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2148 Document(s) 1106 Member(s) 583 Article(s) 12 Page(s)

Document(s)

Towards an Islamic Critique of Capital Punishment

By Robert Postawko / Journal of Islamic and Near Eastern Law, on 1 January 2002


2002

Article

Iran (Islamic Republic of)


More details See the document

In general, Muslim nations recognize the validity of the death penalty, and many frequently impose it. According to Amnesty International, between 1985 and mid-1988, Saudi Arabia executed 140 prisoners for the crimes of murder, robbery with violence, drug smuggling or distribution, and adultery. During the same period, Pakistan executed 115, primarily for the crime of murder. Hundreds every year faced the firing squad in Iraq for murder, desertion, treason, sabotage, and economic corruption. At the same time, the Islamic Republic of Iran executed more than 743 inmates for murder, drug crimes, political offenses, prostitution, adultery and other “moral offenses,” including “being corrupt on earth” and “being at enmity with God.” In face of the widespread acceptance of the death penalty within the Muslim world, this essay explores the contours of an Islamic argument against capital punishment. The argument is not, and cannot be, an appeal for the abolition of the death penalty in all circumstances. It does call into question, however, the legitimacy – indeed, the legality in accordance with the principles of classical Islamic law, or the Shari’ah – of capital punishment as it is practiced in the era of Islamization.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list Iran (Islamic Republic of)
  • Themes list Religion , Capital offences, Most Serious Crimes,

Document(s)

Hindi : आठ मामले शीट (कवर चीन, भारत, इंडोनेशिया, जापान, मलेशिया, पाकिस्तान, सिंगापुर, ताइवान)

By Amnesty International / Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network, on 8 September 2020


2020

NGO report

enenenenenenzh-hant
More details See the document

इस रिपोर्ट संकलन में मामलों की संख्या की समीक्षा की गई है जो स्पष्ट रूप से मौत की सजा को लागू करने के बहुत असली खतरों का प्रदर्शन. आठ मामले शीट (कवर चीन, भारत, इंडोनेशिया, जापान, मलेशिया, पाकिस्तान, सिंगापुर, ताइवान)

Document(s)

Showing Remorse: Reflections on the Gap between Expression and Attribution in Cases of Wrongful Conviction

By Richard Weisman / Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice, on 1 January 2004


2004

Article

Canada


More details See the document

This paper seeks first to show that persons who are convicted of crimes can be perceived as either remorseful or as lacking in remorse. This division establishes a moral hierarchy that has profound implications for the characterization and disposition of persons who are so designated. Second, using both Canadian and American cases, it looks at how inclusion in the category of the unremorseful affects the characterization and disposition of those who have been wrongfully convicted. Finally, it suggests that remorse is a major site of conflict between persons who are wrongfully convicted and officials within the criminal justice system, conflict that involves the use of institutional pressure to encourage the expression of remorse, on the one hand, and the mobilization of individual resources to resist those expressions.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list Canada
  • Themes list Networks,

Document(s)

Executing The Innocent and Support for Capital Punishment: Implications for Public Policy

By Francis T. Cullen / James D. Unnver / Criminology and Public Policy, on 1 January 2005


2005

Article

United States


More details See the document

The issue of whether innocent people have been executed is now at the center of the debate concerning the legitimacy of capital punishment. The purpose of this research was to use data collected by the Gallup Organization in 2003 to investigate whether Americans who believed that an innocent person had been executed were less likely to support capital punishment. We also explored whether the association varied by race, given that African Americans are disproportionately affected by the death penalty. Our results indicated that three-quarters of Americans believed that an innocent person had been executed for a crime they did not commit within the last five years and that this belief was associated with lower levels of support for capital punishment, especially among those who thought this sanction was applied unfairly. In addition, our analyses revealed that believing an innocent person had been executed had a stronger association with altering African American than white support for the death penalty.A key claim of death penalty advocates is that a high proportion of the public supports capital punishment. In this context, scholars opposing this sanction have understood the importance of showing that the public’s support for executing offenders is contingent and shallower than portrayed by typical opinion polls. The current research joins this effort by arguing that the prospect of executing innocents potentially impacts public support for the death penalty and, in the least, creates ideological space for a reconsideration of the legitimacy of capital punishment.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Innocence,

Document(s)

Korean : 아시아에서의 치명적 불의 불공정 재판을 멈춰라, 사형집행을 중단하라.

By Amnesty International / Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network, on 8 September 2020


2020

NGO report

enenenenenenenenzh-hant
More details See the document

아시아∙태평양 지역에서는 세계 나머지 모든 곳을 다 합친 것보다 더 많은 사람이 사형을 당한다. 게다가 불공정한 재판을 받고 사형당할 가능성까지 감안하면 사형이 얼마나 부당한 제도인지 명백히 드러난다. 공정한 재판을 받지 못한 채 사형이 집행된 후에는 이를 되돌이킬 방법이 전혀 없다.

Document(s)

Thai : การประหารชีวิตที่อยุติธรรม ในภูมิภาคเอเชีย ยุติการพิจารณาคดีที่ไม่เป็นธรรม ยกเลิกการประหารชีวิต

By Amnesty International / Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network, on 8 September 2020


NGO report

enenenenenenenenzh-hant
More details See the document

Document(s)

Tagalog : NAKAMAMATAY NA KAWALAN NG KATARUNGAN SA ASYA Itigil ang Di Makatarungang paglilitis, Itigil ang Pagbitay

By Amnesty International / Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network, on 8 September 2020


NGO report

enenenenenenenenzh-hant
More details See the document

Mas maraming tao ang pinarusahan ng kamatayan sa Rehiyong Asya-Pasipikokung ikukumpara sa pinagsamang iba pang bahagi ng mundo. Idagdag pa rito ang probabilidad na sila ay binitay pagkatapos ng di-makatarungang paglilitis, at lalong lilinaw ang garapal na inhustisya ng parusang ito.

Document(s)

Equality of the Damned: The Execution of Women on the Cusp of the 21st Century

By Elizabeth Rapaport / Ohio Northern Law Review 26(3), 581-600, on 1 January 2000


2000

Article

United States


More details See the document

This article explores why women are rarely executed and examines the execution of four women in the Post-Furman Era, focusing on the execution of Karla Faye Tucker. The execution of Karla Faye Tucker in 1998, the second of the four women to be executed, occured in hte midst of relentless publicity. The Tucker execution revived interest in gender equity in the administration of capital punishment.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Women,

Document(s)

Finality Without Fairness: Why We Are Moving Towards Moratoria on Executions, and the potential Abolition of Capital Punishment

By Ronald J. Tabak / Connecticut Law Review, on 1 January 2001


2001

Article

United States


More details See the document

In the past several years, there has been a marked change in the climate with regard to public discourse about the death penalty in the United States. This is partly due to advances in DNA technology. This Article, in Part II, will address the impact that DNA testing has had on public discourse on capital punishment. In Part III, it will discuss the overall context in which public discourse has changed, and its likely impact on judges, prosecutors and governors dealing with capital cases. Finally, in Part IV, it will consider the broader implications of this change in climate, in leading to a moratorium on executions in Illinois, consideration of moratoria elsewhere, and potentially to abolition of capital punishment in this country.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Moratorium ,

Document(s)

Emerging Issues in Juvenile Death Penalty Law

By Victor L. Streib / Ohio Northern University Law Review, on 1 January 2000


2000

Article

United States


More details See the document

As our society’s enduring marriage to the death penalty prepares to enter yet another century, it is a marriage that places the children in danger. Why is it that we continue to impose the death penalty for crimes committed by juvenile offenders? As questionable as the death penalty is in general, might we not at least place an “adults only” label on it? The rest of the world has already done so. Only in America need children fear execution by their own government.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Juveniles,

Document(s)

The Politics of Fear and Death: Successive Problems in Capital Federal Habeas Corpus.”

