Entries tagged with “Secrecy”

Aug 24, 2020

ACLU Lawsuit Seeks Information on Cost and Public Health Risks of Federal Executions

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and American Civil Liberties Foundation have filed a law­suit against the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) seek­ing a court order requir­ing the BOP to dis­close how much the fed­er­al government…

May 10, 2022

ACLU Review of Quintin Jones Execution Documents Finds Texas ​“Woefully Unprepared to Carry Out an Execution”

Documents that the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) with­held from pub­lic dis­clo­sure for months reveal that ​“con­fu­sion and lack of train­ing” have left the state ​“woe­ful­ly unpre­pared to car­ry out an exe­cu­tion,” accord­ing to the American C…

Nov 29, 2021

Alabama Death-Row Prisoner Doyle Hamm, Who Survived Botched Execution Attempt, Dies of Cancer

Alabama death-row pris­on­er Doyle Lee Hamm (pic­tured), whose botched executio…

Jul 29, 2022

Alabama Execution of Joe Nathan James Marred by Failures to Set IV Line, Embarrassing Dress-Code Controversy, and Disrespect of Victim’s Family

Alabama put Joe Nathan James, Jr. to death on July 28, 2022 against the wish­es of his victim’s fam­i­ly in an exe­cu­tion marred by an hours-long fail­ure to set a lethal-injec­tion intra­venous line and an embarrassing …

Aug 11, 2021

Alabama, Mississippi Take Preparatory Steps to Resume Executions

Alabama and Mississippi have under­tak­en prepara­to­ry steps towards resum­ing exe­cu­tions in the face of con­tin­u­ing legal chal­lenges to their meth­ods of exe­cu­tion. On August 2, 2021, Alabama’s Department of C…

Oct 19, 2022

Alan Miller Asks Federal Court to Bar Alabama from Second Attempt to Execute Him By Lethal Injection

Alan Eugene Miller has asked fed­er­al courts to bar Alabama from set­ting a sec­ond exe­cu­tion date days after the Alabama Attorney General’s office filed a motion in the state’s Supreme Court to expe­dite a new exe­cu­tion war­rant. The state attempt­ed t…

Apr 10, 2019

Amnesty International 2018 Global Report: Executions Worldwide Fall to Lowest Level in a Decade

Executions world­wide have fall­en to their low­est lev­els in a decade, accord­ing to a new report released April 9, 2019 by Amnesty International. In its annual 

Apr 22, 2020

Amnesty International Report: Confirmed Executions and Death Sentences Continue Global Decline, But Secrecy Hinders Accurate Assessment of Trends

Executions across the globe fell 5% world­wide in 2019 to the fewest in more than a decade, despite a record num­ber of exe­cu­tions in Saudi Arabia, Amnesty International report­ed in the human rights organization’s

Apr 12, 2018

Amnesty International Report: Death Penalty Use Down Worldwide in 2017

Use of the death penal­ty declined world­wide in 2017, accord­ing to the Amnesty International’s annu­al glob­al report on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. The human rights orga­ni­za­tion record­ed 2,591 death sen­tences imposed in 53 coun­tries in 2017, down 1…

Apr 11, 2017

Amnesty International Report: U.S. Falls to 7^th in Executions Amidst 37% Global Decline

Executions world­wide fell by 37% in 2016, accord­ing to the annu­al Amnesty International Global Report on Death Sentences and Executions, released on April 11, 2017. With 20 exe­cu­tions in 2016, the United States

Apr 06, 2016

Amnesty International Reports Concentrated Spikes in Executions Amidst Continuing Trend Towards Global Death Penalty Abolition

Amnesty International report­ed that world­wide exe­cu­tions spiked by 54% to at least 1,634 — a 25-year high — in 2015, even as the num­ber of coun­tries abol­ish­ing the death penal­ty reached record lev­els. In its annu­al report on …

Mar 08, 2021

Arizona Department of Corrections Says It Is Ready to Resume Executions

Arizona cor­rec­tions offi­cials have announced that the state has pro­cured a sup­ply of an exe­cu­tion drug and is now able to resume exe­cu­tions after a near­ly sev­en-year hia­tus. David Shinn, direc­tor of the Arizona Department …

Jun 02, 2022

Arizona Violated Court Order to Allow Media to Witness Execution, Lawyer for Newspapers Says

Arizona vio­lat­ed state law, state cor­rec­tions poli­cies, and a court order by deny­ing a reporter from the state’s largest dai­ly cir­cu­la­tion news­pa­per access to view the May 11 exe­cu­tion of Clarence Dixon and by blo…

