How we Decrease Death Row & Abolish the Death Penalty: A Conversation with the California Committee on Revision of the Penal Code Watch the recap
Watch a recap of the first of our fall webinar series with “Women on Death Row,” moderated by Diann Rust-Tierney, Executive Director of the National Coalition To Abolish the Death Penalty, in conversation with two women who wrongfully spent time on death row.
“Ten years seem so long, but when I think about the shooting, about losing Laura, it seems both like it happened yesterday and a million
In his op-ed, “Oklahoma’s rush to execute harms culture of life,” in the Oklahoman, Oklahoma City Archbishop Paul S. Coakley writes that a court case pending in
In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law last week a bill that expands another criminal justice reform bill that became law two years ago.
When the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board voted 3-2 against clemency for John Grant last week, it cleared the way for the state to resume
The Oregon Supreme Court issued a ruling last week which will likely overturn the death sentences of all 23 prisoners on death row. In State v.
“The circumstances that lead women to commit violent crimes are often complicated by a history of sexual and/or physical trauma….We know, for instance, that almost
In her Nevada Independent op-ed, “Nevada is preparing to execute a man with significant organic brain damage,” Dr. Natalie Novick Brown, a licensed clinical psychologist who evaluated
Right up to and including the commutation of his death sentence, the state of Oklahoma acted with deliberate malice and cruelty to Julius Jones. Yes, his sentence was commuted, but only hours before he was scheduled to be killed by the same lethal injection method that caused John Grant to vomit and convulse violently during his execution just three weeks earlier. And his sentence was commuted to life without the
When the California Committee on Revision of the Penal Code released a draft report in May, recommending that California abolish its death penalty, it highlighted just how broken California’s death penalty system is. Late last month, the committee released its final report, reiterating that recommendation, specifying what can and should be done until it’s abolished. The only way to repeal the death penalty in California is by initiative, and until
A year ago, wrongful convictions and the death penalty were not something that crossed my mind very often. As a Japanese major, I generally stay in the same academic “bubble” of Japa-nese courses, venturing out only to learn the very basics of other academia through GE courses. Some of the classes I have taken have made a lasting impact on me as a student; but most of these classes come
“I want to share with you my absolute conviction that the death penalty must disappear from the entire world as it is a shame for humanity. The death penalty does not protect society; it dishonors it,” said Robert Badinter, the French justice minister who led the successful effort to abolish capital punishment in France 40 years ago, at an event marking the anniversary last month. In the U.S., where there
In Japan, death row prisoners wake up every day wondering if it will be their last. Execution dates are not set in Japan so the prisoners don’t know when they will be executed until right before they are hanged (the only method Japan uses).
In its analysis of the President Biden-appointed US Supreme Court Reform Commission’s draft recommendations, Balls and Strikes says the “commission gave the death penalty a pass.” Lisa Needham writes that “The notion that the Court might be the final link in a chain of decisions that results in an innocent person’s death does not seem to cause much consternation for the commission.” She argues that “a series of both-sides takes
You are going to want to meet Mamie Lang Kirkland.
The state of Alabama executed Willie B. Smith last month without bothering to dispute the fact that he was intellectually disabled.
Updates from Mississippi, Tennessee, Florida, and Utah.