By Bryan A. Stevenson / New York University (NYU), on 1 January 2002


2002

Article

United States


More details See the document

The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA) of 1996 was drafted, enacted, and signed in an atmosphere of anger and fear. The legislation, which includes substantial cutbacks in the federal habeas corpus remedy, was Congress’s response to the tragedy of the Oklahoma City bombing. During the congressional hearings on the bills that culminated in AEDPA, the proponents of the legislation claimed that its habeas corpus restrictions and other provisions were necessary to fight domestic terrorism. The Senate bill was approved by the House on April 18, 1996, the day before the one-year anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing. President Bill Clinton invoked the bombing in a statement he issued at the time of the Senate’s passage of the legislation and again when he signed the legislation into law. Even at the time of the debates, some courageous legislators were willing to denounce the fallacious connection that the bill’s proponents drew between the bombing and the broader issues of the scope and availability of habeas corpus review. Many of the habeas corpus restrictions ultimately built into AEDPA had been under consideration by Congress since 1990, though none had been adopted. The congressional proponents of these restrictions seized upon the Oklahoma City tragedy as a means of accomplishing their longstanding goal to scale back federal habeas corpus review.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Networks,

Document(s)

Commentary on Counsel’s Duty to Seek and Negotiate a Disposition in Capital cases (ABA Guideline 10.9.1)

By Russell Stetler / Hofstra Law Review, on 1 January 2003


2003

Article

United States


More details See the document

The ABA’s revised Guidelines have squarely addressed the importance of seeking and negotiating dispositions in capital cases as a core component of effective representation in matters of life and death. Pleas have been available in the overwhelming majority of capital cases in the post-Furman era, including the cases of hundreds of prisoners who have been executed. There are no precise empirical data on this question. Plea negotiations are typically confidential, with both parties maintaining a posture of plausible denial if negotiations fail. The prosecutor may find it harder to argue to jurors that justice in a particular case requires a sentence of death if they know that he had offered the defendant a life sentence only weeks before. Defense counsel may not want to advertise her willingness to plead to first-degree murder if the case proceeds to trial and she is arguing to the jurors that the proof supports only second-degree. In addition, there are cases where a plea was acceptable to both sides, but negotiation never began because each side waited for the other to initiate discussions.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Legal Representation,

Document(s)

The Effect of Race, Gender, and Location on Prosecutioral Decisions to Seek the Death Penalty in South Carolina

By Isaac Unah / Michael J. Songer / South Carolina Law Review, on 1 January 2006


2006

Article

United States


More details See the document

This Article analyzes the factors that influence the decisions of South Carolina prosecutors to seek the death penalty. Professor Unah and Mr. Songer employ statistical methods to examine the legal and nonlegal factors that shape this decision-making process. Controlling for political factors, this Article finds that the race of the victim, gender, and rural crime locations are significant considerations in the decision to seek the death penalty. Further, Professor Unah and Mr. Songer argue that these nonlegal factors undermine the legal guidelines that are intended to channel and steer the decision-making process. This Article highlights the arbitrary nature of the decisions that result from these considerations, and it concludes by challenging the legitimacy of a process influenced by these factors.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Networks,

Document(s)

Innocence, Error, and the ‘New Abolitionism’: A Commentary

By Sarat Austin / Criminology & Public Policy, on 1 January 2005


2005

Article

United States


More details See the document

If statistics are any indication, the system may well be allowing some innocent defendants to be executed.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Innocence,

Document(s)

Innocents Convicted: An Empirically Justified Factual Wrongful Conviction Rate

By D. Michael Risinger / Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, on 1 January 2007


2007

Article

United States


More details See the document

The news about the astounding accuracy of felony convictions in the United States, delivered by Justice Scalia and Joshua Marquis in the passage set out epigrammatically above, would be cause for rejoicing if it were true. Imagine. Only 27 factually wrong felony convictions out of every 100,000! Unfortunately, it is not true, as the empirical data analyzed in this article demonstrates. To a great extent, those who believe that our criminal justice system rarely convicts the factually innocent and those who believe such miscarriages are rife have generally talked past each other for want of any empirically-justified factual innocence wrongful conviction rate. This article remedies at least a part of this problem by establishing the first such empirically justified wrongful conviction rate ever for a significant universe of real world serious crimes: capital rape-murders in the 1980’s. Using DNA exonerations for capital rape-murders from 1982 through 1989 as a numerator, and a 406-member sample of the 2235 capital sentences imposed during this period, this article shows that 21.45%, or around 479 of those, were cases of capital rape murder. Data supplied by the Innocence Project of Cardozo Law School and newly developed for this article show that only 67% of those cases would be expected to yield usable DNA for analysis. Combining these figures and dividing the numerator by the resulting denominator, a minimum factually wrongful conviction rate for capital rape-murder in the 1980’s emerges: 3.3%. The article goes on to consider the likely ceiling accompanying this 3.3% floor, arriving at a slightly softer number for the maximum factual error rate of around 5%. The article then goes on to analyze the implications of a factual error rate of 3.3%-5% for both those who currently claim errors are extremely rare, and those who claim they are extremely common. Extension of the 3.3%-5% to other capital and non-capital categories of crime is discussed, and standards of moral duty to support system reform in the light of such error rates is considered at length.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Networks,

Document(s)

Staying Alive: Executive Clemency, Equal Protection, and the Politics of Gender in Women’s Capital Cases

By Elizabeth Rapaport / Buffalo Criminal Law Review, on 1 January 2001


2001

Article

United States


More details See the document

In this Article, I will review the matrix in which executive decisions in women’s capital clemency cases are made, a matrix supplied by modern equal protection law, the nature and scope of the clemency power, gender politics, and contemporary death row. I will then conduct two thought experiments. Each invented case tests the relevance of gender in legally and politically acceptable contemporary clemency decisions. The goal is to understand the politics and law of granting or denying that very rare boon-commutation of sentence – to a female death row prisoner. The exercise offers support for two conclusions. In the age of formal equality, women cannot be granted clemency simply because they are women. The rhetoric of chivalry is untenable for the contemporary executive. A governor who is courageous and rhetorically skillful, however, can sometimes successfully defend the commutation of the death sentence of a woman as a proper use of the power to grant mercy, done for her sake, the class she exemplifies, the conscience of the governor, and the public.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Women, Clemency,

Document(s)

Human Rights and Democracy: The 2010 Foreign & Commonwealth Office Report

By United Kingdom Foreign & Commonwealth Office, on 8 September 2020


2020

NGO report

Afghanistan


More details See the document

The report covers the period from January to December 2010, though some key events in early 2011 have also been included. It highlights the important progressbeing made, serious concerns that we have, and what we are doing to promote our values around the world. It will rightly be studied closely by Parliament, NGOs and the wider public. There is a chapter dedicated to the death penalty, as well as 2010 figures on the death penalty in target countries.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list Afghanistan
  • Themes list Networks,

Document(s)

South Korea’s changing capital punishment policy: The road from de facto to formal abolition

By Byung-Sun Cho / Punishment and Society, on 8 September 2020


Article

Republic of Korea


More details See the document

The most recent executions in South Korea took place in December 1997, when 23 people were executed at short notice on the same day. Similarly, nineteen executions occurred in 1995 and 15 in 1994, in each instance occurring all on the same day. These group executions seem to reflect cultural factors that monthly statistics alone do not capture. No executions have occurred since 1998, but this de facto suspension has not been reinforced by law. Since 1999, lawmakers have thrice endorsed a bill favoring life imprisonment without parole in place of the death penalty, but each time the proposal has stalled and failed to move forward. The need remains to develop a culturally appropriate pro-abolition argument that could persuade the Korean public that the death penalty is unworkable and wrong. On 21 January 2007, in the Inhyeokdang case, the Korean Court acquitted 8 persons who had been executed 32 years earlier. The hope is that, in light of strong arguments based on the risk to innocent persons and the irreversibility of capital punishment, Korea will effectively transition from de facto to formal abolition.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list Republic of Korea
  • Themes list Trend Towards Abolition,

Document(s)

Death Penalty in India: Annual Statistics Report 2020

By Project 39A, on 1 January 2020


2020

Academic report

India


More details See the document

The ‘Death Penalty in India: Annual Statistics’ attempts to create a comprehensive year-by-year documentation of movements in the death row population in India. The publication tracks important political and legal developments in the administration of the death penalty and the criminal justice system in the year 2020.

