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View all document types 2486 Document(s)

Document(s)

Report of the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, Manfred Nowak – MISSION TO CHINA

By United Nations / Manfred Nowak, on 8 September 2020


2020

NGO report

China

frzh-hantesarru
More details See the document

The Special Rapporteur also observes positive developments at the legislative level, including the planned reform of several laws relevant to the criminal procedure, which he hopes will bring Chinese legislation into greater conformity with international norms, particularly the fair trial standards contained in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) which China signed in 1998 and is preparing to ratify. He also welcomes the resumption by the Supreme People’s Court (SPC) of its authority to review all death penalty cases,59 particularly given the fact that the quality of the judiciary increases as one ascends the hierarchy. The Special Rapporteur suggests that China might use the opportunity of this important event to increase transparency regarding the number of death sentences in the country, as well as to consider legislation that would allow direct petitioning to the SPC in cases where individuals do not feel that they were provided with adequate relief by lower courts in cases involving the useof torture, access to counsel, etc.

Document(s)

Capital punishment and implementation of the safeguards guaranteeing protection of the rights of those facing the death penalty : report of the Secretary-General

By United Nations, on 1 January 2001


2001

United Nations report

arrufrzh-hantes
More details See the document

The present, sixth quinquennial report contains a review of the trends in the application of the death penalty, including the implementation of the safeguards, during the period l994-2000. It is a revised, updated version of the report of the Secretary-General on the subject (E/2000/3) that was submitted to the Council at its substantive session of 2000, to the Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice at its ninth session and to the Commission on Human Rights at its fifty-sixth session. Sixty-three countries participated in the survey. There was again a relatively poor response from retentionist countries, especially those making the most use of capital punishment. One major conclusion to be drawn is that, since l994, the rate at which countries have embraced abolition has remained unchanged.

Document(s)

Texas Death Penalty Developments in 2010: The Year in Review

By Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, on 1 January 2010


2010

NGO report


More details See the document

Death sentences in Texas have dropped more than 70% since 2003, reaching a historic low in 2010. According to data compiled from news sources and the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, juries condemned eight new individuals to death in Texas in 2010. This is the lowest number of new death sentences since the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Texas’ revised death penalty statute in 1976. For preious annual reports on Texas please visit: http://tcadp.org/get-informed/reports/

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Statistics,

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)

Annual Report on the Death Penalty in Iran 2022

By Iran Human Rights & ECPM, on 13 April 2023


2023

NGO report

Iran (Islamic Republic of)

fr
More details See the document

The 15th Annual Report on the Death Penalty in Iran, by Iran Human Rights and ECPM reveals the highest annual number of executions since 2015. At least 582 people were executed, an increase of 75% compared to 2021. In 2022, Iran’s authorities demonstrated how crucial the death penalty is to instil societal fear in order to hold onto power.

Document(s)

Leaflet LGBTQIA+ people and the Death Penalty

By World coalition against the death penalty, on 2 October 2023


2023

World Coalition

Gender

fr
More details Download [ pdf - 861 Ko ]

Document(s)

Italian Poster 2005

By World coalition against the death penalty , on 10 October 2005


2005

Campaigning

Trend Towards Abolition


More details See the document

Italian Poster 2005

  • Document type Campaigning
  • Themes list Trend Towards Abolition

Document(s)

TESTIMONIALS FROM WOMEN SENTENCED TO DEATH

By World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, on 1 July 2021


2021

Campaigning

Women

fr
More details Download [ pdf - 942 Ko ]

Collection of testimonials of women’s experiences around the world regarding their death sentences- World Day 2021

Document(s)

Ultimate Punishment: A Lawyer’s Reflections on Dealing with the Death Penalty

By Scott Turow / Picador, on 8 September 2020


2020

Book

United States


More details See the document

Turow bases his opinions on his experiences as a prosecutor and, in his post-prosecutorial years, working on behalf of death-row inmates, as well as his two years on Illinois’s Commission on Capital Punishment, charged by the former Gov. George Ryan.Turow presents both sides of the death penalty debate and seems himself to flip sides depending on the argument.Turow’s reflections include: * Thoughts on victims’ rights vs. community rights * Whether execution is a deterrent * The possible execution of an innocent person * If not the death penalty, what to do with the worst offenders

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

Document(s)

APYN Death Penalty Quizz

By Asia Pacific Youth Network, on 1 January 2009


2009

Campaigning


More details See the document

Quizz on the death penalty by the Asia Pacific Youth Network

  • Document type Campaigning
  • Themes list Networks,

Document(s)

America’s Death Penalty: Between Past and Present

By David Garland / Jonathan Simon / Douglas Hay / Michael Meranze / Randall McGowen / New York University (NYU) / Rebecca Mc Lennan, on 8 September 2020


2020

Book

United States


More details See the document

This volume represents an effort to restore the sense of capital punishment as a question caught up in history. Edited by leading scholars of crime and justice, these original essays pursue different strategies for unsettling the usual terms of the debate. In particular, the authors use comparative and historical investigations of both Europe and America in order to cast fresh light on familiar questions about the meaning of capital punishment.

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

Document(s)

Death Penalty Cases: Leading U.S. Supreme Court Cases on Capital Punishment

By David McCord / Barry Latzer / Butterworth-Heinemann, on 1 January 2010


2010

Book

United States


More details See the document

This brand new edition of Death Penalty Cases makes the most manageable comprehensive resource on the death penalty even better. It includes the most recent cases, including Kennedy v. Louisiana, prohibiting the death penalty for child rapists, and Baze v. Rees, upholding execution by lethal injection. In addition, all of the cases are now topically organized into five sections: * The Foundational Cases * Death-Eligibility: Which persons/crimes are fit for the death penalty? * The Death Penalty Trial * Post-conviction Review * Execution Issues The introductory essays on the history, administration, and controversies surrounding capital punishment have been thoroughly revised. The statistical appendix has been brought up-to-date, and the statutory appendix has been restructured. For clarity, accuracy, complete impartiality and comprehensiveness, there simply is no better resource on capital punishment available.

