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Entries tagged with “Robert Dunham”

Policy Issues

Arbitrariness

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History of the Death Penalty

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Religion

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Oct 17, 2018

ABA Panel Explores History, Morality of Death Penalty

“Has the death penal­ty evolved into an anachro­nism?” asked a pan­el at the August 2, 2018 American Bar Association Annual Meeting in Chicago. Moderator Ronald Tabak, chair of the ABA Death Penalty Committee, and pan­elists Cardinal Blase J. Cupich of the Archdiocese of Chicago; Karen Gottlieb, co-direc­tor of the Florida Center for Capital Representation; Meredith Martin Rountree, senior lec­tur­er at the…

Executions

Botched Executions

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Lethal Injection

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Nov 23, 2022

Alabama Governor Halts Executions After Latest in Series of Execution Failures

Alabama Governor Kay Ivey (pic­tured) has halt­ed exe­cu­tions and ordered a ​“top-to-bot­tom review” of the state’s exe­cu­tion pro­ce­dures, five days after fail­ures by cor­rec­tions per­son­nel to estab­lish an intra­venous exe­cu­tion line caused Alabama to call off the November 17, 2022 exe­cu­tion of Kenneth…

Policy Issues

Arbitrariness

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Costs

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Sentencing Data

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Jan 30, 2013

ARBITRARINESS: Pennsylvania’s Costly and Broken Death Penalty System

The the­o­ry of the death penal­ty is that pros­e­cu­tors select offend­ers who have com­mit­ted aggra­vat­ed mur­der and obtain death sen­tences for the most heinous offend­ers through a scrupu­lous tri­al with full due process. The real­i­ty in Pennsylvania is rad­i­cal­ly dif­fer­ent. Hundreds of inmates have been sen­tenced to death, but of the cas­es that have com­plet­ed the appeals process, 100% have been over­turned, most­ly because of errors in the con­vic­tion or sen­tenc­ing stages. (Three inmates…

Jan 27, 2016

Criminal Justice Committee, Florida Senate: Materials from hear­ing on revi­sions to Florida’s death penal­ty statute in light of Hurst v. Florida

Criminal Justice Committee, Florida Senate: Materials from hear­ing on revi­sions to Florida’s death penal­ty statute in light of Hurst v. Florida fea­tur­ing tes­ti­mo­ny of Robert Dunham, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center (Tallahassee, January 27, 2016). Mr. Dunham’s tes­ti­mo­ny begins at the 11:30 mark of the video of the Senate Committee…

Policy Issues

Innocence

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Prosecutorial Accountability

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Jun 30, 2022

DPIC Analysis Finds Prosecutorial Misconduct Implicated in More than 550 Death Penalty Reversals or Exonerations

An analy­sis by the Death Penalty Information Center has dis­cov­ered ram­pant pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct in death penal­ty pros­e­cu­tions. DPIC’s ongo­ing review of death sen­tences imposed and over­turned after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down exist­ing death penal­ty statutes in 1972 has iden­ti­fied more than 550 pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct rever­sals and exon­er­a­tions in cap­i­tal cas­es (click to enlarge image). That amounts to more than 5.6% of all death sen­tences imposed in the United…

Policy Issues

Costs

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Race

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Sentencing Data

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Nov 16, 2018

DPIC Analysis: The Decline of the Death Penalty in Philadelphia

During his elec­tion cam­paign, Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner described the eco­nom­ic waste­ful­ness of city pros­e­cu­tors’ pur­suit of the death penal­ty as ​“light­ing mon­ey on fire.” A DPIC analy­sis of the out­comes of the more than 200 death sen­tences imposed in the city since 1978 (click here to enlarge image) and the last sev­en years of cap­i­tal pros­e­cu­tion out­comes pro­vides strong sup­port for Krasner’s…

Policy Issues

Innocence

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Prosecutorial Accountability

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Oct 23, 2020

DPIC Analysis: Use or Threat of Death Penalty Implicated in 19 Exoneration Cases in 2019