  • Document type Academic report
  • Countries list India
Coalition Congolaise Contre la Peine de Mort (CCPM)

Member(s)

Coalition Congolaise Contre la Peine de Mort (CCPM)

on 27 February 2023

In their desire to promote the abolition of the death penalty in the Republic of Congo, Congolese abolitionists have formed a coalition called the Coalition Congolaise Contre la Peine de Mort, Congolese Coalition Against the Death Penalty (CCCPM). This coalition was created on October 02, 2019 in Brazzaville. Its main objectives are the promotion of […]

2023

Congo

Document(s)

The Fear of Too Much Justice : Race, Poverty, and the Persistence of Inequality in the Criminal Courts

By Stephen B. Bright, James Kwak , on 21 April 2023


2023

Book

Fair Trial

United States


More details See the document

In The Fear of Too Much Justice, legendary death penalty lawyer Stephen B. Bright and legal scholar James Kwak offer a heart-wrenching overview of how the criminal legal system fails to live up to the values of equality and justice. The book ranges from poor people squeezed for cash by private probation companies because of trivial violations to people executed in violation of the Constitution despite overwhelming evidence of intellectual disability or mental illness. They also show examples from around the country of places that are making progress toward justice.

With a foreword by Bryan Stevenson, who worked for Bright at the Southern Center for Human Rights and credits him for “[breaking] down the issues with the death penalty simply but persuasively,” The Fear of Too Much Justice offers a timely, trenchant, firsthand critique of our criminal courts and points the way toward a more just future.

Available: June 2023

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Fair Trial

Member(s)

Coalition nigérienne contre la peine de mort

on 30 April 2020

2020

Niger

Member(s)

Bahrain Centre for Human Rights

on 30 April 2020

Bahrain

Ditshwanelo's logo

Member(s)

DITSHWANELO – The Botswana Centre for Human Rights

on 30 June 2023

DITSHWANELO – The Botswana Centre for Human Rights was established in 1993 and since then has remained the only organisation in Botswana dealing with varied aspects of human rights. We work to advocate for changes in laws, policies and practices, and to raise public awareness of rights and responsibilities.  We also provide paralegal services to […]

2023

Botswana

Member(s)

Society for Human Rights and Development Organisation (SHRDO)

on 30 April 2020

The Society for Human Rights and Development Organisation (SHRDO) – Formally MRU youth parliament – purpose is for peace &  development and its activities are base on Sub Regional Peace Consolidations, Peace Promotion & Peace Maintenance across Sierra Leone, Liberia, Guinea & Ivory Coast by the Youngsters/ Youth Leaders themselves that agitates for regional reintegration, […]

2020

Sierra Leone

Document(s)

Grief, Loss, and Treatment for Death Row Families

By Sandra Joy, on 5 December 2013


2013

Book

Murder Victims' Families


More details See the document

The families of death row inmates are rarely considered in public discourse regarding the death penalty. They have largely been forgotten, and their pain has not been acknowledged by the rest of society. These families experience a unique grief process as they are confronted with the loss of their loved one to death row and brace themselves for the possibility of an execution. Death row families are disenfranchised from their grief by the surrounding community, and their; mental health needs exacerbated as they struggle in isolation with the ambiguous loss that comes with the fear that the state will kill their loved one.

Grief, Loss, and Treatment for Death Row Families describes the grief that families experience from the time of their loved one’s arrest through his or her execution. In each chapter, Sandra Joy guides the reader through the grief process experienced by the families, offering clinical interventions that can be used by mental health professionals who are given the opportunity to work with these families at various stages of their grief. The author conducted over seventy qualitative interviews with family members from Delaware who either currently have a loved one on death row or have survived the execution of their loved one. Delaware was chosen because though it has a relatively small death row, it is ranked third in the nation with its rate of per capita executions. This book provides an in-depth awareness of the grieving process of death row families, as well as ways that professionals can intervene to assist them in healing. With increased awareness and effective clinical treatment, we can ensure that the families of death row inmates are forgotten no more.

  • Document type Book
  • Themes list Murder Victims' Families

Document(s)

Roper and Race: the Nature and Effects of Death Penalty Exclusions for Juveniles and the “Late Adolescent Class”

By Craig Haney, Frank R. Baumgartner and Karen Steele, on 20 October 2022


2022

Academic report

United States


More details See the document

In Roper v. Simmons (2005), the US Supreme Court raised the minimum age at which someone could be subjected to capital punishment, ruling that no one under the age of 18 at the time of their crime could be sentenced to death. The present article discusses the legal context and rationale by which the Court established the current age-based limit on death penalty eligibility as well as the scientific basis for a recent American Psychological Association Resolution that recommended extending that limit to include members of the “late adolescent class” (i.e., persons from 18 to 20 years old). In addition, we present new data that address the little-discussed but important racial/ethnic implications of these age-based limits to capital punishment, both for the already established Roper exclusion and the APA-proposed exclusion for the late adolescent class. In fact, a much higher percentage of persons in the late adolescent class who were sentenced to death in the post-Roper era were non-White, suggesting that their age-based exclusion would help to remedy this problematic pattern.

  • Document type Academic report
  • Countries list United States

Document(s)

The Innocents

By Taryn Simon, on 1 January 2002


2002

Working with...


More details See the document

The Innocents documents the stories of individuals who served time in prison for violent crimes they did not commit. At issue is the question of photography’s function as a credible eyewitness and arbiter of justice.

  • Document type Working with...
  • Themes list Innocence,

Document(s)

The True Legacy of Atkins and Roper: The Unreliability Principle, Mentally Ill Defendants, and the Death Penalty’s Unraveling

By Scott E. Sundby / University of Miami School of Law, on 8 September 2020


2020

NGO report

United States


More details See the document

In striking down the death penalty for intellectually disabled and juvenile defendants, Atkins v. Virginia and Roper v. Simmons have been understandably heralded as important holdings under the Court’s Eighth Amendment jurisprudence that has found the death penalty “disproportional” for certain types of defendants and crimes. This Article argues, however, that the cases have a far more revolutionary reach than their conventional understanding. In both cases the Court went one step beyond its usual two-step analysis of assessing whether imposing the death penalty violated “evolving standards of decency.” This extra step looked at why even though intellectual disability and youth were powerful mitigators, juries were not able to reliably use them in their decision making. The Court thus articulated expressly for the first time what this Article calls the “unreliability principle:” if too great a risk exists that constitutionally protected mitigation cannot be reliably assessed, the unreliability means that the death penalty cannot be constitutionally imposed. In recognizing the unreliability principle, the Court has called into serious question the death penalty for other offenders to whom the principle applies, such as mentally ill defendants. And, unlike with the “evolving standards” analysis, the unreliability principle does not depend on whether a national consensus exists against the practice. This Article identifies the six Atkins-Roper factors that bring the unreliability principle into play and shows why they make application of the death penalty to mentally ill defendants unconstitutional. The principle, which finds its constitutional home in the cases of Woodson v. North Carolina and Lockett v. Ohio, has profound implications for the death penalty, and if taken to its logical endpoint calls into question the Court’s core premise since Furman v. Georgia, that by providing individualized consideration of a defendant and his crime, the death penalty decision will be free of arbitrariness.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Fair Trial, Intellectual Disability,

Document(s)

Grace and Justice on Death Row

By Brian W. Stolarz / Skyhorse Publishing, on 1 January 2016


2016

Book

United States


More details See the document

This book tells the story of Alfred Dewayne Brown, a man who spent over twelve years in prison (ten of them on Texas’ infamous Death Row) for a high-profile crime he did not commit, and his lawyer, Brian Stolarz, who dedicated his career and life to secure his freedom. The book chronicles Brown’s extraordinary journey to freedom against very long odds, overcoming unscrupulous prosecutors, corrupt police, inadequate defense counsel, and a broken criminal justice system. The book examines how a lawyer-client relationship turned into one of brotherhood.Grace And Justice On Death Row also addresses many issues facing the criminal justice system and the death penalty – race, class, adequate defense counsel, and intellectual disability, and proposes reforms.Told from Stolarz’s perspective, this raw, fast-paced look into what it took to save one man’s life will leave you questioning the criminal justice system in this country. It is a story of injustice and redemption that must be told.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Innocence, Death Row Conditions, Death Penalty,

Document(s)

A Tale of Two (and Possibly Three) Atkins: Intellectual Disability and Capital Punishment Twelve Years after The Supreme Court’s Creation of a Categorical Bar

By John H. Blume / Sheri Lynn Johnson / William and Mary Bill of Rights Journal, on 8 September 2020


2020

Article

United States


More details See the document

The article, with three co-authors, examines empirically the capital cases decided by the lower courts since the United States Supreme Court created the categorical ban against the execution of persons with intellectual disability twelve years ago in the Atkins decision.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Mental Illness,

Document(s)

UPR death penalty stakeholder report template

By The Advocates for Human Rights, on 1 January 2015


2015

Working with...


