Two-and-a-half years ago, Kevin Cooper’s lawyer, Norman Hile, submitted to Governor Jerry Brown a 235-page clemency petition, pleading for advanced DNA testing of evidence from
In terms of the criminal justice system, it can be argued that the most important locally elected official is the district attorney. So, in last
Next Tuesday, 34-year-old Christopher Young is scheduled to be executed in Texas for the 2004 murder of a 55-year-old convenience store owner. Exactly three months
Last Friday, Japan executed doomsday cult leader Shoko Asahara and his six followers, who had been sentenced to death for the sarin gas attack on
Scott Dozier In Alabama, AL.com reports that eight death row prisoners are dropping their lawsuit challenging the state’s three-drug lethal injection method because they have decided
In a New York Times op-ed, “What Happens When Prosecutors Break the Law?” defense attorney Nina Morrison focuses on the case of Suffolk County, New
An American pharmaceutical company filed a lawsuit blocking Nevada’s scheduled execution of Scott Dozier on Wednesday. New Jersey-based Alvogen said the state had “illegitimately acquired”
The son of the man whose life Christopher Young took 14 years ago has released a powerful video asking the State of Texas not to
In Louisiana in 1974, at the age of 16, Gary Tyler was sentenced to die for a crime he did not commit. He was arrested
When Pope Francis declared last week that “the death penalty is inadmissible,” because it is “an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person,” and vowed that the church will work for its “abolition worldwide,” he made it impossible from this point forward for Catholic supporters of this barbaric punishment to stake their position on the moral high ground of the Church. His statement is now official doctrine and
Saying there were “fundamental flaws” in his sentencing, Ohio Gov. John Kasich commuted Raymond Tibbetts’ death sentence to life without parole late last month. The governor was referring to the fact that jurors never heard about Tibbetts’ horrific childhood during his trial for the 1997 murders of his 42-year-old wife, Judith Crawford, and landlord, 67-year-old Fred Hicks. Tibbetts was sentenced to death for the murder of Hicks, and life without
In St. Louis, six civil rights organizations filed an amicii brief with the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals last week on behalf of Charles Rhines arguing that the homophobia openly displayed by his South Dakota jury in 1993 was proof that he was sentenced to death because he is gay. Courthouse News reports that organizations including the ACLU, Lambda Legal, GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders and the National Center for
In his book, Making Habeas Work: A Legal History, Eric Freedman analyzes how essential the writ of habeas corpus is to a free society, going back to this country’s earliest cases, “and explores the lessons this history holds for some of today’s most pressing problems including terrorism, the Guantanamo Bay detentions, immigration, Brexit, and domestic violence.” In the Texas Tribune, Jolie McCullough examines the Texas clemency process in the wake of last
On Sunday, September 23, in Los Angeles, Death Penalty Focus will honor the Reverend James Lawson, a civil rights icon whom Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., called “The leading theorist and strategist of nonviolence in the world.” DFP will present Rev. Lawson with its Lifetime Achievement Award for his lifelong dedication to civil rights, criminal and social justice, and the abolition of the death penalty. Rev. Lawson helped coordinate the Freedom
From the team behind the award-winning One For Ten comes a feature documentary to lift the lid on the human cost of the death penalty in the United States. One of America’s most divisive issue – capital punishment – is running into some trouble. With drug supplies for lethal injections drying up and public support at an all-time-low, the struggle to keep executing is taking its toll. The Penalty follows
Pope Francis today, in what could be a decisive turning point for the future of the death penalty in not just the United States, but in many of the 53 countries where it is still in place, declared that it is “inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person” and said the church will work for its “abolition worldwide.” The Pope’s statement is now
Britain Home Secretary Sajid Javid is being accused of taking “the power of life and death into his own hands” over his plan, made in secret, to allow the United States to bring to trial and potentially sentence to death two terrorism suspects who were British citizens. The Guardian reports that Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh are Islamic State members who authorities believe committed war crimes of kidnap and torture,