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

Document(s)

Surviving Execution: A Miscarriage of Justice and the Fight to End the Death Penalty

By Ian Woods / Atlantic Books, on 1 January 2018


2018

Book

United States


More details See the document

Imagine being condemned to death for murder, when even the prosecutors admit that you didn’t actually kill anyone. This is what happened to Richard Glossip.Despite being convicted on the word of the actual self-confessed killer, the state of Oklahoma is still intent on executing him.Ian Woods, a reporter for Sky News in the UK, came across the case, and has tirelessly campaigned ever since to bring the injustices Glossip has faced to the world’s attention.

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

Document(s)

America Without the Death Penalty: States Leading the Way

By John F. Galliher / Larry W. Koch / Northeastern / Teresa J. Guess, on 1 January 2002


2002

Book

United States


More details See the document

Twelve states and the District of Columbia do not impose the death penalty. The authors, all sociology professors at American universities, use the case-study method to examine why this is so. The factors they consider include murder rates, the history of executions, economic circumstances, public opinion, mass media, population diversity, and each state’s abolition of the death penalty. They also examine the role of a state’s social, cultural, and economic leaders in public debate on capital punishment. The states studied are Michigan, Wisconsin, Maine, Minnesota, North Dakota, Alaska, Hawaii, Iowa, and West Virginia, though there is also some discussion of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Vermont, and the District of Columbia. Media reports and government documents were reviewed and legislators, civil servants, journalists, death-penalty activists, and others interviewed. Throughout, the authors express an abolitionist point of view, stating “We hope this book will provide practical information to those interested in furthering death penalty abolition in the United States and throughout the world.”

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

Document(s)

The last executioner: memoirs of Thailand’s last prison executioner

By Chavoret Jaruboon / Nicola Pierce / kindle edition, on 8 September 2020


2020

Book

Thailand


More details See the document

Chavoret Jaruboon was personally responsible for executing 55 prison inmates in Thailand’s infamous prisons. As a boy, he wanted to be a teacher like his father, but his life changed when he chose one of the hardest jobs in the world. Honest and often disturbing – but told with surprising humour and emotion – ‘The Last Executioner’ is the remarkable story of a man who chose death as his vocation.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list Thailand
  • Themes list Firing Squad,

Document(s)

When the State Kills: Capital Punishment and the American Condition

By Austin Sarat / Princeton University Press, on 1 January 2001


2001

Book

United States


More details See the document

Is capital punishment just? Does it deter people from murder? What is the risk that we will execute innocent people? These are the usual questions at the heart of the increasingly heated debate about capital punishment in America. In this bold and impassioned book, Austin Sarat seeks to change the terms of that debate. Capital punishment must be stopped, Sarat argues, because it undermines our democratic society.Sarat unflinchingly exposes us to the realities of state killing. He examines its foundations in ideas about revenge and retribution. He takes us inside the courtroom of a capital trial, interviews jurors and lawyers who make decisions about life and death, and assesses the arguments swirling around Timothy McVeigh and his trial for the bombing in Oklahoma City. Aided by a series of unsettling color photographs, he traces Americans’ evolving quest for new methods of execution, and explores the place of capital punishment in popular culture by examining such films as Dead Man Walking, The Last Dance, and The Green Mile.Sarat argues that state executions, once used by monarchs as symbolic displays of power, gained acceptance among Americans as a sign of the people’s sovereignty. Yet today when the state kills, it does so in a bureaucratic procedure hidden from view and for which no one in particular takes responsibility. He uncovers the forces that sustain America’s killing culture, including overheated political rhetoric, racial prejudice, and the desire for a world without moral ambiguity. Capital punishment, Sarat shows, ultimately leaves Americans more divided, hostile, indifferent to life’s complexities, and much further from solving the nation’s ills. In short, it leaves us with an impoverished democracy.The book’s powerful and sobering conclusions point to a new abolitionist politics, in which capital punishment should be banned not only on ethical grounds but also for what it does to Americans and what we cherish.

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

Document(s)

Perspectives on Capital Punishment in America

By CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform / Charles E. MacLean, on 1 January 2013


2013

Book

United States


More details See the document

Searching inquiry into the contours of capital punishment in America. Containing over 1300 footnotes, the chapters by ten young scholars explore the sometimes-ignored fine details of the death penalty. Topics include the impropriety of applying the death penalty to felony murder, the implications of death row exonerations and their impact on access to post-conviction DNA testing, media impacts on capital cases, death qualification of capital juries and its impact on the right of prospective capital jurors to enjoy First Amendment protection of the free exercise of their religions, the fiscal conservative and social conservative argument favoring abolition of the death penalty, the need for a heightened standard of proof – greater than beyond a reasonable doubt – at the penalty phase of capital trials, federal habeas corpus protections for state-sentenced capital offenders and the constitutionality of limits on “actual innocence” equitable tolling, tips and techniques for capital defense counsel representing defendants who were acutely substance-impaired at the time of the crime or have a history of chronic substance abuse or chemical dependency, the impropriety of allowing counsel to argue fiscal matters to the jury, such as that either execution or life imprisonment is the “cheapest” option for society, and the role the death penalty should and does play within the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Due Process ,

Document(s)

The Executioner’s Song

By Norman Mailer / Vintage , on 8 September 2020


2020

Book

United States


More details See the document

Norman Mailer tells Gary Gilmore’s story, and those of the men and women caught up in his procession toward the firing squad, with implacable authority, steely compassion, and a restraint that evokes the parched landscapes and stern theology of Gilmore’s Utah.

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

Document(s)

Cruel and Unusual: The American Death Penalty and the Founders’ Eighth Amendment

By John D. Bessler / Northeastern, on 1 January 2012


2012

Book

United States


More details See the document

While shedding important new light on the U.S. Constitution’s “cruel and unusual punishments” clause, Bessler explores the influence of Cesare Beccaria’s essay, on Crimes and Punishments, on the Founders’ views, and the transformative properties of the Fourteenth Amendment, which made the Bill of Rights applicable to the states.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States

Document(s)

Chinas Death Penalty: History, Law and Contemporary Practices

By Terance D. Miethe / Hong Lu / Routledge, on 1 January 2007


2007

Book

China


More details See the document

This book examines the death penalty within the changing socio-political context of China. The authors’ treatment of China’s death penalty is legal, historical, and comparative. In particular, they examine; the substantive and procedures laws surrounding capital punishment in different historical periods the purposes and functions of capital punishment in China in various dynasties changes in the method of imposition and relative prevalence of capital punishment over time the socio-demographic profile of the executed and their crimes over the last two decades and comparative practices in other countries. Their analyses of the death penalty in contemporary China focus on both its theory – how it should be done in law – and actual practice – based on available secondary reports/sources.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list China
  • Themes list Networks,