More details See the document

Template for civil society submissions to the Universal Periodic Review of human rights organised by the United Nations.

  • Document type Working with...
  • Themes list International law,

Document(s)

Death Penalty Issues Checklist – Universal Periodic Review Stakeholder Reports

By The Advocates for Human Rights, on 8 September 2020


2020

Academic report


More details See the document

List of points of international human rights law to review when submitting a report on a country’s use of the death penalty to the United Nations’ Universial Periodic Review.

  • Document type Academic report
  • Themes list International law,

Document(s)

New claims about executions and general deterrence: déjà vu all over again?

By Richard Berk / Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, on 1 January 2005


2005

Article

United States


More details See the document

A number of papers have recently appeared claiming to show that in the United States executions deter serious crime. There are many statistical problems with the data analyses reported. This article addresses the problem of “influence,” which occurs when a very small and atypical fraction of the data dominate the statistical results. The number of executions by state and year is the key explanatory variable, and most states in most years execute no one. A very few states in particular years execute more than five individuals. Such values represent about 1 percent of the available observations. Reanalyses of the existing data are presented showing that claims of deterrence are a statistical artifact of this anomalous 1 percent.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Deterrence , Statistics,

Document(s)

UN advocacy: the universal periodic review – Death penalty

By The Advocates for Human Rights / Amy Bergquist / Rosalyn Park / Jennifer Prestholdt, on 8 September 2020


2020

Academic report


More details See the document

PowerPoint presentation used at The Advocates for Human Rights’ training session on death penalty advocacy for the United Nations’ Universal Periodic Review of human rights. See also the video of the presentation here.

  • Document type Academic report
  • Themes list International law,

Document(s)

There Will Be No Stay

By Patty Ann Dillon, on 1 January 2015


2015

Working with...


More details See the document

There Will Be No Stay is not a documentary about the death penalty. Not in any way you’ve ever seen before, at least. It is a film about the actual men who are tasked by society with carrying out the death penalty. This is a first-hand look at executioners, the pressures they’re put under, and the unbearable toll the act of taking another’s life has on their own.

  • Document type Working with...
  • Themes list Death Row Conditions, Methods of Execution,

Document(s)

The Death Penalty and Victims

By United Nations, on 1 January 2016


2016

International law - United Nations


More details See the document

This publication includes perspectives from a broad range of victims. While some of them are family members of crime victims, others are victims of human rights violations in application of the death penalty, of its brutality and traumatic effects. Victims’ perspectives, taken holistically, make a compelling case against the death penalty. When it comes to the death penalty, almost everyone loses. The perspectives of the victims on the death penalty as reflected in this book are likely to provoke tough discussions. This may be a welcome challenge. The publication was launched at a high-level event on 21st September at the UN in New York.The full recording of the event and the programme is available at: texte

  • Document type International law - United Nations
  • Themes list Innocence, Murder Victims' Families, Death Penalty,

Document(s)

Lethal Rejection: An Empirical Analysis of the Astonishing Plunge in Death Sentences in the United States from Their Post-Furman Peak

By Talia Roitberg Harmon / David McCord / Albany Law Review, on 1 January 2018


2018

Article

United States


More details See the document

The authors gathered information on 1665 death-eligible cases nationwide for three years at decade intervals: 1994, 2004, and 2014. In 517 cases death sentences were imposed; in 311 cases sentences spared the defendants from death sentences, and in 837 cases prosecutors spared defendants from death sentences.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Death Penalty, Statistics, Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

Death Sentencing Database

By Brandon L. Garrett / End of its Rope, on 1 January 2018


Working with...


More details See the document

This resource website displays data concerning death sentencing in the United States from 1990 to present. Research using these data includes a book, “End of its Rope: How Killing the Death Penalty Can Revive Criminal Justice” published by Harvard University Press in Fall 2017. This research was conducted by Professor Brandon L. Garrett with the support of the University of Virginia School of Law.

  • Document type Working with...
  • Themes list Death Penalty, Statistics,

Document(s)

Bloodsworth an Innocent Man

By Gregory Bayne, on 1 January 2015


2015

Working with...


More details See the document

BLOODSWORTH – An Innocent Man is a documentary memoir recounting Kirk Noble Bloodsworth’s remarkable journey through the criminal justice system. An innocent man convicted and sentenced to death for a crime he did not commit, Kirk became the first death row inmate exonerated by DNA evidence in the United States.Set against the backdrop of his 2013 battle to repeal the death penalty in the State that sentenced him to death, BLOODSWORTH – An Innocent Man offers an intimate glimpse into what it is to wake to a living nightmare; an innocent man caught in the perfect storm of injustice.

  • Document type Working with...
  • Themes list Innocence,

Document(s)

Documentary: “In The Executioner’s Shadow; a Story of Justice, Injustice and the Death Penalty”

By Maggie Burnette Stogner / Rick Stack / In The Executioner's Shadow, on 8 September 2020


2020

Multimedia content

United States


More details See the document

Video “It is the potential of this documentary to move us toward a more enlightened society that excites me about this work.” Benjamin Jealous, former NAACP PresidentAs wrongful convictions, botched executions, and a broken justice system inch further into the spotlight, we must consider: What is justice? What part should the death penalty play?

  • Document type Multimedia content
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Mental Illness, Innocence, Death Penalty,

Document(s)

A year-end compilation of death penalty data for the state of Missouri : Annual Report 2015

By Missourians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, on 1 January 2015


2015

NGO report


More details See the document

MADP released its annual report which highlights some of the major problems with Missouri’s broken death penalty system. Here is a snapshot of the death penalty in Missouri in 2015: 6 executions in 2015 but no new death sentences in Missouri in 2015.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Country/Regional profiles,

Member(s)

Children Education Society (CHESO)

on 30 April 2020

The mandate of Children Education Society (CHESO) is: – To combat causes of most vulnerable children including children’s rights violations, poor governance,  HIV/AIDS, poverty, climate change and reinforce realization of the children’s right to education -To eliminate bad policies and laws subjecting children to vulnerability – To end human rights violations subjecting children to vulnerability […]

2020

United Republic of Tanzania

Document(s)

Public Opinion On The Death Penalty In Singapore: Survey Findings

By National University of Singapore / Chan Wing Cheong / Tan Ern Ser / Jack Lee / Braema Mathi, on 1 January 2018


2018

Academic report


More details See the document

Informations and survey findings about the public opinion on the death penalty in Singapore

  • Document type Academic report
  • Themes list Public opinion, Death Penalty,

Document(s)

Confronting the Death Penalty. How Language Influences Jurors in Capital Cases

By Oxford University Press / Robin Conley, on 1 January 2015


2015

Book

United States


More details See the document

Confronting the Death Penalty: How Language Influences Jurors in Capital Cases probes how jurors make the ultimate decision about whether another human being should live or die. Drawing on ethnographic and qualitative linguistic methods, this book explores the means through which language helps to make death penalty decisions possible – how specific linguistic choices mediate and restrict jurors’, attorneys’, and judges’ actions and experiences while serving and reflecting on capital trials. By focusing on how language can both facilitate and stymie empathic encounters, the book addresses a conflict inherent to death penalty trials: jurors literally face defendants during trial and then must distort, diminish, or negate these face-to-face interactions in order to sentence those same defendants to death. The book reveals that jurors cite legal ideologies of rational, dispassionate decision-making – conveyed in the form of authoritative legal language – when negotiating these moral conflicts. By investigating the interface between experiential and linguistic aspects of legal decision-making, the book breaks new ground in studies of law and language, language and psychology, and the death penalty.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Public opinion, Public debate, Death Penalty,