Jun 04, 2020

Arkansas Federal Court Rejects Death-Row Prisoners’ Challenge to State’s Use of Midazolam in Executions

U.S. District Judge Kristine Baker on June 1, 2020 denied a chal­lenge brought by Arkansas death-row pris­on­ers to the use of the con­tro­ver­sial drug mida­zo­lam in car­ry­ing out exe­cu­tions. The rul­ing fol­lowed a 

Nov 20, 2018

Behind the Curtain: Secrecy and the Death Penalty in the United States

Mar 01, 2021

Capital Case Roundup — Death Penalty Court Decisions the Week of February 22, 2021

NEWS (2/​25/​21) — Alabama: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11^th Circuit has denied habeas relief for Alabama death-row pris­on­er Charles Clark, who the tri­al court had sen­tenced to death based upon a non‑u…

Jun 13, 2020

Capital Case Roundup — Death Penalty Court Decisions the Week of June 8, 2020

NEWS (6/​11/​20) — Florida: The Florida Supreme Court applied new cas­es that retroac­tive­ly changed the law regard­ing claims of intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty and the uncon­sti­tu­tion­al­i­ty of death sen­tences imposed after non-unan­i­mous jury votes for …

Dec 02, 2020

Citing State’s Lack of Execution Drugs, South Carolina Supreme Court Stays Richard Moore’s Execution

Saying that the state lacked the abil­i­ty to car­ry out a lethal injec­tion, the South Carolina Supreme Court has stayed the sched­uled December 4, 2020 exe­cu­tion of Richard Moore (pic­tured). With no state executions …

May 24, 2021

Citing ​‘Inexperience’ and ​‘Miscommunication,’ Texas Conducts Execution Without Media Witnesses

In a fail­ure of trans­paren­cy one leg­isla­tive leader described as ​“unfath­omable,” the State of Texas put Quintin Jones (pic­tured) to death on May 19, 2021 with­out any media wit­ness­es present to observe the exe­cu­tion. It was the fir…

Jun 03, 2022

Court Documents Reveal Widespread Irregularities in Tennessee Executions

Court records from a law­suit brought by Tennessee death-row pris­on­ers have revealed wide­spread irreg­u­lar­i­ties in the state’s exe­cu­tion prac­tices. A series of four arti­cles pub­lished in the Nashville news­pa­per, The Ten…

Nov 15, 2021

Death-Row Prisoners in Japan Sue Over Same-Day Notice of Executions

Two Japanese death-row pris­on­ers have filed a law­suit alleg­ing that the country’s long-crit­i­cized prac­tice of noti­fy­ing pris­on­ers of their exe­cu­tion the same day they are to be put to death is ​“inhu­mane” and vio­lates the nation’s constitution.…

Nov 20, 2018

DPIC Releases New Report, ​“Behind the Curtain: Secrecy and the Death Penalty in the United States”

The Death Penalty Information Center has released a major new report, Behind the Curtain: Secrecy and the Death Penalty in the United States, exam­in­ing the scope and con­se­quences of secre­cy in the appli­ca­tion of the death penalty …

Mar 04, 2021

Evenly Split Indiana Supreme Court Affirms Ruling Requiring Release of Execution-Drug Records

An even­ly divid­ed Indiana Supreme Court has affirmed a tri­al court rul­ing that requires the Indiana Department of Correction (IDOC) to release records relat­ed to the lethal injec­tion drugs Indiana has used in carr…

Aug 06, 2020

Execution Lawsuits Settle in Arizona and California, as Prisoners Renew Lethal-Injection Protocol Challenge in Oklahoma

Long-run­ning exe­cu­tion law­suits have set­tled in Arizona and California, as a renewed chal­lenge to the state’s revised lethal-injec­tion pro­to­col has ramped up in Oklahoma. The Arizona set…

Mar 11, 2022

Execution Secrecy Bill Passes in Florida, Fails in Idaho

Bills to increase secre­cy in the con­duct of exe­cu­tions have met dif­fer­ent fates in Florida and Idaho. Florida leg­is­la­tors on March 7, 2022 gave final leg­isla­tive approval to a bill that would con­ceal the identity …

May 17, 2022

Fallout From Aborted Tennessee Execution: Prosecutors Misrepresented Facts in Federal Lawsuit, 2 Members of Execution Team Knew Drugs Had Not Been Tested