Prosecutors or police used or threat­ened to use the death penal­ty as a coer­cive tool that led to or extend­ed the wrong­ful con­vic­tions of at least nine­teen peo­ple who were exon­er­at­ed in 2019, a Death Penalty Information Center analy­sis of data from the National Registry of Exonerations has revealed. Nearly 95% of those cas­es also involved some oth­er form of major mis­con­duct, the DPIC analysis…

Policy Issues

Deterrence

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Murder Rates

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Sep 12, 2017

NEW PODCAST: DPIC Study Finds No Evidence that Death Penalty Deters Murder or Protects Police

A Death Penalty Information Center analy­sis of U.S. mur­der data from 1987 through 2015 has found no evi­dence that the death penal­ty deters mur­der or pro­tects police. Instead, the evi­dence shows that mur­der rates, includ­ing mur­ders of police offi­cers, are con­sis­tent­ly high­er in death-penal­ty states than in states that have abol­ished the death penal­ty. And far from expe­ri­enc­ing increas­es in mur­der rates or open sea­son on law enforce­ment, the data show that states that have abol­ished the death…

Facts & Research

Sentencing Data

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Executions Overview

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Dec 05, 2017

No Executions in the ​“Capital of Capital Punishment” for First Time in 30 Years

Harris County (Houston), Texas, has exe­cut­ed 126 pris­on­ers since the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Texas’s cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment statute in 1976, more than any oth­er coun­ty in the United States and, apart from the rest of Texas, more than any state. But in 2017, no one will be sen­tenced to death in Harris County and, for the first time since 1985, no one sen­tenced to death in the coun­ty will be…

Policy Issues

Arbitrariness

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Intellectual Disability

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Mental Illness

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Race

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Religion

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Federal Death Penalty

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Jul 10, 2020

Op-Eds Highlight Disparities in Federal Death Penalty, as 1,000 Faith Leaders and the European Union Urge Justice Department to Halt Executions

As the sched­uled July 13, 2020 date for the first fed­er­al exe­cu­tions in 17 years approach­es, faith lead­ers, diplo­mats, and legal experts have asked the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment to call them off. 1,000 faith lead­ers from across the coun­try have urged President Trump and Attorney General Barr to halt the exe­cu­tions. They are joined by the European Union, which on July 10 also issued a state­ment strong­ly oppos­ing the resump­tion of fed­er­al exe­cu­tions. Complementing their efforts, two…

Policy Issues

Arbitrariness

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Costs

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Representation

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Aug 31, 2010

Pennsylvania’s Costly Death Penalty Produces Nothing in Return

Pennsylvania Governor Edward Rendell has signed 113 exe­cu­tion war­rants dur­ing his two terms in office, yet it appears like­ly that he will leave office in a few months with­out see­ing any of them car­ried out. Since the state rein­stat­ed the death penal­ty in 1978, only three men have been exe­cut­ed, all of whom had waived their…

Policy Issues

Innocence

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May 29, 2019

Philadelphia Death-Row Exoneree Harold Wilson Dies at 61

Harold Wilson, exon­er­at­ed in 2005 six­teen years after his wrong­ful con­vic­tion and death sen­tence for a triple mur­der in a Philadelphia crack house, has died. He had recent­ly suf­fered a series of strokes that were fur­ther com­pli­cat­ed by pneu­mo­nia. His risk of stroke and the com­pli­ca­tions that fol­lowed had been wors­ened by the Posttraumatic Stress Disorder he devel­oped as a result of the 17 years he faced the death penal­ty, most spent in soli­tary con­fine­ment on…

Facts & Research

History of the Death Penalty

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Recent Legislative Activity

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Mar 24, 2021

Virginia Becomes 23rd State and the First in the South to Abolish the Death Penalty

Saying “[t]here is no place today for the death penal­ty in this com­mon­wealth, in the South, or in this nation,” Governor Ralph Northam (pic­tured) signed his­toric leg­is­la­tion mak­ing Virginia the 23rd U.S. state and the first in the South to abol­ish capital…