Document(s)

Capital Punishment: Strategies for Abolition

By William A. Schabas / Peter Hodgkinson / Cambridge University Press, on 1 January 2004


2004

Book

Georgia


More details See the document

The editors of this study isolate the core issues influencing legislation so that they can be incorporated into strategies that advise governments in changing their policy on capital punishment. What are the critical factors determining whether a country replaces, retains or restores the death penalty? Why do some countries maintain the death penalty in theory, but in reality rarely invoke it? These questions and others are explored in chapters on South Korea, Lithuania, Georgia, Japan and the British Caribbean Commonwealth, as well as the U.S.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list Georgia
  • Themes list Networks,

Document(s)

When the State No Longer Kills: International Human Rights Norms and Abolition of Capital Punishment

By Sangmin Bae / State University of New York Press, on 1 January 2007


2007

Book

Republic of Korea


More details See the document

This book tries to explain what leads a state to abolish capital punishment or impose a moratorium, by offereing in-depth analyses of four countries: Ukraine, South Africa, South Korea and the United States. Focusing on the role of political leadership and domestic political institutions, Bae clarifies the causal mechanisms that lead to state compliance or noncompliance with the norm.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list Republic of Korea
  • Themes list Moratorium ,

Document(s)

Murdering Myths: The Story Behind the Death Penalty

By Judith W. Kay / Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., on 1 January 2005


2005

Book

United States


More details See the document

In Murdering Myths: The Story Behind the Death Penalty, Judith Kay goes beyond the hype and statistics to examine Americans’ deep-seated beliefs about crime and punishment. She argues that Americans share a counter-productive idea of justice–that punishment corrects bad behavior, suffering pays for wrong deeds, and victims’ desire for revenge is natural and inevitable. Drawing on interviews with both victims and inmates, Kay shows how this belief harms perpetrators, victims, and society and calls for a new narrative that recognizes the humanity in all of us.

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

Document(s)

A Life in the Balance: The Billy Wayne Sinclair Story, A Journey from Murder to Redemption Inside America’s Worst Prison System

By Jodie Sinclair / Billy Wayne Sinclair / Arcade Publishing, on 8 September 2020


2020

Book

United States


More details See the document

Life in the Balance: a book on the Billy Wayne Sinclair Story, A Journey from Murder to Redemption Inside America’s Worst Prison System. The New York Times Book Review called it a “numbing tale of crime, punishment, and redemption.”

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Innocence, Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

Circumstances of Offense: Robert “Saint” Bailey on Death Row

By Chris Dahl / CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, on 8 September 2020


Book

United States


More details See the document

This book is a first-hand account of the life of Simon City Royals gangster Robert “Saint” Bailey who is currently on Death Row in Raiford, Florida. He killed a law enforcement officer in 2005.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Innocence, Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

The Darkest Hour: Shedding Light on the Impact of Isolation and Death Row

By Dr. Betty Gilmore and Nanon M. Williams / Goodmedia press, on 1 January 2012


2012

Book

United States


More details See the document

The Darkest Hour: Stories and Interviews from Death Row by Nanon M. Williams emerged from a deep and dark despair in a place where the thought of suicide often holds more appeal than the thought of living

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment and Punishment, Death Row Conditions,

Document(s)

The Death Penalty: An American History

By Stuart Banner / Harvard University Press, on 1 January 2003


2003

Book

United States


More details See the document

Law professor Stuart Banner tells the story of how, over four centuries, dramatic changes have taken place in the ways capital punishment has been administered and experienced. Banner moves beyond the debates, to give us an unprecedented understanding of capital punishment’s many meanings. As nearly four thousand inmates are now on death row, and almost one hundred are currently being executed each year, the furious debate is unlikely to diminish. The Death Penalty is invaluable in understanding the American way of the ultimate punishment.

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

Document(s)

The Death of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Executions

By Helen Prejean / Vintage , on 1 January 2005


2005

Book

United States


More details See the document

She tells the story of two inmates she came to know as a spiritual adviser. Dobie Williams, a poor black man with an IQ of 65 from rural Louisiana, was executed after being represented by incompetent counsel and found guilty by an all-white jury based mostly on conjecture and speculation. Joseph O’Dell was convicted of murder after the court heard from an inmate who later admitted to giving false testimony for his own benefit. O’Dell received neither an evidentiary hearing nor potentially exculpatory DNA testing and was executed, insisting on his innocence the whole while. Besides exploring the shaky cases against them, Prejean describes in vivid detail the thoughts and feelings of Williams and O’Dell as their bids for clemency fail and they are put to death. The second part of the book details “the machinery of death,” the legal process that Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun, dismayed at the inequities of the death penalty, cited as his reason for resigning and that current justice Antonin Scalia has boasted of being a part of.

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

Document(s)

Determinants of the Death Penalty: A Comparative Study of the World

By Carsten Anckar / Routledge, on 1 January 2004


2004

Book


More details See the document

Determinants of the Death Penalty seeks to explain the phenomenon of capital punishment – without recourse to value judgements – by identifying those characteristics common to countries that use the death penalty and those that mark countries which do not. This global study uses statistical analysis to relate the popularity of the death penalty to physical, cultural, social, economical, institutional, actor oriented and historical factors. Separate studies are conducted for democracies and non-democracies and within four regional contexts. The book also contains an in-depth investigation into determinants of the death penalty in the USA.

  • Document type Book
  • Themes list Networks,

Document(s)

Add Resources and Apply Them Systemically: Governments’ Responsibilities Under the Revised ABA Capital Defense Representation Guidelines

By Eric M. Freedman / Hofstra Law Review, on 1 January 2003


2003

Article

United States


More details See the document

The mainstream legal community, including the ABA, has long understood the importance of system-building, but the revised Guidelines state the point especially forcefully. In articulating “the current consensus about what is required to provide effective defense representation in capital cases,” they set high performance standards not just for lawyers, but for death penalty jurisdictions. As the problems are systemic, it is “imperative” that the solutions be.The Guidelines accordingly not only call on governments to deliver capital defense resources that are sufficient in amount, but also furnish the states with a user-friendly blueprint for using those resources wisely to create structures that will function well in the present and evolve effectively over time. This mandate for institution-building is welcome, and the states should lead it. Indeed, they must do so if the Guidelines are to achieve their ameliorative purposes and avoid becoming just a collection of lofty aspirations “‘that palter with us in a double sense, that keep the word of promise to our ear, and break it to our hope”.