The fall­out fol­low­ing Tennessee’s abort­ed attempt to exe­cute Oscar Smith on April 21, 2022 con­tin­ues to grow, as state pros­e­cu­tors dis­closed that their plead­ings had mis­rep­re­sent­ed facts in a fed­er­al lethal inject…

Oct 18, 2021

Federal Appeals Court Reinstates Oklahoma Death-Row Prisoners to Lawsuit in Decision That May Require State to Vacate Execution Dates

In a deci­sion with poten­tial to vacate a num­ber of Oklahoma exe­cu­tion dates, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit has held that a low­er fed­er­al court abused its dis­cre­tion in dis­miss­ing six death-row pris­on­ers from a law­suit challenging…

Feb 26, 2021

Federal Bureau of Prisons Sanitized Execution Reports, Omitting Disturbing Details Observed by Media Witnesses

Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) offi­cials repeat­ed­ly mis­rep­re­sent­ed accounts of the exe­cu­tions they car­ried out in 2020 and 2021, pro­vid­ing san­i­tized descrip­tions of the exe­cu­tions that omit­ted all ref­er­ences to dra­mat­ic body move…

Sep 26, 2022

Federal Court Orders Alabama to Preserve Evidence of Botched Attempted Execution of Alan Miller

A fed­er­al dis­trict court has ordered Alabama state offi­cials to pre­serve evi­dence relat­ed to the state’s failed attempt to exe­cute death-row pris­on­er Alan Miller on September 22, 2022. The botched exe­cu­tion attempt, Alabama’s third since 2018, cam…

May 20, 2022

Former South Carolina Death-Row Doctor: ​“I’m Supposed to be Saving People, Not Killing People”

After 37 years of silence, a South Carolina prison doc­tor who was in the exe­cu­tion cham­ber when eight pris­on­ers it was his duty to treat were put to death has for the first time pub­licly dis­cussed his con­flict­ing roles. I…

Dec 21, 2021

House Committee Asks Justice Department Its Plans on Resuming Executions, Purchasing Execution Drugs

The House Committee on Oversight and Reform has sent a let­ter to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland seek­ing infor­ma­tion on the Department of Justice’s death penal­ty prac­tices and poli­cies, includ­ing whether DOJ…

Mar 30, 2022

Idaho Expands Execution Secrecy After Senate Committee Reconsiders Failed Vote

Idaho Governor Brad Little on March 25, 2022, signed into law an exe­cu­tion secre­cy bill that con­ceals from the pub­lic and the courts infor­ma­tion on the pro­duc­ers and sup­pli­ers of drugs used in exe­cu­tions in the state. Hou…

Oct 21, 2019

In Response to Court Order, Alabama Releases Heavily Redacted Execution Protocol

Under court order, Alabama has released for the first time a copy of the state’s pre­vi­ous­ly con­fi­den­tial exe­cu­tion pro­to­col. The 17-page doc­u­ment — filed on October 16, 2019 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Al…

Oct 19, 2021

Intellectually Disabled Alabama Death-Row Prisoner Appeals Denial of Stay of Execution, Arguing Designation of Lethal Injection Violated Americans With Disabilities Act

An intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled Alabama death-row pris­on­er has appealed a fed­er­al dis­trict court rul­ing that clears the way for his exe­cu­tion on October 21, 2021. On October 17, a fed­er­al dis­trict court judge denied for a secon…

Jan 21, 2022

Investigative Report: Idaho Records Reveal State’s Efforts to Conceal Ghost Purchase of Execution Drugs and Out-of-State Cash Payment to Pharmacy With Dubious Regulatory History

Idaho prison offi­cials engaged in cloak and dag­ger prac­tices, includ­ing twice send­ing state employ­ees across state lines to make cash pur­chas­es of con­trolled sub­stances intend­ed for exe­cu­tions, active­ly con­ceal­ing the intend­ed use…

Mar 07, 2019

Judiciary Committee, Nebraska Unicameral Legislature: Testimony on LB 238 – A Bill Relating to Witnessing Executions

Judiciary Committee, Nebraska Unicameral Legislature: Testimony on LB 238 – A Bill Relating to Witnessing Executions by Robert Brett Dunham, Ex…

Sep 24, 2019

Lawsuits in Arizona and Virginia Highlight Media Efforts to Witness Executions in Their Entirety

Federal law­suits filed by coali­tions of media orga­ni­za­tions in two states high­light recent media efforts to vin­di­cate the public’s right to wit­ness exe­cu­tions in their entire­ty. On September 17, 2019, the 