Document(s)

Death Qualification in Black and White: Racialized Decision Making and Death‐Qualified Juries

By Craig Haney / Mona Lynch / SSRN, on 1 January 2018


2018

Academic report


More details See the document

Death qualification has been shown to have a number of biasing effects that appear to undermine a capital defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to a fair jury. Attitudes toward the death penalty have shifted modestly but consistently over the last several decades in ways that may have changed the overall impact of death qualification. Specifically, the very large gap between black and white Americans’ current support for capital punishment raises the question of whether death qualification procedures disproportionately exclude African Americans from capital jury participation. In order to examine this possibility, we conducted two countywide death penalty attitude surveys in the California county that has the highest percentage of African American residents in the state. Results show that death qualification continues to have a number of serious biasing effects—including disproportionately excluding death penalty opponents—which result in the significant underrepresentation of African Americans. This creates a death‐qualified jury pool with the potential to be significantly more likely to ignore and even misuse mitigating factors and to rely more heavily on aggravating factors in their death penalty decision making. The implications of these findings for the fair administration of capital punishment are discussed.

  • Document type Academic report

Document(s)

In the Executioner’s Shadow

By Maggie Burnette Stogner, on 8 September 2020


2020

Multimedia content

United States


More details See the document

What would you do if someone you love was raped, tortured, or murdered? How would you seek justice? The very thought evokes horror— we shudder to even consider it. But it is a reality faced by Vicki and Syl Scheiber after their daughter’s rape and murder; faced by Karen Brassard in the traumatic aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombing; faced by former Virginia state executioner Jerry Givens after performing 62 executions.As wrongful convictions, botched executions, and a broken justice system inch further into the spotlight, we must consider: What is justice? What part should the death penalty play?In the Executioner’s Shadow allows a glimpse into Jerry’s rarely seen world of death row and execution. It explores Karen’s moral conflict as she attends the accused bomber’s trial, a young man the same age as her son. It defies our perception of justice as Vicki and Syl fight for the life of their daughter’s murderer.In the Executioner’s Shadow illuminates the oft hidden realities entangled in death row, the death penalty, and the U.S. Justice system at large.

  • Document type Multimedia content
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Public opinion, Death Penalty, Country/Regional profiles,

Member(s)

Quaker United Nations Office, Geneva

on 30 April 2020

The Quaker United Nations Office (QUNO) serves as a Quaker presence at the United Nations (UN) in Geneva and New York. QUNO represents Quaker concerns at the international level, under the auspices of the Friends World Committee for Consultation (Quakers), the international Quaker body which has General Consultative Status with the UN. In addition to […]

2020

Switzerland

Document(s)

Against Capital Punishment: The Anti-Death Penalty Movement in America, 1972-1994

By Oxford University Press / Herbert H. Haines, on 8 September 1999


1999

Book

United States


More details See the document

While most western democracies have renounced the death penalty, capital punishment enjoys vast and growing support in the United States. A significant and vocal minority, however, continues to oppose it. Against Capital Punishment is the first full account of anti-death penalty activism in America during the years since the ten-year moratorium on executions ended.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Trend Towards Abolition,

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in Singapore: in Decline but Still Too Soon for Optimism

By National University of Singapore, on 1 January 2016


2016

Article

Singapore


More details See the document

A survey on Singaporeans’ opinion on the death penalty, which was led by Assoc Prof Chan Wing Cheong from the NUS Faculty of Law, found that most Singaporeans are in favour of the death penalty but less so for certain cases. Fewer support the death penalty for drug trafficking and firearms in cases where no one dies or is injured and there is also less support for the mandatory death penalty. The survey polled 1,500 Singapore citizens aged 18 to 74 between April and May 2016.For a free summary of the study: http://news.nus.edu.sg/highlights/11231-death-penalty-support-not-clear-cut

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list Singapore
  • Themes list Public opinion, Public debate, World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, Death Penalty, Statistics, Country/Regional profiles,

Member(s)

Civil Rights and Social Justice Society (CRSJS)

on 30 April 2020

The Civil Rights and Social Justice Society (CRSJS) is a human rights NGO registered under the Travancore Cochin, Literary, Scientific and Charitable Societies Registration Act, 1955 in Kerala State, India in the year 1997. The members of CRSJS are persons committed to the promotion and protection of human rights in all spheres. However the main […]

2020

India

Document(s)

Deadly Justice: A Statistical Portrait of the Death Penalty

By Oxford University Press / Frank Baumgartner, on 1 January 2017


2017

Book


More details See the document

Provides a comprehensive statistical assessment of how the death penalty has been applied over the entire modern period, 1976 to present

  • Document type Book
  • Themes list Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment and Punishment, Death Penalty, Statistics,

Document(s)

Chad, Death Penalty: ending a moratorium, between security opportunism and settling of scores

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Mahfoudh Ould Bettah / Isabelle Gourmelon / Olivier Foks, on 1 January 2004


2004

NGO report

fr
More details See the document

The report is damning, showing a system of justice which attaches little importance to regional and international instruments for the protection of human rights ratified by Chad. The case was conducted with a haste wholly incompatible with the respect for the right to a fair trial – proceedings exclusively for the prosecution, confessions obtained under torture, refusal to take account of evidence brought by the defence during the investigation, no lawyer present during the investigation stage. This iniquitous trial proves the hypothesis that justice has been manipulated in order to hide the true nature of a crime and the identity of its perpetrators, whilst securing the executions of persons judged undesirable.

Document(s)

Vietnam: From “Vision” to Facts: Human Rights in Vietnam under its Chairmanship of ASEAN

By Vietnam Committee on Human Rights / International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Quê Me: Action for Democracy in Vietnam, on 8 September 2020


2020

NGO report

Viet Nam


More details See the document

The use of the death penalty is frequent in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. In 2009, the government reduced the number of offences punishable by death from 29 to 22. Capital punishment is applied for crimes including murder, armed robbery, drug trafficking, rape, sexual abuse of children, and a range of economic crimes. Execution is by firing squad. A draft law was introduced in November 2009 proposing the use of two methods of execution, either by firing squad or by lethal injection. Statistics on the number of death sentences and executions are not made public. Indeed, following criticisms by international human rights organisations, in January 2004, Vietnam adopted a decree classifying death penalty statistics as “state secrets”. According to the Vietnamese and international press, at least 100 people are executed each year in Vietnam. In 2007, 104 death sentences were pronounced, including 14 women. In 2010, the official legal magazine Phap Luat (Law) reported 11 death sentences for the month of January alone.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list Viet Nam
  • Themes list Death Row Conditions, Firing Squad,

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in Botswana: Hasty and Secretive Hangings – International Fact Finding Mission

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), on 8 September 2020


NGO report

Botswana


More details See the document

This report determined that the death penalty remains a sensitive and secretive issue in Botswana. The authorities are reluctant to encourage public debate about the death penalty and its possible abolition. There is a total lack of transparency in the actual execution process of the death sentence. The hasty way in which most recent hangings have been carried out, further cast doubt upon the willingness of the Government of Botswana to seriously address this issue.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list Botswana
  • Themes list Transparency, Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

Iran/death penalty: A state terror policy – Special edition for the 4th World Congress against the death penalty

By Bijan Baharan / International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), on 8 September 2020


NGO report

Iran (Islamic Republic of)

fa
More details See the document

This report covers the various aspects of the topic including: domestic laws, international legal framework, execution of juvenile offenders, religious and ethnic minorities, and methods of execution. According to the report, there are over 20 main categories of offences, some of them with several sub-categories, in the IRI, which are punishable by the death penalty. The majority of those “offences” are certainly not among “the most serious crimes.” Some others should not be considered as “offences” at all. In conclusion, FIDH issued a wide set of recommendations to the IRI and the international community. Among others, it recommended the adoption of an immediate moratorium on executions in light of the serious shortcomings of the guarantees of due process and fair trial.

