News & Developments
Race
Sep 03, 2021
‘Martinsville 7’ Granted Posthumous Pardons 70 Years After Their Executions
Virginia Governor Ralph Northam has posthumously pardoned seven young Black men who were sentenced to death by all-white juries and executed in Virginia seven decades ago on charges of raping a white woman. Follow…
Innocence
Sep 02, 2021
Oklahoma Attorney General Requests Seven Execution Dates Despite Pending Trial on Constitutionality of Lethal-Injection Protocol
Despite the pendency of a trial on the constitutionality of the state’s lethal-injection protocol, newly appointed Oklahoma Attorney General John O’Connor has asked the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals to set execution dates for…
Innocence
Sep 01, 2021
Massachusetts 8th Graders Push to Exonerate Woman Sentenced to Death in 1683 in Salem Witchcraft Hysteria
A group of 8th graders from North Andover Middle School in North Andover, Massachusetts are championing efforts to posth…
Sep 01, 2021
NAACP Legal Defense Fund: U.S. Death Row Falls to Lowest Level in Nearly Three Decades
The number of people on death row or facing possible capital resentencing in the United States has fallen to its lowest level in nearly three decades, according to a DPIC analysis of the latest death-row data compiled by the NAACP Legal De…
Deterrence
Aug 31, 2021
New Podcast: Rethinking Public Safety, A Conversation with Executive Director of Fair and Just Prosecution, Miriam Krinsky
In the third episode of the Discussions with DPIC podcast’s Rethinking Public Safety series, Miriam Krinsky (pictured) speaks with DPIC Senior Director of Research and Special Projects Ngozi Ndul…
Innocence
Aug 30, 2021
Jurors who Voted to Convict Toforest Johnson Now Support New Trial
Three members of the jury who voted to convict and sentence Toforest Johnson (pictured, center) to death in his capital trial in Birmingham in 1998 are now urging Alabama’s courts to grant him a n…
Mental Illness
Aug 27, 2021
California Supreme Court Overturns Conviction of Defendant who Represented Himself After Expert Deemed Him Incompetent to Stand Trial
The California Supreme Court has reversed the conviction of a death-row prisoner who was permitted to waive counsel and represent himself despite a mental health expert’s finding that he was too mentally ill even to stand trial.
Mental Illness
Aug 26, 2021
Federal Appeals Court Upholds Convictions and Death Sentences for Dylann Roof
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit has affirmed Dylann Roof’s federal-court convictions and death sentences for the racially motivated murders of nine parishioners in an historic Charleston, South Carolina
Arbitrariness
Aug 25, 2021
NEW SCHOLARSHIP: Death is Indeed Different in U.S. Administrative Law — Condemned Prisoners Receive FEWER Procedural Protections
In the 1970s, the United States Supreme Court famously declared that “death is different” from all other punishments and, as such, required the provision of heightened procedural safeguards to ensure that its application was not cruel or unusual. …
International
Aug 24, 2021
Malawi Supreme Court Retreats from Opinion that Declared the Death Penalty Unconstitutional
In a confusing about-face that has angered human rights activists, the Malawian Supreme Court of Appeal has retreated from a prior decision of the court that had appeared to have abolished the African nation’s death penalty. On Au…