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

Document(s)

Race and Age Characteristics of those Sentenced to Death before and after Roper

By Frank R. Baumgartner, on 29 August 2022


2022

Academic report

fr
More details Download [ pdf - 111 Ko ]

“The penalty of death is more likely to be imposed on individuals who suffer from various disadvantages: poverty, poor lawyers, mental illness, intellectual deficits, for example. It also is more common among those with white victims compared to minority victims, those who commit crimes in jurisdictions that have previously sentenced more individuals to death, and those who committed their crimes in the 1980s or 1990s as compared to more recent years (see Baumgartner et al. 2018 for details). In this short report I focus on two particular disadvantages: age and minority status.” – Frank R. Baumgartner

Link to the article: https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/report-racial-disparities-in-death-sentences-imposed-on-late-adolescent-offenders-have-grown-since-supreme-court-ruling-banning-juvenile-death-penalty

  • Document type Academic report
  • Available languages

Document(s)

Addressing the Gender Dimension of the Death Penalty: Coaction Between Parliamentarians and Civil Society

By World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, on 10 September 2021


2021

Working with...

Women

fr
More details Download [ pdf - 311 Ko ]

Created on the occasion of the 19th World Day Against the Death Penalty (10/10/21), this tool’s aim is to provide practical advice and concrete suggestions to civil society organizations who wish/ are already collaborating with parliamentarians to end the death penalty and bring attention to women sentenced to death.

Document(s)

Annual Statistics Report 2022

By Project 39A, on 22 February 2023


2023

NGO report

India


More details See the document

This is the seventh edition of the Death Penalty in India: Annual Statistics Report published by Project 39A at National Law University, Delhi. 2022 represents a significant shift in death penalty adjudication, with the Supreme Court recognising the need to reconsider the capital sentencing framework for the first time since it was laid down in Bachan Singh v. State of Punjab in 1980. In a momentous order, the Supreme Court noted the gaps in the death penalty sentencing framework and has sought to address these concerns through a Constitution Bench towards establishing the components of a real, meaningful and effective capital sentencing hearing. In another decision, the Court laid down guidelines for the collection of mitigating material by trial courts. However, in the same year that the Supreme Court cast grave doubts on the death penalty sentencing framework and its implementation by trial courts, it is of concern that 165 death sentences were imposed by Sessions Courts, the highest in a single year since 2000.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list India

Document(s)

EVALUATING FAIRNESS AND ACCURACY IN STATE DEATH PENALTY SYSTEMS: The Tennessee Death Penalty Assessment Report: An Analysis of Tennessee’s Death Penalty Laws, Procedures, and Practices

By American Bar Association, on 1 January 2007


2007

NGO report


More details See the document

To assess fairness and accuracy in Tennessee’s death penalty system, the Tennessee Death Penalty Assessment Team researched the twelve issues that the American Bar Association identified as central to the analysis of the fairness and accuracy of a state’s capital punishment system: (1) collection, preservation, and testing of DNA and other types of evidence; (2) law enforcement identifications and interrogations; (3) crime laboratories and medical examiner offices; (4) prosecutorial professionalism; (5) defense services; (6) the direct appeal process; (7) state post-conviction proceedings; (8) clemency proceedings; (9) jury instructions; (10) judicial independence; (11) racial and ethnic minorities; and (12) mental retardation and mental illness. Following a preliminary chapter on Tennessee’s death penalty law, the Tennessee Death Penalty Assessment Report devotes a chapter to each of these twelve issues. Each chapter begins with a discussion of the relevant law and then concludes the extent to which the State of Tennessee is in compliance with the ABA’s Recommendations.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Due Process ,

Document(s)

EVALUATING FAIRNESS AND ACCURACY IN STATE DEATH PENALTY SYSTEMS: The Pennsylvania Death Penalty Assessment Report: An Analysis of Pennsylvania’s Death Penalty Laws, Procedures, and Practices

By American Bar Association, on 1 January 2007


NGO report


More details See the document

To assess fairness and accuracy in Pennsylvania’s death penalty system, the Pennsylvania Death Penalty Assessment Team researched the twelve issues that the American Bar Association identified as central to the analysis of the fairness and accuracy of a state’scapital punishment system: (1) collection, preservation, and testing of DNA and other types of evidence; (2) law enforcement identifications and interrogations; (3) crime laboratories and medical examiner offices; (4) prosecutorial professionalism; (5) defense services; (6) the direct appeal process; (7) state post-conviction proceedings; (8) clemency; (9) jury instructions; (10) judicial independence; (11) racial and ethnic minorities; and (12) mental retardation and mental illness. Following a preliminary chapter on Pennsylvania’s death penalty law, the Pennsylvania Death Penalty Assessment Report devotes a chapter to each of these issues. Each chapter begins with a discussion of the relevant law and concludes with a discussion of the extent to which the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is in compliance with the ABA’s Recommendations.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Due Process ,

Document(s)

What Strategies Towards the Abolition of the Death Penalty in West Africa? : Report of the Symposium in Dakar

By FIACAT, on 1 January 2012


2012

NGO report


More details See the document

The regional seminar on the abolition of the death penalty in West Africa took place inDakar (Senegal) from 12-14 November 2012. This workshop brought together nineteenACAT members affiliated to FIACAT. It was therefore possible for each of the nine West Afri-can ACATs1to be represented by two participants (with the exception of Senegal, whichwas represented by three members).Participants at the workshop attended lectures and had the opportunity to developnational action plans for achieving abolition in their countries. According to feedbackreceived at the end of the seminar, attendees found the practical nature of the lectures,and the opportunity to network with other ACATs and learn from the experiences of otherparticipants, particularly beneficial.This document is a collection of all of the lectures from the Dakar seminar, as well asinternational and African texts relating to the death penalty. It is intended as a practicaltool to assist us as we progress towards abolition in Sub-Saharan Africa.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Trend Towards Abolition, Member organizations, Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

