Five states, Alabama, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Florida, and Texas, have carried out five executions so far this year, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
Earlier this month, a Johnston County judge in North Carolina found that race played a significant role in the death penalty trial of Hasson Bacote,
Last year, “California experienced the largest death-row population decline of any U.S. death penalty jurisdiction. Sixty-six people came off of the state’s death row, one
This year’s Capital Case Defense Seminar, scheduled for February 14-17 in Monterey, will feature a “Fireside Chat with California Supreme Court Justice Goodwin Liu.” Liu
In his YouTube talk, “The death penalty is dying,” Robert D. Bacon, a California defense attorney who has represented death-sentenced individuals for 34 years, maintains
Indiana executed Joseph Corcoran last month, the state’s first execution in 15 years. A lethal injection of pentobarbital killed the 49-year-old Corcoran, the first time
In his article, “The Supreme Court and Intellectual Disability – Yet Again,” in Santa Barbara Lawyer Magazine,” criminal law specialist (and DPF board member) Robert
“Even as use of the death penalty remains historically low in Texas, it continues to be imposed disproportionately on people of color and dependent largely
In 2024, for the tenth year in a row, fewer than 30 people were executed (25), and fewer than 50 people were sentenced to death
In California, Riverside County District Attorney Mike Hestrin announced late last month that he will seek the death penalty for 43-year-old Jesse Ceazar Navarro, accused of killing a Riverside County Deputy Sheriff in January. CBS Los Angeles reported. Navarro is charged with one count of murder for killing 30-year-old Deputy Darnell Calhoun after he responded to a report of a domestic disturbance in Lake Elsinore on January 13. He’s facing
Oklahoma Rep. Kevin McDugle, leader of the effort to free Richard Glossip, alleged last week that the District Attorney’s Council and Pardon and Parole Board decided to deny Glossip’s clemency application before his April 26 hearing had even been held. In an interview with Fox 25, McDugle said that one of the DAs admitted there had been prior communication after the rest of the Council and Pardon and Parole Board
Patrick Crusius, who pleaded guilty in February to killing 23 people and injuring 22 others at an El Paso Walmart store, was sentenced early this month to 90 consecutive life terms, the U.S. Department of Justice reported. Crusius was charged with 90 federal counts, including 45 hate crimes, in a shooting rampage in August 2019. According to the grand jury indictment, two months before the attack, he bought an assault
“If you take away the arguments about cost, deterrence, and closure, what’s left other than a call for vengeance?” the Idaho Statesman asks in an editorial debunking common — erroneous —arguments conservatives use to justify their support for state killing. The paper points to Idaho’s plan to spend $750,000 to build a facility for firing squads to kill people in the wake of a new state law authorizing that method
The State of Alabama killed James Barber last Friday, its first execution since Gov. Kay Ivey called for a temporary halt in November after the state had botched three executions in a row. All three resulted from corrections officials’ inability to insert IV lines for the lethal drugs. On July 28, the execution team tried for three hours to insert IV lines into Joe Nathan James, Jr., and an independent
Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to vacate Richard Glossip’s 1997 capital murder conviction and return his case to a district court. In May, the U.S. Supreme Court granted a stay of execution for Glossip two weeks before he was scheduled to be killed. In a news release, Drummond said he filed a brief in support of Glossip’s petition for a writ of certiorari on
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals denied Rodney Reed’s petition for a new trial in the murder conviction that sent him to death row 25 years ago. The ruling surprised many as it came four years after the high court issued a stay of execution for Reed five days before he was scheduled to be killed. In the 7-1 decision, the TCCA found that “Reed has failed to make an
In Oklahoma, Anthony Sanchez, on death row for 27 years, told CBS News in a telephone interview that he will reject his opportunity for a clemency hearing because of the unlikelihood it would be granted. CBS said Sanchez, now 44, pointed to the recent cases of Bigler Stouffer and James Coddington, both of whom received clemency recommendations from the Pardon and Parole Board only to have Gov. Kevin Stitt reject
Not even pleas from the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops were enough to persuade Gov. Ron DeSantis to commute Duane Owen’s death sentence and spare his life. Continuing his zeal for state killing, DeSantis gave the go-ahead for Owen to be executed on June 15, despite credible evidence that Owen was not mentally competent. “Tonight’s execution was the fourth in an execution spree fueled solely by political ambition. Tonight we