Mar 08, 2020

Legislative Roundup — Recent Legislative Activity as of March 7

Washington — A bill that would for­mal­ly remove Washington’s judi­cial­ly abol­ished death penal­ty from the state’s statute books has failed. SB 5339, which pa…

Aug 02, 2013

LETHAL INJECTION: Shortage of Drugs Leaves Texas Unsure About Future Executions

On August 1, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice announced its remain­ing sup­ply of pen­to­bar­bi­tal, used for lethal injec­tions, expires in September, and it is unsure where to obtain more. The drug’s man­u­fac­tur­er, Lundb…

Mar 09, 2020

Media and Legal Organizations Urge Idaho Supreme Court to Require Execution Transparency

Saying that states have ​“no com­pelling need” to keep exe­cu­tion infor­ma­tion secret, the American Bar Association (ABA) has asked the Idaho Supreme Court to require the state to dis­close numer­ous exe­cu­tion-relat­ed d…

Jun 28, 2022

Mississippi Gives Department of Corrections Unprecedented Discretion Over Execution Methods

Mississippi cor­rec­tions offi­cials will have unprece­dent­ed dis­cre­tion in select­ing how the state’s death-row pris­on­ers will be exe­cut­ed under a new law that takes effect July 1, 2022. Mississippi autho­rizes exe­cu­tion by le…

Sep 25, 2017

Mixed Rulings in Arkansas and Arizona Highlight Issue of Lethal-Injection Secrecy

Recent court rul­ings in Arkansas and Arizona reach­ing oppo­site out­comes high­light the con­tin­u­ing con­tro­ver­sy over state prac­tices keep­ing infor­ma­tion relat­ing to state acqui­si­tion of drugs for use in exe­cut­ing pri…

Feb 20, 2020

Nebraska Bill to Make Executions More Transparent Advances in Legislature

Nebraska’s uni­cam­er­al leg­is­la­ture vot­ed on February 13, 2020 to advance a bill that would increase trans­paren­cy in the state’s exe­cu­tion process. 

Aug 18, 2020

Nebraska Legislature Passes, Governor Vetoes Execution Transparency Bill

Nebraska Governor Pete Ricketts has vetoed a bill that would have increased trans­paren­cy in the state’s exe­cu­tion process. 

Jul 28, 2020

Nebraska Pharmacy May Have Violated Drug Distribution Policies, State Refused Drug Give-Back Demands, Records Show

Nebraska may have exe­cut­ed Carey Dean Moore in August 2018 using drugs sup­plied by a phar­ma­cy in vio­la­tion of phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal man­u­fac­tur­ers’ dis­tri­b­u­tion poli­cies, Nebraska Department of Correctional Services (NDCS…

May 20, 2020

Nebraska Supreme Court Orders Release of Lethal-Injection Drug Records

In a major vic­to­ry for media out­lets and pris­on­er advo­cates, the Nebraska Supreme Court has ordered the state’s Department of Correctional Services (DCS) to release pub­lic records relat­ed to the pro­cure­ment of drugs used in the 20…

Feb 11, 2022

Nevada Execution Personnel Back Out of Participation After Judge Inquires About Credentials

At least three Nevada exe­cu­tion per­son­nel backed out of par­tic­i­pat­ing in Zane Floyd’s (pic­tured, right) exe­cu­tion after a U.S. dis­trict judge asked about their edu­ca­tion and train­ing. The per­son­nel, includ­ing a doc­tor and two emer…

Jul 30, 2021

Nevada Press Association Sues State for Full Access to Witness Executions

The Nevada Press Association has filed a fed­er­al law­suit against Nevada state offi­cials and the Nevada Department of Corrections chal­leng­ing lim­i­ta­tions the state’s exe­cu­tion pro­to­col places on the media’s ability…

Aug 24, 2022

New DPIC Podcast: Former Governor Brad Henry and Former U.S. Magistrate Judge Andy Lester, co-Chairs of the Oklahoma Death Penalty Review Commission, Call for Halt to Executions

In the August 2022 Discussions With DPIC pod­cast, for­mer Oklahoma Governor Brad Henry and for­mer U.S. Magistrate Judge Andy Lester (pic­tured), two of the co-chairs of the bipar­ti­san Oklahoma Death Penalty…

Aug 25, 2021

NEW SCHOLARSHIP: Death is Indeed Different in U.S. Administrative Law — Condemned Prisoners Receive FEWER Procedural Protections