EVALUATING FAIRNESS AND ACCURACY IN STATE DEATH PENALTY SYSTEMS: The Florida Death Penalty Assessment Report: An Analysis of Florida’s Death Penalty Laws, Procedures, and Practices

By American Bar Association, on 1 January 2006


2006

NGO report


More details See the document

To assess fairness and accuracy in Florida’s death penalty system, the Florida Death Penalty Assessment Team researched the twelve issues that the American Bar Association identified as central to the analysis of the fairness and accuracy of a state’s capital punishment system: (1) collection, preservation, and testing of DNA and other types of evidence; (2) law enforcement identifications and interrogations; (3) crime laboratories and medical examiner offices; (4) prosecutorial professionalism; (5) defense services; (6) the direct appeal process; (7) state post-conviction proceedings; (8) clemency; (9) jury instructions; (10) judicial independence; (11) racial and ethnic minorities; and (12) mental retardation and mental illness. The Florida Death Penalty Assessment Report devotes a chapter to each of these issues, which follow a preliminary chapter on Florida death penalty law (for a total of 13 chapters). Each of the issue chapters begins with a discussion of the relevant law and then reaches conclusions about the extent to which the State of Florida complies with the ABA Recommendations.

  • Document type NGO report

Document(s)

EVALUATING FAIRNESS AND ACCURACY IN STATE DEATH PENALTY SYSTEMS: The Ohio Death Penalty Assessment Report: An Analysis of Ohio’s Death Penalty Laws, Procedures, and Practices

By American Bar Association, on 1 January 2007


2007

NGO report


More details See the document

To assess fairness and accuracy in Ohio’s death penalty system, the Ohio Death Penalty Assessment Team researched the twelve issues that the American Bar Association identified as central to the analysis of the fairness and accuracy of a state’s capital punishment system: (1) collection, preservation, and testing of DNA and other types of evidence; (2) law enforcement identifications and interrogations; (3) crime laboratories and medical examiner offices; (4) prosecutorial professionalism; (5) defense services; (6) the direct appeal process; (7) state post-conviction proceedings; (8) clemency; (9) jury instructions; (10) judicial independence; (11) racial and ethnic minorities; and (12) mental retardation and mental illness. The Ohio Death Penalty Assessment Report devotes a chapter to each of these issues, which follow a preliminary chapter on Ohio death penalty law (for a total of 13 chapters). Each of the issue chapters begins with a discussion of the relevant law and then reaches conclusions about the extent to which the State of Ohio complies with the ABA Recommendations.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Due Process ,

Document(s)

EVALUATING FAIRNESS AND ACCURACY IN STATE DEATH PENALTY SYSTEMS: The Indiana Death Penalty Assessment Report: An Analysis of Indiana’s Death Penalty Laws, Procedures, and Practices

By American Bar Association, on 1 January 2007


NGO report


More details See the document

To assess fairness and accuracy in Indiana’s death penalty system, the Indiana Death Penalty Assessment Team researched the twelve issues that the American Bar Association identified as central to the analysis of the fairness and accuracy of a state’s capital punishment system: (1) collection, preservation, and testing of DNA and other types of evidence; (2) law enforcement identifications and interrogations; (3) crime laboratories and medical examiner offices; (4) prosecutorial professionalism; (5) defense services; (6) the direct appeal process; (7) state post-conviction proceedings; (8) clemency; (9) jury instructions; (10) judicial independence; (11) racial and ethnic minorities; and (12) mental retardation and mental illness. The Indiana Death Penalty Assessment Report devotes a chapter to each of these issues, which follow a preliminary chapter on Indiana death penalty law (for a total of 13 chapters). Each of the issue chapters begins with a discussion of the relevant law and then reaches conclusions about the extent to which the State of Indiana complies with the ABA Recommendations.

  • Document type NGO report

Document(s)

EVALUATING FAIRNESS AND ACCURACY IN STATE DEATH PENALTY SYSTEMS: The Alabama Death Penalty Assessment Report: An Analysis of Alabama’s Death Penalty Laws, Procedures, and Practices

By American Bar Association, on 1 January 2006


2006

NGO report


More details See the document

To assess fairness and accuracy in Alabama’s death penalty system, the Alabama Death Penalty Assessment Team researched twelve issues: (1) collection, preservation, and testing of DNA and other types of evidence; (2) law enforcement identifications and interrogations; (3) crime laboratories and medical examiner offices; (4) prosecutorial professionalism; (5) defense services; (6) the direct appeal process; (7) state postconviction proceedings; (8) clemency; (9) jury instructions; (10) judicial independence; (11) the treatment of racial and ethnic minorities; and (12) mental retardation and mental illness. The Alabama Death Penalty Assessment Report summarizes the research on each issue and analyzes the level of compliance with the relevant ABA Recommendations.

  • Document type NGO report

Document(s)

EVALUATING FAIRNESS AND ACCURACY IN STATE DEATH PENALTY SYSTEMS: The Arizona Death Penalty Assessment Report: An Analysis of Arizona’s Death Penalty Laws, Procedures, and Practices

By American Bar Association, on 1 January 2006


NGO report


More details See the document

To assess fairness and accuracy in Arizona’s death penalty system, the Arizona Death Penalty Assessment Team researched twelve issues: (1) collection, preservation, and testing of DNA and other types of evidence; (2) law enforcement identifications and interrogations; (3) crime laboratories and medical examiner offices; (4) prosecutorial professionalism; (5) defense services; (6) the direct appeal process; (7) state postconviction proceedings; (8) clemency; (9) jury instructions; (10) judicial independence; (11) the treatment of racial and ethnic minorities; and (12) mental retardation and mental illness. The Arizona Death Penalty Assessment Report summarizes the research on each issue and analyzes the State’s level of compliance with the relevant ABA Recommendations.

