that the General Assembly is tak­ing steps to address the seri­ous flaws in Tennessee’s cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem,” said Rev. Stacy Rector, Executive Director of the Tennessee Coalition to Abolish State Killing. (Eyewitness News — Memphis, May 2, 2007). A fed­er­al District Court in Tennessee grant­ed a stay to Philip Workman, but the stay was lift­ed by the 6th Circuit. He is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed May 9.
  • Tennessee Issues New Lethal Injection Protocols; Court Challenges and ABA Objections Continue Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen (pic­tured) lift­ed the mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions that he imposed in February after accept­ing revised death penal­ty pro­to­cols sub­mit­ted by the Tennessee Department of Corrections just days before the next exe­cu­tion. Though the new pro­ce­dures include more detailed guide­lines for car­ry­ing out lethal injec­tions, the state will con­tin­ue to use a con­tro­ver­sial three-drug ​“cock­tail” and exclude doc­tors from par­tic­i­pat­ing, meau­res that some say risk severe and unnec­es­sary pain. Legal chal­lenges to the lethal injec­tion process con­tin­ue. In February 2007, Gov. Bredesen expressed con­cerns about the man­ner in which exe­cu­tions were car­ried out in the state and ordered a halt to exe­cu­tions until May 2. He direct­ed the Tennessee Department of Corrections to con­duct a ​“com­pre­hen­sive review of the man­ner in which death sen­tences are admin­is­tered… and pro­vide [the gov­er­nor] new pro­to­cols and relat­ed writ­ten pro­ce­dures in admin­is­ter­ing death sen­tences in Tennessee.” In April, the American Bar Association issued a review of Tennessee’s death penal­ty and urged Bredesen to extend the state’s mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions ​“to per­mit a thor­ough review of every aspect of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment admin­is­tra­tion in the state.” The ABA not­ed that the review should include an exam­i­na­tion of ​“exces­sive case­loads and inad­e­quate stan­dards for defense coun­sel” and ​“racial dis­par­i­ties and inad­e­quate review of death row inmates’ claims of actu­al inno­cence.” Tennessee has sched­uled the exe­cu­tion of Philip Workman for May 9. (Jurist Legal News & Research, May 1, 2007). Read the revised Tennessee Death Penalty Protocols. Read the Executive Summary of the ABA’s study.
  • The U.S. Supreme Court declined to con­sid­er the case of Abdur’Rahman v. Bredesen in which the Tennessee Supreme Court held that the state’s lethal injec­tion pro­ce­dure is con­sti­tu­tion­al under the Eighth Amendment. The U.S. Supreme Court’s action is no reflec­tion of their opin­ion on the mat­ter of lethal injec­tion. The Justices are cur­rent­ly review­ing a sep­a­rate case that asks whether inmates can use a fed­er­al civ­il rights law to chal­lenge lethal injec­tion pro­ce­dures. That case is sched­uled for deci­sion by the end of June. (Bloomberg News, May 22, 2006).