In the 1970s, the United States Supreme Court famous­ly declared that ​“death is dif­fer­ent” from all oth­er pun­ish­ments and, as such, required the pro­vi­sion of height­ened pro­ce­dur­al safe­guards to ensure that its appli­ca­tion was not cru­el or unusual. …

Feb 08, 2023

NEW VOICES: Tennessee Business Leader Underscores Problems with the Death Penalty

“Speaking as a busi­ness leader, a proud, life­time Tennessean and a human being, it’s time for the state to abol­ish cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment,” wrote Mac Bartine, CEO of Knoxville-based tech com­pa­ny Smartria, in an op-ed for Knox News. Bartine de…

Aug 01, 2019

Ohio Governor Says State Cannot Obtain Lethal-Injection Drugs, Reschedules Upcoming Execution

Ohio can­not obtain drugs to car­ry out exe­cu­tions with­out putting pub­lic health at risk, Governor Mike DeWine (pic­tured) announced on July 31, 2019. DeWine told reporters that phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal man­u­fac­tur­ers are unwill­ing to sell the state drugs for e…

Feb 10, 2022

Oklahoma is Paying Execution Doctor $15,000 Plus Training Fees for Each Execution

Oklahoma is pay­ing $15,000 per exe­cu­tion, plus $1,000 for each day of train­ing, to an unnamed doc­tor to par­tic­i­pate in the process of putting state pris­on­ers to death. Under the agree­ment, the doc­tor stood to receive an estimated …

Mar 02, 2020

Oklahoma Prisoners Challenge New Execution Protocol in Federal Court

Less than two weeks after Oklahoma offi­cials announced that the state would return to the same con­tro­ver­sial three-drug exe­cu­tion pro­to­col impli­cat­ed in a series of botched exe­cu­tions in 2014 and 2015, the state’s death-row prison…

Aug 04, 2016

Pharmaceutical Companies Reiterate Opposition to Participating in Executions as States Scramble for Execution Drugs

Distribution restric­tions put in place by major phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies in the United States against mis­use of their med­i­cines and export reg­u­la­tions insti­tut­ed by the European Union have made it increas­ing­ly dif­fi­cult for states to obtain suppli…

Jan 08, 2021

ProPublica Investigation Reveals Irregularities in Federal Executions

The fed­er­al government’s his­tor­i­cal­ly aber­rant exe­cu­tion spree has been fraught with irreg­u­lar­i­ties and ​“has tram­pled over an array of bar­ri­ers, both legal and prac­ti­cal,” accord­ing to an inves­tiga­tive report by the non-prof­it news organization, 

Jan 04, 2023

Report: Tennessee Repeatedly Violated Execution Protocol Since 2018

An inde­pen­dent inves­ti­ga­tion into Tennessee’s exe­cu­tion prac­tices has found that the state repeat­ed­ly failed to fol­low its own pro­to­cols in per­form­ing sev­en exe­cu­tions and prepar­ing for an eighth between 2018 and 2022. Gov…

May 03, 2023

RESOURCES: Newspaper Series Explores Arizona’s Recent Death Penalty History

In a detailed five-part series titled ​“Poorly exe­cut­ed: How Arizona has failed at car­ry­ing out the death penal­ty,” the …

Nov 28, 2017

Senior U.N. Official Assails Death-Penalty Secrecy As Obstruction of Human Rights

A senior United Nations human rights offi­cial has crit­i­cized the secre­cy with which coun­tries car­ry out the death penal­ty and called for greater trans­paren­cy by coun­tries that still employ cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. ​“There is far too much secrecy,” 

Apr 28, 2023

South Carolina Advances Legislation to Keep Execution Details Secret

Bills to hide the iden­ti­ties of lethal-injec­tion drug sup­pli­ers and exe­cu­tion team mem­bers from the pub­lic have passed both cham­bers of the South Carolina leg­is­la­ture. The bills face a rec­on­cil­i­a­tion process before one can move to the governor’s d…

Dec 08, 2021

South Carolina Execution Practices are Shrouded in Secrecy

As South Carolina pre­pares pro­ce­dures for car­ry­ing out exe­cu­tions via fir­ing squad, an inves­ti­ga­tion by Columbia’s dai­ly news­pa­per, The State, reports that impor­tant infor­ma­tion about the exe­cu­tion process and the sources of mate­ri­als to …

Nov 22, 2017

South Carolina Seeks Drug-Secrecy Law to Carry Out Execution that was Never Going to Happen

Claiming that a lack of lethal-injec­tion drugs was pre­vent­ing the state from exe­cut­ing Bobby Wayne Stone (pic­tured, right) on December 1, South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster (pic­tured, left) urged state legisla…