  • Document type NGO report

Document(s)

EVALUATING FAIRNESS AND ACCURACY IN STATE DEATH PENALTY SYSTEMS: The Georgia Death Penalty Assessment Report: An Analysis of Georgia’s Death Penalty Laws, Procedures, and Practices

By American Bar Association, on 1 January 2006


NGO report


More details See the document

To assess fairness and accuracy in Georgia’s death penalty system, the Georgia Death Penalty Assessment Team researched twelve issues: (1) collection, preservation, and testing of DNA and other types of evidence; (2) law enforcement identifications and interrogations; (3) crime laboratories and medical examiner offices; (4) prosecutorial professionalism; (5) defense services; (6) the direct appeal process; (7) state postconviction proceedings; (8) clemency; (9) jury instructions; (10) judicial independence; (11) the treatment of racial and ethnic minorities; and (12) mental retardation and mental illness. The Georgia Death Penalty Assessment Report summarizes the research on each issue and analyzes the level of compliance with the relevant ABA Recommendations.

  • Document type NGO report

Document(s)

International Network of Academics Against the Death Penalty

By International Academic Network for the abolition of capital punishment, on 8 September 2020


2020

Working with...


More details See the document

It is of the utmost importance, in the short and medium-term, to develop an intense work of academically nature both of study and disclosure of the problems of the abolition of the death penalty in the international scenario, to complement and help the work of the diplomatic action and non-governmental organizations. To this effect it is proposed to keep REPECAP as an ever – growing scientific world network comprising academic law scholars, human rights centers, institutions of public law and Ngos, with expertise and skill in the problems of death penalty and interests in the field of international criminal justice, as well as young researchers who have been dealing with these topics or wish to get involved with the subject, regardless of nationality or locations.

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

Document(s)

Responsible Business Engagement on the Death Penalty. A Practical Guide

By Responsible Business Initiative on the Death Penalty, on 1 January 2019


2019

Working with...

fr
More details See the document

Business engagement in the death penalty is critical because of the impact it can have. Putsimply: the power is in your hands. If your business is looking for a human rights issue whereit can achieve measurable change, advocacy on the death penalty must be considered.Global support for the death penalty is declining. Meanwhile, competition for investment isfierce. Governments and the public at large care more about job creation and a healthy economythan a system of executions. Therefore, the voices of businesses and business leaders havea huge role to play in shaping public dialogue about whether to keep – or end – the use ofcapital punishment.

Document(s)

Key legal Instruments and texts adopted on Abolition of the death penalty by the Council of Europe

By Council of Europe, on 24 January 2023


2023

Regional body report

Trend Towards Abolition

fr
More details See the document

All the Council of Europe documents related to abolition of the death penalty gathered in one page : decisions of the Committee of Ministers, resolutions of the Parliamentary Assembly, Treaties…

Document(s)

Myths and Facts about the Death Penalty

By Death Penalty Focus, on 1 January 2009


2009

Arguments against the death penalty

es
More details See the document

8 Myths about the death penalty are explored in this text: 1. the death penalty is needed to keep society safe, 2. the death penalty is applied fairly, 3. the death penalty is used worldwide, 4. the death penalty deters crime, 5. execution is cheaper than permanent imprisonment, 6. the death penalty offers justice to victims’ families, 7. only the truly guilty get the death penalty, 8. religious teachings support the death penalty.

Document(s)

Crossing the River Styx, The Memoir of a Death Row Chaplain

By Russ Ford. Charles Peppers. Todd C. Peppers, on 24 March 2023


2023

Book

Death Row Conditions 

United States


More details See the document

The Reverend Russ Ford, who served as the head chaplain on Virginia’s death row for eighteen years, raged against the inequities of the death penalty—now outlawed in Virginia—while ministering to the men condemned to die in the 1980s and 1990s. Ford stood watch with twenty-eight men, sitting with them in the squalid death house during the final days and hours of their lives. In July 1990 he accidentally almost became the 245th person killed by Virginia’s electric chair as he comforted Ricky Boggs in his last moments, a vivid episode that opens this haunting book. Many chaplains get to know the condemned men only in these final moments. Ford, however, spent years working with the men of Virginia’s death row, forging close bonds with the condemned and developing a nuanced understanding of their crimes, their early struggles, and their challenges behind bars. His unusual ministry makes this memoir a unique and compelling read, a moving and unflinching portrait of Virginia’s death row inmates. Revealing the cruelties of the state-sanctioned violence that has until recently prevailed in our backyard, Crossing the River Styx serves as a cautionary tale for those who still support capital punishment.

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

Document(s)

THE MOST IMPORTANT FACTS OF 2003

By HANDS OFF CAIN, on 1 January 2004


2004

NGO report

en
More details See the document

The worldwide situation to date: The worldwide situation concerning the death penalty has once again registered a trend towards abolition in the past year. The countries or territories that to different extents have decided to give up the practice of capital punishment total 133, including the first months of 2004. Of these 81 have abolished the death penalty completely; 14 have abolished it for ordinary crimes; 1, Russia, as a member of the Council of Europe is committed to abolish it and in the meanwhile apply a moratorium on executions; 5 are observing moratoriums and 32 countries are de facto abolitionist, not having carried out executions for at least 10 years.

Document(s)

Capital Punishment: New Perspectives

By Peter Hodgkinson / Ashgate Publishing, on 1 January 2013


2013

Book


More details See the document

The authors argue that capital litigators should use their skills challenging the abuses not just of process, but of the conditions in which the condemned await their fate, namely prison conditions, education, leisure, visits, medical services, etc. In the aftermath of successful constitutional challenges it is the beneficiaries (arguably those who are considered successes, having been ‘saved’ from the death penalty and now serving living death penalties of one sort or another) who are suffering the cruel and inhumane alternative.Part I of the book offers a selection of diverse, nuanced examinations of death penalty phenomena, scrutinizing complexities frequently omitted from the narrative of academics and activists. It offers a challenging and comprehensive analysis of issues critical to the abolition debate. Part II offers examinations of countries usually absent from academic analysis to provide an understanding of the status of the debate locally, with opportunities for wider application.

  • Document type Book

Document(s)

No Human Way to Kill

By Robert Priseman / Artfractures, on 1 January 2009


2009

Working with...


More details See the document

‘No Human Way to Kill’ comprises an exhibition of twelve etchings produced by the Goldmark Atelier in 2007 and a 102 page book published by Seabrook Press in association with the Human Rights Centre at the Universtiy of Essex in 2009. The etchings were first displayed at the University of San Francisco in 2008 and the European Commission Gallery in 2009.