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – Special edition for the 4th World Congress Against the Death Penalty

By Vietnam Committee on Human Rights / International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), on 8 September 2020


NGO report

Viet Nam


More details See the document

The use of the death penalty is frequent in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV). Capital punishment is applied for 22 offences, including murder, armed robbery, drug trafficking, rape, sexual abuse of children, and a range of economic crimes, such as graft and corruption, fraud and embezzlement (for 500 million dong – $33,200 – or more of state property), illegal production and trade of food, foodstuffs and medicines. Seven political acts perceived as “threats against national security” carry the death penalty as a maximum sentence. Capital punishment is most often used to sanction drug-related offences, followed by corruption, black-market and violent crimes. Vietnam has some of the harshest drug laws in the world. A 1997 law made possession or smuggling of 100g or more of heroin, or 5 kilograms or more of opium, punishable by death. In 2001, 55 sentences were pronounced for drug trafficking alone.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list Viet Nam
  • Themes list Firing Squad, Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

Iran/death penalty: A state terror policy

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Antoine Bernard, on 1 January 2009


2009

NGO report

en
More details See the document

As momentum is gathering across the world towards abolition of capital punishment, Iran ranks second for number of executions, after China, and first for per capita executions. Unfair trials, execution of juveniles, targeting of ethnic and religious minorities… the death penalty is applied in blatant violation of Iran’s obligations under international human rights law. A very wide range of offences (including economic, drug-related, so-called sexual offences, apostasy…) carry the death penalty and the methods of execution (public hangings, stoning…)amount to the most inhuman and degrading treatment.

Document(s)

ایران: مجازات اعدام – سیاست دولتی ایجاد وحشت

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Antoine Bernard, on 8 September 2020


2020

NGO report

Iran (Islamic Republic of)

en
More details See the document

در دوراني که حرکت به سوي لغو مجازات اعدام در سراسر جهان رو به گسترش است، تمايز جمهوري اسلامي ايران در تعداد زياد اعدام هايي است که در شرايطي آشکارا ناقض�? موازين بين المللي حقوق بشر انجام مي پذيرد. محاکمه های ناعادلانه، اعدام نوجوانان، هد�? گیری اقلیت های قومی و مذهبی… مجازات اعدام در نقض آشکار تعهدات ایران بر اساس قانون بین المللی حقوق بشر انجام می پذیرد.

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in Japan: The Law of Silence – Going Against the International Trend

By Florence Bellivier / International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Dan Van Raemdonck / Jiazhen Wu, on 8 September 2020


NGO report

Japan

fr
More details See the document

This report is the outcome of a fact-finding mission conducted by FIDH in July 2008, in order to assess the measures taken by the Japanese government to implement the recommendations made by a previous investigation, conducted in 2003.The conclusions of the report are appalling. According to Florence Bellivier, General Secretary of FIDH “Japan continues to condemn criminals to death, and incarcerate them up for decades, in prisons where secrecy and isolation are commonplace, in total disregard of the world opinion”. In addition, the rhythm of the executions has accelerated over the recent years. “2008 has been a record year, with more executions this year than in any other of the last fifteen years. We are witnessing a real step backwards” added Dan Van Raemdonck, Vice-President of FIDH. Thirteen persons have been executed since the beginning of the year, and 102 are currently on death row. There has not been a single retrial of a death penalty case since 1986, and no convicted prisoner has been pardoned since 1975.

Document(s)

Slow march to the gallows: Death penalty in Pakistan

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Anne-Christine Habbard, on 1 January 2007


2007

NGO report


More details See the document

Pakistan ranks among the countries in the world which issue the most death sentences: currently, over 7,400 prisoners are lingering on death row. In recent years, Pakistan has witnessed a significant increase in charges carrying capital punishment, in convictions to death, as well as in executions. The HRCP and FIDH find that the application of death penalty in Pakistan falls far below international standards. In particular, they find that, given the very serious defects of the law itself, of the administration of justice, of the police service, the chronic corruption and the cultural prejudices affecting women and religious minorities, capital punishment in Pakistan is discriminatory and unjust, and allows for a high probability of miscarriages of justice, which is wholly unacceptable in any civilised society, but even more so when the punishment is irreversible. At every step, from arrest to trial to execution, the safeguards against miscarriage of justice are weak or non-existent, and the possibility that innocents have been or will be executed remains frighteningly high.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Due Process , Discrimination,

Document(s)

Pakistan, a long march for democracy and the rule of law

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Fatma Cosadia / Odette Lou Bouvier, on 1 January 2009


2009

NGO report

fr
More details See the document

Regularly denounced by human rights associations, violations of the right to a fair trial and inequality before the law for prisoners who face the death penalty are flagrant. Most prisoners belong to the most disadvantaged social classes or to ethnic or religious minorities. Involved in often questionable circumstances, with confessions extracted under frequent beatings and torture, many litigants are not given an adequate defence. To defend these cases, lawyers appointed ex officio receive 200 rupees per hearing (less than 5 U.S. dollars). Often young and inexperienced to deal with procedures not respecting the minimum fair trial guarantees, these lawyers are not in a position to ensure the mandate entrusted to them.

Document(s)

China: The death penalty in China: breaking records, breaking rules

By Amnesty International, on 1 January 1997


1997

NGO report

fres
More details See the document

In China last year, approximately 17 people were sentenced to death each day, every day of the year. This report examines the record versus the rhetoric in 1996. It examines the death penalty in practice during this year’s “Strike Hard Anti-Crime Campaign” which highlights legal inadequacies and institutionalized abuses long discussed by domestic critics.

Document(s)

Tanzania: the death sentence institutionnalised

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Eric Mirguet / Arnold Tsunga, on 1 January 2005


2005

NGO report

enfr
More details See the document

Individuals are regularly sentenced to death in murder cases, but no statistics are published about the number of condemnations. Under the Tanzanian Penal Code, the death sentence remains a mandatory penalty for murder while it can also be applied for treason. As of April 2003, 370 persons (359 males and 11 females) were awaiting execution in the prisons of mainland Tanzania in conditions that might amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. There are a number of dysfunctions in the Tanzanian legal system, which seems to represent a threat to the rule of law, and an obstacle to reform: the unwillingness of the Executive to have its decisions challenged in judicial proceedings, and; the existence of a Penal System essentially based on retaliation towards the offenders rather than rehabilitation ; e.g. corporal punishments can still be applied for numerous offences, in spite of the fact that they clearly violate international and regional human rights instruments. Furthermore, pervasive corruption in the police and the judiciary represents a serious threat to the due process of law, including in death penalty cases.

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in Egypt

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Etienne Jaudel / Alya Chérif Chammari / Nabeel Rajab, on 1 January 2005


NGO report

arfr
More details See the document

The report notably points to the great number of crimes which entail the death penalty in Egypt and to the fact that civilians may be tried by military courts, sentenced to death and executed without delay, in violation of the rights of the defence and sometimes in abstentia. The only remedy is the unlikely pardon of the President of the Republic. Confessions obtained under duress are often accepted in court and form the basis of the sentence. The FIDH report recommends to the Egyptian authorities to put an immediate end to the state of emergency which, after 23 years, is no longer justified in Egypt today; the state of emergency is conducive to serious violations of human rights, including administrative detention without any effective judicial control, unfair trials of civilians before military courts, and widespread torture of detainees, including during the pre-trial stage. The Egyptian authorities should inquire into all allegations of torture and bring to justice those responsible.

Document(s)

The death penalty in Thailand

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Julie Morizet / Sinapan Samidoray / Siobhan Ni Chulachain, on 1 January 2005


NGO report


More details See the document

The present report shows that, although the formal judicial process which leads to the imposition of the death penalty is theoretically in accordance with the international legal standards, serious miscarriages of justice can result in condemnations to the capital punishment. By lasting up to 84 days, the long police custody creates conditions that favour possible cruel, inhuman and degrading treatments. The difficult access to legal aid, both during police custody and the trial process, does not provide sufficient safeguards that the rights of the defence are fully respected. The conditions of detention in prisons, and notably the fact that death row inmates are chained 24 hours a day, may amount to torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in Japan: A Practice Unworthy of a Democracy

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Sharon Hom / Etienne Jaudel / Richard Wild, on 1 January 2003


2003

NGO report

enfr
More details See the document

Despite the Japanese Federation of Bar Associations’ efforts towards improving the defence system, Japanese prisoners – especially those sentenced to death – do not receive a fair trial.The Daiyo Kangoku practice is one amongst several practices which allows suspects to be detained in police stations for 23 days, contravening the rules of a fair trial. Confessions, which can be obtained through strong pressure, give police the basis for accusation. Furthermore, the conditions on death row themselves amount to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatments: Once the death sentence has been delivered, the prisoner is held in solitary confinement. Detainees have extremely limited contact with families and lawyers and meetings are closely monitored. Above all, prisoners live with the constant fear of never knowing if today will be their last day. The prisoner is informed that the execution will take place on the very same day, and family members are notified the following day.

