Crossing the River Styx: The Memoir of a Death Row Chaplain
March 21, 2023
“I was haunted by Russ before I even knew him. I tried to wrap my mind around what it was like to sit across from
“I was haunted by Russ before I even knew him. I tried to wrap my mind around what it was like to sit across from
In Texas, corrections officials executed two men this month, Gary Green and Arthur Brown, Jr. Texas has killed five men this year. With last week’s
A state district judge withdrew the April 5 execution warrant for Andre Thomas earlier this month to give Thomas’s lawyers time to prepare for a
Declaring that he wants to “literally transform this place,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced last week that San Quentin State Prison will convert from a
Bucking a trend of decreasing support for the death penalty in the United States, Republican-dominated legislatures in South Carolina and Florida are attempting to expand
Three months after a series of botched executions caused Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey to call for a pause in state killing to allow time for
Florida corrections officials killed Donald Dillbeck last Thursday. They did so despite the extensive evidence of his horrific sexual and physical abuse as a child,
Former Death Penalty Focus board member Donald Spoto died earlier this month. He was 81. His death from a brain hemorrhage was announced by his
“Justice Department standards on federal death penalty called confusing,” was the headline in a recent Washington Post article. The paper interviewed federal defense lawyers and
In California, three death sentences were overturned by state and federal courts in the past few weeks, the Death Penalty Information Center reports. “Richard Clark, Michael Bramit, and Andrew Lancaster were granted relief on claims related to defense counsel’s inadequate performance or jury-related issues,” according to DPIC. Clark (sentenced in 1987 in Santa Clara) and Bramit (sentenced in 1997 in Riverside) were granted new penalty phase trials, and a Los
In her New York Times piece, “After Parkland, One Question Remains: What Is Justice?”, Audra D. S. Burch writes about Tom and Gena Hoyer, whose son was killed in a mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida in 2018. Fifteen-year-old Luke Hoyer was one of 17 students and teachers killed in the shooting, which also injured 17 others. A penalty trial is now underway for the
“It was so frustrating to see these horrible, untrue claims go unconfronted. I felt I could go after them and call them out for what they are — absurd.” Dr. Philip Hansten is explaining what inspired him to write his new book, Death Penalty Bullshit: Fifteen Absurd Claims of Death Penalty Supporters, and why he gave it what some might consider a controversial title. “It’s an accurate description. We have
Amnesty International called on President Biden to make good on his 2020 campaign promise and abolish the federal death penalty, and commute the sentences of the 44 men on federal death row. The 114-page report, “The Power of Example: Whither the Biden Death Penalty Promise?”, was released late last month to coincide with the 50th anniversary of Furman v. Georgia, the U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down the death
The Death Penalty Information Center marked the 50th anniversary of Furman v. Georgia by releasing a census of death sentences handed down from June 29, 1972 — the day the U.S. Supreme Court abolished the death penalty in Furman — through January 1, 2021, and the status of each sentence. “The data provide powerful evidence that the nation’s use of capital punishment continues to be arbitrary, discriminatory, and rife with
In our June Focus newsletter, we covered how Oklahoma’s attorney general has asked for execution dates for 25 men who have exhausted their appeals, but have valid innocence claims still unresolved. The most well-known among these men is Richard Glossip, who was sentenced to death in 1997, convicted of engineering the murder of Barry Van Treese, the owner of a motel where Glossip worked. The actual killer, Justin Sneed, serving
(Updated July 4, 2022) On Friday, the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals scheduled execution dates for 25 men on death row, including individuals with claims of innocence, severe mental illness, and intellectual disability. The CCA set the dates in response to a request by Oklahoma Attorney General John O’Connor, who said he was acting “for the sake of the victims’ families, many of whom have waited for decades.” Despite troubling
Fifty years ago this week, the United States took a historic step toward a more fair, humane, less racist criminal justice system. On June 29, 1972, the Supreme Court ruled, in Furman v. Georgia, that the death penalty constituted cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. The decision halted executions nationally, and more than 630 people sentenced to death in the U.S. were resentenced to life in prison.
The Oklahoma City law firm that conducted a pro bono independent investigation into the case of Richard Glossip, the second in line of the 25 men Oklahoma Attorney General John O’Connor is seeking to execute beginning in August, released its findings earlier this month. Its statement was unequivocal. “Considering the facts we uncovered, and that there exists no physical forensic evidence or credible corroborating testimony linking Glossip to the crime,