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

Document(s)

The International Library of Essays on Capital Punishment, Volume 3 : Policy and Governance

By Peter Hodgkinson / Ashgate Publishing, on 8 September 2020


2020

Book


More details See the document

This volume provides analyses of a range of subjects and issues in the death penalty debate, from medicine to the media. The essays address in particular the personal complexities of those involved, a fundamental part of the subject usually overridden by the theoretical and legal aspects of the debate. The unique personal vantage offered by this volume makes it essential reading for anyone interested in going beyond the removed theoretical understanding of the death penalty, to better comprehending its fundamental humanity. Additionally, the international range of the analysis, enabling disaggregation of country specific motivations, ensures the complexities of the death penalty are also considered from a global perspective.

  • Document type Book
  • Themes list Death Penalty,

Document(s)

Closing the Slaughterhouse

By Dale M Brumfield, on 8 December 2022


2022

Book

United States


More details See the document

On July 1, 2021, Virginia ended a 413-year tradition by abolishing the death penalty.
Many of those convicted from 1608 to 2017 deserved harsh punishment – but Virginia took harsh to a whole new level with its “finality over fairness” philosophy. Four hundred years of her racist, mob-driven capital punishment system ensnared many innocent and undeserving victims under the toxic guises of protecting white citizens or being “tough on crime.” So many of those killed by the state died with their guilt or innocence lost to history.
Virginia leads the nation with 1,390 executions. After a 1976 Supreme Court decision, Virginia institutionalized and streamlined the parade to the death chamber more efficiently than any other state, executing between 1976 and 2017 a breathtaking 73 percent of all who received death sentences. The national average is 16 percent.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States

Document(s)

10 Steps to Writing a UPR Stakeholder Report

By The Advocates for Human Rights, on 1 January 2014


2014

Working with...


More details See the document

This four-page document proposes a roadmap for organisations interested in submitting reports to the United Nations’ Universal Periodic Review of Human Rights.

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

Document(s)

Discrimination and Instructional Comprehension: Guided Discretion, Racial Bias, and the Death Penalty

By Craig Haney / Mona Lynch / Law and Human Behavior, on 1 January 2000


2000

Article

United States


More details See the document

This study links two previously unrelated lines of research: The lack of comprehension of capital penalty-phase jury instructions and discriminatory death sentencing. Jury-eligible subjects were randomly assigned to view one of four versions of a simulated capital penalty trial in which the race of defendant (Black or White) and the race of victim (Black or White) were varied orthogonally. Dependent measures included a sentencing verdict (life without the possibility of parole or the death penalty), ratings of penalty phase evidence, and a test of instructional comprehension. Results indicated that instructional comprehension was poor overall and that, although Black defendants were treated only slightly more punitively than White defendants in general, discriminatory effects were concentrated among participants whose comprehension was poorest. In addition, the use of penalty phase evidence differed as a function of race of defendant and whether the participant sentenced the defendant to life or death. The study suggest that racially biased and capricious death sentencing may be in part caused or exacerbated by the inability to comprehend penalty phase instructions.

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

Document(s)

Death Penalty For Drug Offences: Global Overview 2020

By Harm Reduction International (HRI), on 4 May 2021


2021

NGO report

Drug Offenses


More details See the document

Harm Reduction International has monitored the use of the death penalty for drug offences worldwide since our first ground-breaking publication on this issue in 2007.

This report, our tenth on the subject, continues our work of providing regular updates on legislative, policy and practical developments related to the use of capital punishment for drug offences, a practice which is a clear violation of international law.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Drug Offenses

Document(s)

The Last Supper

By Julie Green, on 1 January 2013


2013

Working with...


More details See the document

The Last Supper illustrates the meal requests of U.S. death row inmates. Cobalt blue mineral paint is applied to second-hand plates, then kiln-fired by technical advisor Toni Acock. I am looking for a space to exhibit all the plates on a ten-year loan. 540 final meals, and two first meals on the outside for exonerated men, are completed to date. I plan to continue adding fifty plates a year until capital punishment is abolished.

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

Document(s)

Adieu to Electrocution

By Deborah W. Denno / Ohio Northern University Law Review, on 1 January 2000


2000

Article

United States


More details See the document

Much has been written about why electrocution has persisted so stubbornly over the course of the twentieth century. This Article focuses briefly on more recent developments concerning why electrocution should be abolished entirely. Part I of this Article describes the facts and circumstances surrounding Bryan as well as Bryan’s unusual world-wide notice due to the gruesome photos of the executed Allen Lee Davis posted on the Internet. Part II focuses on the sociological and legal history of electrocution, most particularly the inappropriate precedential impact of In re Kemmler. In Kemmler, the Court found the Eighth Amendment inapplicable to the states and deferred to the New York legislature’s determination that electrocution was not cruel and unusual. Regardless, Kemmler has been cited repeatedly as Eighth Amendment support for electrocution despite Kemmler’s lack of modern scientific and legal validity.

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

Document(s)

The Death Penalty: A Worldwide Perspective

By Roger Hood / Oxford University Press, on 1 January 2014


2014

Book


More details See the document

The fifth edition of this highly praised study charts and explains the progress that continues to be made towards the goal of worldwide abolition of the death penalty. The majority of nations have now abolished the death penalty and the number of executions has dropped in almost all countries where abolition has not yet taken place. Emphasising the impact of international human rights principles and evidence of abuse, the authors examine how this has fuelled challenges to the death penalty and they analyse and appraise the likely obstacles, political and cultural, to further abolition. They discuss the cruel realities of the death penalty and the failure of international standards always to ensure fair trials and to avoid arbitrariness, discrimination and conviction of the innocent: all violations of the right to life. They provide further evidence of the lack of a general deterrent effect; shed new light on the influence and limits of public opinion; and argue that substituting for the death penalty life imprisonment without parole raises many similar human rights concerns.