Nov 20, 2020

South Carolina Seeks to Execute Richard Moore December 4, But Won’t Say How

South Carolina has issued a death war­rant to exe­cute Richard Moore (pic­tured) on December 4, 2020, but, his lawyers say, the state has refused to tell him how it intends to car­ry it out. In a motion to st…

Jun 25, 2019

Supreme Court Orders Alabama to Unseal Execution Documents

The U.S. Supreme Court has ordered the unseal­ing of court doc­u­ments relat­ed to Alabama’s May 30, 2019 exe­cu­tion of 

Jun 23, 2022

Tennessee Executions Could Be on Hold for Years Following Independent Investigation, Anticipated Court Challenges

Tennessee exe­cu­tions could be on hold for years, as the state con­ducts an inde­pen­dent inves­ti­ga­tion into wide­spread non-com­pli­ance with its exe­cu­tion pro­to­col and lit­i­gates the con­sti­tu­tion­al­i­ty of revi­sions expect­ed to be made to…

May 03, 2022

Tennessee Governor Halts Executions Scheduled for 2022 to Conduct Review of Execution Protocol ​‘Oversight’

Tennessee Governor Bill Lee (pic­tured) has paused all exe­cu­tions sched­uled for 2022 and called for an ​“inde­pen­dent review” of the state’s exe­cu­tion pro­to­col to address a ​“tech­ni­cal over­sight” that…

Jan 05, 2023

Texas Appeals Court Denies Death-Row Prisoners Stays of Execution, Judicial Review of State’s Use of Expired Drugs in Upcoming Executions

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCCA) has grant­ed an appli­ca­tion by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to block a state tri­al court from review­ing a civ­il law­suit filed by three death-row pris­on­ers who chal…

Jun 30, 2021

Texas Executes John Hummel, Former Marine with Service-Related Trauma Whose Trial Lawyer Now Works for Prosecutor Who is Trying to Execute Him

Texas exe­cut­ed John Hummel on June 30, 2021, an hon­or­ably dis­charged for­mer Marine with ser­vice-relat­ed trau­ma whose tri­al lawyer now works for the pros­e­cu­tor who was try­ing to exe­cute him. Hummel had com…

Mar 11, 2019

Two Legislatures, Two Divergent Approaches to Execution Transparency

After con­tro­ver­sial exe­cu­tions raised ques­tions of gov­ern­ment com­pe­tence or mis­con­duct, leg­is­la­tures in two states have respond­ed with bills tak­ing sharply dif­fer­ent approach­es to the ques­tions of gov­ern­ment account­abil­i­ty and pub­lic oversight. 

Feb 01, 2021

Under Court Order Requiring Protective Measures, Federal Bureau of Prisons Takes No Action After Media Witnesses to Executions Contract COVID-19

Despite being under fed­er­al court order to under­take pro­tec­tive mea­sures against the spread of COVID-19, the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) took no action after being alert­ed that two reporters who had been media wit­ness­es to the…

Apr 19, 2019

Veil of Execution Secrecy Expands in Several Southern Death-Penalty States

Three south­ern states have tak­en action to lim­it the public’s access to infor­ma­tion relat­ing to exe­cu­tions by increas­ing secre­cy sur­round­ing lethal-injec­tion drug sup­pli­ers. On April 12, 2019, the Texas Supreme Court reversed an e…

Mar 20, 2017

Virginia Increases Execution Secrecy After Difficulty Setting IV in Last Execution

After prison per­son­nel took more than a half hour to set the IV line dur­ing Virginia’s January 18 exe­cu­tion of Ricky Gray, the Commonwealth’s Department of Corrections has changed its exe­cu­tion pro­ce­dures to condu…

May 30, 2018

With Drugs Expiring and Lawsuits Pending, Nebraska Prosecutors Seek to Expedite Execution

Facing an August 2018 expi­ra­tion date for two of the drugs in Nebraska’s exper­i­men­tal exe­cu­tion pro­to­col, state Attorney General Douglas Peterson (pic­tured) has asked the Nebraska Supreme Court to expe­dite conside…

Jan 07, 2022

“Random and Unjust,” ​“Barbaric” and ​“Ineffective”: Editorials Call for End to Death Penalty

As 2021 came to a close, edi­to­r­i­al writ­ers in four death penal­ty states called for leg­isla­tive and exec­u­tive action to end cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment or fur­ther lim­it its use. Editorial boards for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch