Entries tagged with “Scott Panetti”
Nov 06, 2025
Facts About the Death Penalty: Execution of Prisoners with Severe Mental Illness
In 2002, a Gallup poll found that 75% of Americans opposed executing individuals who have severe mental illnesses. Many people believe that the U.S. does not execute people who suffer from serious mental illness. This is only partially true. In fact, the Constitution bars the execution only of people who are legally deemed “insane” or mentally incompetent. But the legal standard for demonstrating mental incompetence is high and exemptions from execution for mental incompetence are rare. Given…
Jun 03, 2025
Scott Panetti, Prisoner in Landmark Competency Case, Dies on Texas Death Row of Natural Causes
Scott Panetti died on Texas’ death row at the end of May 2025 after 30 years in prison. He became well-known for the role his case played in clarifying the legal standard for determining when defendants are competent to face execution — precedent that continues to shape court decisions nationwide. Mr. Panetti’s severe mental illness manifested in his late teens, leading to more than a dozen psychiatric hospitalizations through the 1980s and early 1990s. His documented conditions included…
State & Federal Info
Military
,Nov 10, 2023
A Veterans Day Review: Uneven Progress Understanding the Role of Military Service in Capital Crimes
In 2015, DPIC’s Battle Scars report brought worldwide attention to the issue of military veterans on death row. DPIC found approximately 300 veterans incarcerated under a sentence of death, representing at least 10% of death row, and many more who had been executed. Since that report, research and understanding about Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), traumatic brain injury (TBI), substance use disorders, and mental illness among veterans has only grown. A 2023 survey of members of the…
Issues
Nov 02, 2023
Under Recent State Legislation, Courts in Ohio and Kentucky Rule Four Men Ineligible for Execution Due to Serious Mental Illness
Though the Supreme Court has ruled that the Constitution forbids the death penalty for a person who is “insane” at the time of execution, it has never held that the execution of people with serious mental illness is unconstitutional. Experts have found that two in five people executed between 2000 and 2015 had a mental illness diagnosis such as bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, or PTSD. Since 2017, at least eleven states have attempted to strengthen protections for vulnerable prisoners by…
Issues
Sep 29, 2023
Federal District Court Finds Scott Panetti Not Competent for Execution
On September 28, 2023, the Western District Court of Texas ruled that the state cannot execute Scott Panetti (pictured), a death row prisoner with a decades-long history of serious mental health issues and a diagnosis of schizophrenia. Despite a state expert conceding Mr. Panetti’s serious mental illness, Texas argued that he is competent to face execution because he has “some degree” of rational understanding. U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman ruled, however, that “[Mr.] Panetti is not sane…
Issues
Nov 03, 2022
Federal Court Holds Competency Hearing for Scott Panetti
A federal district court in Texas has heard evidence on, and now must decide, whether a severely mentally ill man is competent to be executed. On October 24, 2022, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas began presiding over the competency hearing of Scott Panetti (pictured), whose case established the constitutional standard for competency to be executed, to determine whether he has a rational understanding of his death sentence and the reason for it or is so mentally ill…
Issues
Apr 20, 2021
Florida Bars From Medical Practice Psychiatrist Who Repeatedly Testified that Severely Mentally Ill Death-Row Prisoners Were ‘Malingering’
A controversial psychiatrist who repeatedly testified that severely mentally ill death-row prisoners were faking their symptoms and were competent to be executed has been barred from medical practice in Florida. On March 31, 2021, the Florida Department of Health issued an emergency restriction on the medical license of Alan J. Waldman, M.D. (pictured), prohibiting him from practicing as a medical doctor until the impaired practitioner program for the state’s Board of Medicine provides notice…
Issues
Mar 26, 2015
States Struggle with Determinations of Competency to Be Executed
A recent article in Mother Jones examines lingering questions in the determination of which inmates are exempt from execution because of mental incompetency. In 1986, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Ford v. Wainwright that a person could not be executed if he or she was “unaware of the punishment they’re about to suffer and why they are to suffer it.” The 2007 ruling in Panetti v. Quarterman updated that decision, with Justice Anthony Kennedy writing, “A prisoner’s awareness of the State’s…