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in the United States

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Antoine Bernard, on 1 January 2002


2002

NGO report


More details See the document

The report indicates that most of the people sentenced to capital punishment, especially the poor and indigent, did not benefit from a fair trial, and that the conditions of detention – which is very long – constitute “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatments”. Furthermore, the FIDH fears that the possible moratoriums on the executions considered by several States only aims at improving the criminal procedures prior to the executions.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

Execution by lethal injection – a quarter century of state poisoning

By Amnesty International, on 1 January 2007


2007

NGO report

es
More details See the document

Any potential increase in executions or lobbying for the death penalty as a result of the use of lethal injection is of serious concern. The increased pressure on medical professionals to participate in executions also raises serious ethical and human rights issues. This paper reviews developments with respect to lethal injection executions over the past decade.

Document(s)

People’s Republic of China: Executed “according to law”? The death penalty in China

By Amnesty International, on 8 September 2020


2020

NGO report

China

fr
More details See the document

This document describes the process that someone suspected of committing a capital crime goes through under the Chinese criminal justice system, from detention through to execution. This process will be described using examples of cases researched by Amnesty International, and others monitored in the official press in China. As shown, there is potential for the violation of human rights at every stage of the criminal justice process leading to execution.

Document(s)

China: The Olympics Countdown: Repression of activists overshadows death penalty and media reforms

By Amnesty International, on 1 January 2007


2007

NGO report

fres
More details See the document

Amnesty International remains deeply concerned that several senior Chinese officials continue to use ‘strike hard’ policies to constrain the legitimate activities of a range of peaceful activists, including journalists, lawyers and human rights defenders. This report updates concerns in these areas, illustrated by the experiences of several individuals who have been detained or imprisoned in violation of their fundamental human rights. The failure of the Chinese authorities to address the legal and institutional weaknesses that allow such violations to flourish continues to hamper efforts to strengthen rule of law in China.

Document(s)

People’s Republic of China: The Death Penalty Log in 2000

By Amnesty International, on 8 September 2020


2020

NGO report

China


More details See the document

The Death Penalty Log gives available details of death sentences and executions occurring in China throughout 2000.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list China
  • Themes list Statistics,

Document(s)

China: Death penalty log in 1999

By Amnesty International, on 1 January 2000


2000

NGO report


More details See the document

The attached Log gives available details of death sentences and executions occurring in China throughout 1999.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Statistics,

Document(s)

USA: Breaking a lethal habit – A look back at the death penalty in 2007

By Amnesty International, on 8 September 2020


2020

NGO report

United States

es
More details See the document

This document looks back at the death penalty in 2007 beginning with the New Jersey Death Penalty Study Commission releasing its final report recommending abolition and concluding with the UN General Assembly passing a landmark resolution calling for a global moratorium. It includes death by electrocution; abolition; execution, commutation and stay of execution; mental illness; child rape as well as geographical and colour bias.

Document(s)

Affront to Justice: Death Penalty in Saudi Arabia

By Amnesty International, on 1 January 2008


2008

NGO report

ar
More details See the document

Amnesty International has been documenting the Saudi Arabian authorities’ extensive use of the death penalty for over a quarter of a century. This report is the latest evaluation, made in light of the legal, judicial and human rights changes that have been introduced in recent years in the country. The report details cases of death row prisoners on whose behalf Amnesty International has campaigned. It also includes testimonies of former detainees, some of whom have been under sentence of death.

Document(s)

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: No return to execution – The US death penalty as a barrier to extradition

By Amnesty International, on 8 September 2020


2020

NGO report

United States

ares
More details See the document

This document examines the issue of extradition and the death penalty in the United States. It looks at the emergence of death penalty clauses in extradition treaties and laws and gives examples of specific cases in the US where extradition has either prevented the application of the death penalty or been circumvented to allow individuals to be sentenced to death.

Document(s)

USA: More about politics than child protection: The death penalty for sex crimes against children

By Amnesty International, on 1 January 2006


2006

NGO report

es
More details See the document

On 8 June, the Governor of South Carolina signed a bill allowing the death penalty for a person convicted for a second time of sex crimes against children under the age of 11 and a day later, the Governor of Oklahoma signed a similar bill. Amnesty International urges all legislative, executive and judicial authorities in the United States to meet their human rights obligations by not permitting any expansion of the death penalty to non-lethal crimes such as sexual assault. The organization renews its call for a total moratorium on executions in the United States.

Document(s)

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Indecent and internationally illegal: The death penalty against child offenders

By Amnesty International, on 1 January 2002


2002

NGO report


More details See the document

This report gives details of the national picture of the execution of juveniles, looking particularly at how two key decisions of the US Supreme Court have widened the gap between the USA and most other countries on this issue. The report examines the arguments used by those who oppose the execution of juvenile offenders and provides an overview of the international situation on the use of the death penalty against child offenders.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Juveniles,

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in Guatemala: On the road towards abolition

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Catherine Delanoë-Daoud / Marcela Talamas / Emmanuel Daoud, on 1 January 2005


2005

NGO report


More details See the document

Violations of due process in the case of prisoners condemned to death. There are known cases of torture carried out by agents of the State and there is no legal provision that allows the Executive branch to grant a pardon and, subsequently, to commute a death sentence. The Guatemalan State has executed various individuals despite the fact that the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights had petitioned for precautionary measures; this constitutes a flagrant and recurrent violation of Guatemala’s international human rights commitments.The Guatemalan State, in addition to not having adequate public policies for prisons, also has no laws regulating prisons and conditions of detention, in spite of the fact that various UN instruments are devoted to that question.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Due Process , Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

Uganda: Challenging the Death Penalty

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Thomas Lemaire / Eric Mirguet / Mary Okosun, on 1 January 2005


NGO report


More details See the document

The general feeling of NGOs and abolitionists in Uganda is that the most pressing issue is the situation of ordinary prisoners, while the death penalty as administered by the military should be addressed at a second stage. The questions relating to the military are sensitive issues in Uganda, which might also explain that position. The focus of the present report is consequently mainly on the death sentences pronounced by ordinary criminal courts.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in Taiwan: Towards Abolition?

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Sharon Hom / Penelope Martin / Siobhan Ni Chulachain, on 1 January 2006


2006

NGO report


More details See the document

This report highlights serious concerns regarding the conditions of detention of prisoners in Taiwan. Although there has been some improvement in conditions in recent years, FIDH and TAEDP report severe problems of overcrowding and inadequate medical treatment for prisoners, requiring urgent attention. In addition, the mission found that the use of shackles, in violation of international standards, is widespread. Prisoners, in particular those on death row, regularly have their legs chained together for 24 hours per day, in violation of the prohibition against cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. Despite recent reforms to the criminal justice system, FIDH and TAEDP found that serious failings continue to lead to miscarriages of justice. The report highlights persistent problems including discrimination, limited access to legal representation, piecemeal and only partially implemented reforms and unsatisfactory appeals procedures. FIDH and TAEDP found that training and supervision for actors within the system, including police, is grossly inadequate, leading to failures in the collection and preservation of evidence, whilst prosecutors and judges are inclined to “rubber stamp” police findings.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Trend Towards Abolition, Death Row Conditions, Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in Uzbekistan: Torture and Secrecy

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) / Christine Martineau / Caroline Giraud / Richard Wild, on 1 January 2005


2005

NGO report

rufr
More details See the document

On August 1, 2005, President Karimov announced, through a presidential decree, that the abolition of the death penalty was planned for January 1, 2008. The report concludes that the Uzbek authorities are responsible of serious and systematic human rights violations in the framework of the administration of criminal justice. The rights of those arrested are systematically violated. They often lack any access to a lawyer during their pre-trial detention, their families are not informed and torture is used in order to extort confessions, which often serve as a basis for their condemnation.

