In Nevada, 48-year-old Scott Dozier apparently died by suicide on death row at Ely State Prison last Friday. The Huffington Post reports that Dozier apparently died by
In his New Republic article, “Why Aren’t Democratic Governors Pardoning More Prisoners?”, Matt Ford looks at how few Democratic governors pardon or commute the sentences of prisoners,
(Editor’s Note: The front page of this newsletter spells Joe Giarattano’s name incorrectly in the headline. We would correct it, but the computer program we use won’t
Six former governors called on California Gov. Jerry Brown this week to grant clemency to the 740 men and women on death row, stating that
The California Supreme Court last week unanimously reversed the death sentence for Dora Buenrostro, who was convicted of killing her three children, Susana, Vicente, and
“New death sentences and executions remained near historic lows in 2018 and a twentieth state [Washington] abolished capital punishment, as public opinion polls, election results,
The Texas Department of Criminal Justice obtains its lethal injection drugs “from a pharmacy that regulators have repeatedly cited for dangerous practices,” according to a
“Until I can be sure that everyone sentenced to death in Illinois is truly guilty, until I can be sure with moral certainty that no
In her article, “This Is What Wrongful Conviction Does to a Family,” in Politico, Lara Bazelon looks at the arrest of two men for the 1982
Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case of Shinn v. Ramirez. It’s a complicated case, involving two respondents, David Ramirez and Barry Jones, who were convicted of separate murders, Ramirez in 1990, and Jones in 1995; a Supreme Court ruling in Martinez v. Ryan (2012), and the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA) passed by Congress in 1996. Both Ramirez and Jones were sentenced
On Wednesday, December 8, 2021, we will presented “The Death Penalty Brutalizes Us All,” the fourth in our webinar series. Mike Farrell, DPF board president, moderated an in-depth conversation with three people who know first-hand how the brutality of the death penalty reverberates beyond the men and women who have been sentenced to death to their families and loved ones, to their spiritual advisors, and legal teams.
In his op-ed, “California halted executions, now it should abolish the death penalty,” in the Los Angeles Times, Scott Martelle says the moratorium on executions instituted by Gov. Gavin Newsom “is not a solution” to the state’s many problems with its death penalty system. He maintains it’s time for the governor and legislative leaders to put an abolition initiative on the ballot in 2024, and “Newsom should use his political
In Mississippi, David Cox died by lethal injection late last month in the state’s first execution since 2012. Cox, who had asked the court to dismiss all appeals, was convicted in 2010 of killing his estranged wife. WLOX reported that among his last words were a message to his children that “I love them very much and that I was a good man at one time.” In Idaho, Gerald Ross
Doyle Lee Hamm, who survived a horrifically botched execution in Alabama’s Holman Correctional Facility in 2018, died late last month in prison. The cause was complications from lymphoma and cranial cancer. He was 64. AL.com reported that Hamm was buried last Friday in Cherokee, Alabama. His longtime attorney, Bernard Harcourt, who was at the gravesite, said in a statement that “It was a simple country service with about 35 persons
Pervis Payne, who has been on Tennessee’s death row for 34 years, and has always maintained his innocence, will be resentenced to life in prison because of his intellectual disability. A county criminal court judge vacated Payne’s sentence late last month after the Shelby County district attorney withdrew her request for a hearing on the issue of intellectual disability. She acted after a state expert testified that an examination of
Oklahoma executed Bigler Stouffer II on Thursday. He was 79, the second-oldest prisoner to be killed in the U.S. since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, and the oldest in Oklahoma history, according to The Oklahoman. He was put to death by lethal injection for the fatal shooting of elementary school teacher Linda Reaves in 1985. It was Oklahoma’s second execution this year. John Grant was killed on October
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
