Publications & Testimony

In the March 2026 episode of 12:01: The Death Penalty in Context, DPI Managing Director Anne Holsinger speaks with Elizabeth Vartkessian (pic­tured), the exec­u­tive direc­tor of Advancing Real Change (ARC), a nation­al non-prof­it that works to pro­vide mit­i­ga­tion inves­ti­ga­tion ser­vices and train­ing that ensure the full life his­to­ries of indi­vid­u­als fac­ing extreme sen­tences are pre­sent­ed to judges and juries. Ms. Vartkessian is a mit­i­ga­tion spe­cial­ist who has spent…

On March 5, 2026, Hamilton County Common Pleas Judge Christopher McDowell​“for­mal­ly vin­di­cat­ed” death-sen­­tenced exoneree Derrick Jamison, allow­ing him to seek mon­e­tary com­pen­sa­tion from the state for his wrong­ful incar­cer­a­tion 21 years after pros­e­cu­tors dropped charges. Mr. Jamison, who was sched­uled for exe­cu­tion six times while impris­oned, filed a law­suit seek­ing a for­mal dec­la­ra­tion of wrong­ful impris­on­ment in 2024. With this for­mal dec­la­ra­tion, he can…

On March 2, 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review Alabama’s appeal of a rul­ing by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit that reversed and remand­ed Michael Sockwell’s case on the grounds that the tri­al pros­e­cu­tor vio­lat­ed his con­sti­tu­tion­al rights by inten­tion­al­ly remov­ing Black jurors. The Court’s denial of review clears a path for Mr. Sockwell to receive a new tri­al, some 36 years after a judge first sen­tenced him to death. A November 2025 federal…

A March 9, 2026, com­pe­ten­cy hear­ing for Andre Thomas, a death-sen­­tenced pris­on­er in Texas, has been post­poned to an unspec­i­fied date because of con­cerns that Mr. Thomas is too men­tal­ly ill to be trans­port­ed to his com­pe­ten­cy hear­ing and he could not be re-exam­­ined by the State’s expert. Mr. Thomas was sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed in April 2023; how­ev­er, his exe­cu­tion date was with­drawn in March 2023, cit­ing con­cerns with his severe men­tal ill­ness (SMI) and…

On February 18, 2026, a three-judge pan­el of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit heard oral argu­ments in a case seek­ing to open exe­cu­tions in Indiana to press wit­ness­es. The First Amendment chal­lenge to Indiana’s absolute ban was ini­ti­at­ed a year ago by a broad coali­tion of media out­lets seek­ing, at that time, to wit­ness the exe­cu­tion of Benjamin Ritchie. The coali­tion was unsuc­cess­ful in that endeav­or; Mr. Ritchie’s May 20, 2025, exe­cu­tion would be later…

DPI’s​“What to Know” series exam­ines cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment from mul­ti­ple angles, one top­ic at a time. Each install­ment pro­vides essen­tial facts and data on spe­cif­ic aspects of the death penal­ty. Why it mat­ters: Deterrence is among the most com­mon­ly cit­ed jus­ti­fi­ca­tions for the death penal­ty, yet decades of research have failed to pro­duce cred­i­ble evi­dence that use of the death penal­ty has an impact on homi­cide rates. ### Key Facts: — 88% of the nation’s…

UPDATE: On March 10, 2026, two days ahead of his sched­uled exe­cu­tion, Governor Kay Ivey grant­ed clemen­cy for Charles​“Sonny” Burton, com­mut­ing his death sen­tence to a sen­tence of life with­out parole. In a state­ment, Gov. Ivey said,​“I can­not pro­ceed in good con­science with the exe­cu­tion of Mr. Burton under such dis­parate cir­cum­stances. I believe it would be unjust for one par­tic­i­pant in this crime to be exe­cut­ed while the par­tic­i­pant who pulled the trigger…