Document(s)

He Called Me Sister

By Suzanne Craig Robertson, on 24 February 2023


2023

Book

Death Row Conditions 

United States


More details See the document

The fascinating, moving story of a friendship with an inmate on death row. It was a clash of race, privilege, and circumstance when Alan Robertson first signed up through a church program to visit Cecil Johnson on Death Row, to offer friendship and compassion. Alan’s wife Suzanne had no intention of being involved, but slowly, through phone calls and letters, she began to empathize and understand him. That Cecil and Suzanne eventually became such close friends—a white middle-class woman and a Black man who grew up devoid of advantage—is a testament to perseverance, forgiveness, and love, but also to the notion that differences don’t have to be barriers. This book recounts a fifteen-year friendship and how trust and compassion were forged despite the difficult circumstances, and how Cecil ended up ministering more to Suzanne’s family than they did to him. The story details how Cecil maintained inexplicable joy and hope despite the tragic events of his life and how Suzanne, Alan, and their two daughters opened their hearts to a man convicted of murder. Cecil Johnson was executed Dec. 2, 2009.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Death Row Conditions 

Document(s)

Execution in Saudi Arabia 2023: Ongoing Bloodshed with Unusual Sentences

By The European Saudi Organization for Human Rights (ESOHR), on 23 January 2024


2024

NGO report

Saudi Arabia


More details See the document

Published on 22 January، 2024.

The European Saudi Organization for Human Rights views 2023 as a year that demonstrated Saudi Arabia’s inconsistency in using the death penalty. Besides the unexplained shift in the types of executed sentences, the implementation of death sentences for drug-related charges, and the disregard for international legal opinions, the high numbers indicate Saudi Arabia’s determination to use the death penalty without restraint.

In Saudi Arabia in 2023, 172 executions were carried out according to data from the Ministry of Interior published by the official news agency. The number of executions increased by 15% compared to the figure announced by the Ministry of Interior in 2022, where 147 sentences were reported, despite the mass execution of 81 individuals in 2022.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list Saudi Arabia

Document(s)

Dealing with Punishment: Risks and Rewards in Indonesia’s Illicit Drug Trade

By Carolyn Hoyle, Death Penalty Project, on 18 April 2023


2023

NGO report

Drug Offenses

Indonesia


More details See the document

In 2020-2021, The Death Penalty Project, in partnership with Community Legal Aid Institute, LBH Masyarakat, commissioned The Death Penalty Research Unit (DPRU) at the University of Oxford, in association with University Centre of Excellence HIV/AIDS Research Centre-HPSI at Atma Jaya Catholic University of Indonesia (AJCU), to conduct the research building empirical knowledge on who is being convicted for drug offences and uncover the factors that have influenced their motivations and decision making. Interviews were conducted on 57 prisoners from a prison in Jakrata, Indonesia, all convicted for drug offences. This is the first stage of a larger mapping project, which will interview those convicted of drug offences and sentenced to death or life in prisons across Indonesia and Southeast Asia. It also compliments our two part opinion study on attitudes on capital punishment in Indonesia.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list Indonesia
  • Themes list Drug Offenses

Document(s)

Shattered Justice – Crime Victims’ Experiences with Wrongful Convictions and Exonerations

By Kimberly J. Cook, on 12 August 2022


2022

Book

United States


More details See the document

Shattered Justice presents original crime victims’ experiences with violent crime, investigations and trials, and later exonerations in their cases. Using in-depth interviews with 21 crime victims across the United States, Cook reveals how homicide victims’ family members and rape survivors describe the painful impact of the primary trauma, the secondary trauma of the investigations and trials, and then the tertiary trauma associated with wrongful convictions and exonerations. Important lessons and analyses are shared related to grief and loss, and healing and repair. Using restorative justice practices to develop and deliver healing retreats for survivors also expands the practice of restorative justice. Finally, policy reforms aimed at preventing, mitigating, and repairing the harms of wrongful convictions is covered.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in the OSCE Area: Background Paper 2022

By Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, on 7 October 2022


2022

Regional body report


More details See the document

This paper updates The Death Penalty in the OSCE Area: Background Paper 2021. It is intended to provide a concise update to highlight changes in the status of the death penalty in OSCE participating States since the previous publication and to promote constructive discussion of the issue. It covers the period from 1 April 2021 to 31 March 2022.

  • Document type Regional body report

Document(s)

Poster 2022 Turkish – 20.CI ÖLÜM CEZASINA KARŞI DÜNYA GÜNÜ

By the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, on 5 August 2022


2022

World Coalition


More details Download [ pdf - 5076 Ko ]

World Day 2022 Poster in Turkish – ÖLÜM CEZASI: İŞKENCEYLE DÖŞELI BIR YOLDUR

  • Document type World Coalition

Document(s)

Poster World day against the death penalty 2024 – 2025 – Portuguese

By World coalition against the death penalty, on 8 July 2024


2024

Campaigning

World Coalition


More details Download [ pdf - 1590 Ko ]
  • Document type Campaigning / World Coalition

Document(s)

Poster World Day 2003

By World coalition against the death penalty , on 10 October 2003


2003

Campaigning

Trend Towards Abolition

fr
More details See the document

Poster World Day 2003

Document(s)

Poster World Day 2003

By World Coalition against the death penalty , on 10 October 2003


Campaigning

Trend Towards Abolition


More details See the document

Poster for the world day against the death penalty 2003

  • Document type Campaigning
  • Themes list Trend Towards Abolition

Document(s)

Poster World Day 2004

By World Coalition against the death penalty , on 10 October 2004


2004

Campaigning

Trend Towards Abolition

esfr
More details Download [ pdf - 17 Ko ]

Poster world day against the death penalty 2004

Document(s)

Poster World Day 2007

By World coalition against the death penalty , on 10 October 2007


2007

Campaigning

Trend Towards Abolition

arfr
More details Download [ pdf - 228 Ko ]

Take action
against the death penalty:
Join the hundreds
of initiatives worldwide
Sign the petition
calling for a universal
moratorium on executions

Document(s)

Poster World Day 2009

By World Coalition against the death penalty , on 10 October 2009


2009

Campaigning

Trend Towards Abolition

fr
More details Download [ pdf - 11475 Ko ]

Poster world day against the death penalty 2009

Document(s)

Poster World Day 2010

By World Coalition against the death penalty , on 10 October 2010


2010

Campaigning

Trend Towards Abolition

esfr
More details Download [ pdf - 82 Ko ]

Poster World Day against the death penalty 2010

Document(s)

Poster Urdu 2022 – سزائے موت کے خلاف بیسواں عالمی دن

By the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, on 8 July 2022


2022


More details Download [ pdf - 19959 Ko ]
  • Document type Array

Document(s)

Death Penalty: Majority of States Continue to Support UN Call for Moratorium on Executions at Committee Vote

on 1 January 2020


2020

NGO report

Antigua and Barbuda

Congo

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Djibouti

Dominica

Eswatini

Guinea

Lebanon

Libya

Nauru

Niger

Pakistan

Philippines

Republic of Korea

Sierra Leone

Solomon Islands

South Sudan

Tonga

Uganda

Zimbabwe


More details See the document
  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list Antigua and Barbuda / Congo / Democratic Republic of the Congo / Djibouti / Dominica / Eswatini / Guinea / Lebanon / Libya / Nauru / Niger / Pakistan / Philippines / Republic of Korea / Sierra Leone / Solomon Islands / South Sudan / Tonga / Uganda / Zimbabwe

Document(s)

Voting record – Draft resolution A/C.3/75/L.41 as amended, Moratorium on the use of the death penalty

By United Nations General Assembly, on 18 November 2020


2020

International law - United Nations

zh-hant
More details See the document
  • Document type International law - United Nations
  • Available languages