  • Document type Book
  • Themes list Trend Towards Abolition,

Document(s)

Executions, Deterrence and Homicide: A Tale of Two Cities

By David T. Johnson / Jeffrey Fagan / Franklin Zimring / Columbia School of Law, on 1 January 2009


2009

Article

China


More details See the document

We compare homicide rates in two quite similar cities with vastly different execution risks. Singapore had an execution rate close to 1 per million per year until an explosive twentyfold increase in 1994-95 and 1996-97 to a level that we show was probably the highest in the world. Hong Kong,has no executions all during the last generation and abolished capital punishment in 1993. Homicide levels and trends are remarkably similar in these two cities over the 35 years after 1973. By comparing two closely matched places with huge contrasts in actual execution but no differences in homicide trends, we have generated a unique test of the exuberant claims of deterrence that have been produced over the past decade in the U.S.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list China
  • Themes list Deterrence ,

Document(s)

Not to Decide is to Decide: The U.S. Supreme Courts Thirty-Year Struggle With One Case About Competency to Waive Death Penalty Appeals

By Phyllis L. Crocker / Wayne Law Review 49(4), 885-938, on 1 January 2004


2004

Article

United States


More details See the document

In 1995, the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed Rees v. Peyton, Rees was a death penalty case in which the petitioner sought to withdraw his petition for writ of certiorari so that he could be executed. The Court stayed the proceedings after Rees was found incompetent to waive his appeal, but the Court did not dismiss the case until after Rees died of natural causes. Rees pended in the Court during the terms of three Chief Justices. Even though the Court underwent major changes in personnel and philosophy during those years, the Court’s treatment of Rees was essentially the same–to hold the case in abeyance. This article chronicles the extraordinary history of Rees in the U.S. Supreme Court for those thirty years.

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

Document(s)

Capital Punishment and the Bible

By Gardner C. Hanks / Herald Press, on 1 January 2002


2002

Book

United States


More details See the document

Capital Punishment and the Bible goes beyond proof-text arguments to examine biblical statements about capital punishment in their historical contexts and for present meaning. Does the use of capital punishment in the USA meet Old Testament standards for fairness? How did Jesus and the early church extend God’s love in restorative justice? Gardner C. Hanks convincingly shows that the use of the death penalty is not consistent with Jesus’ call for love and forgiveness.

  • Document type Book
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Religion ,

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)

The Death Penalty: Should the Judge or the Jury Decide Who Dies?

By John H. Blume / Theodore Eisenberg / Sheri Lynn Johnson / Cornell Law Review / Martin T. Wells / Valerie P. Hans / Amelia Courtney Hritz / Caisa E. Royer, on 1 January 2014


2014

Academic report


More details See the document

This article addresses the effect of judge versus jury decision making through analysis of a database of all capital sentencing phase hearing trials in the state of Delaware from 1977-2007. Over the three decades of the study, Delaware shifted responsibility for death penalty sentencing from the jury to the judge. Currently, Delaware is one of the handful of states that gives the judge the final decision making authority in capital trials. Controlling for a number of legally-relevant and other predictor variables, we find that the shift to judge sentencing significantly increased the number of death sentences. Statutory aggravating factors, stranger homicides, and the victim’s gender also increased the likelihood of a death sentence, as did the county of the homicide. We reflect on the implications of these results for debates about the constitutionality of judge sentencing in capital cases.

  • Document type Academic report
  • Themes list Statistics, Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

Ray Krone

By Amnesty International / YouTube, on 1 January 2008


2008

Legal Representation


More details See the document

Ray Krone was on death row in Arizona State Prison for two years (and eight years in prison) before he was freed after DNA tests proved his innocence in 2002.Mr. Krone became the 100th death row inmate to be proven innocent in the United States of America since 1973. Mr. Krone was twice convicted for a murder he did not commit. Mr. Krone tell his story in this video.

  • Document type Legal Representation
  • Themes list Networks,

Document(s)

3 questions to Ndume Olatushani, former death row prisoner

By Ensemble contre la peine de mort (ECPM), on 1 January 2018


2018

Academic report

United States


More details See the document

Ndume, 56 years old, spent 28 years in prison in the US, 20 of which on death row, for a crime he did not commit. Today, he is human rights activist, and fight with us for the abolition of the death penalty. He is also a very gifted painter.

  • Document type Academic report
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Death Row Conditions, Death Penalty,

Document(s)

The Grass Beneath His Feet: The Charles Victor Thompson Story

By Roger Rodriguez / AuthorHouse, on 1 January 2008


2008

Book

United States

fr
More details See the document

Nothing produced a glow in his eyes like the wonders of nature provoking his every curiosity. Everything about nature appealed to his meticulous character and his childhood was invested at Medina Lake, chasing down fireflies, and fishing. There was nothing he liked better than fried perch and eggs for breakfast. So how does such an innocent boy end up on death row in what most agree is the most relentless state for executing murders? The Grass Beneath His Feet recounts the life of Charles Victor Thompson, who after falling in love; found himself in a disturbing chain of events that would change his life forever. This re-telling of his story is extracted directly from the journals of Charles Victor Thompson himself where his childhood, his true love, and his ultimate escape from death row are revealed. For this first time, readers can enjoy the intimate details of the escape that shocked the entire nation. America?s Most Wanted, CNN, The World News all wanted to know the same question: How did this man manage to escape from the most notorious death row system in the country? The Grass Beneath His Feet also introduces Charles to the people, not as a murderer, but as a man fighting to prove that there were many flaws in his legal process that kept him from proving that he does not meet criteria for capital punishment. Prepare to embark on a journey into a life at death row through the eyes of Charles Victor Thompson and run next to him as a child and an escapee as he took in the beauty of nature and the South Texas sun with the grass beneath his feet.

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 Failure of Mitigation?

By Robert J. Smith / Hastings Law Journal, on 1 January 2014


2014

Article

United States


More details See the document

A vast literature details the crimes that condemned inmates commit, but very little is known about the social histories of these capital offenders. For example, how many offenders possessed mitigating characteristics that demonstrate intellectual or psychological deficits comparable to those shared by classes of offenders categorically excluded from capital punishment? Did these executed offenders suffer from intellectual disability, youthfulness, mental illness, or childhood trauma? The problem with this state of affairs is that the personal characteristics of the defendant can render the death penalty an excessive punishment regardless of the characteristics of the crime. This Article begins to fill the mitigation knowledge gap by describing the social histories of the last hundred offenders executed in America. Scouring state and federal court records, this Article documents the presence of significant mitigation evidence for eighty-seven percent of executed offenders. Though only a first step, our findings suggest the failure of the Supreme Court’s mitigation project to ensure the only offenders subjected to a death sentence are those with “a consciousness materially more depraved” than that of the typical murderer. Indeed, the inverse appears to be true: the vast majority of executed offenders possess significant functional deficits that rival — and perhaps outpace — those associated with intellectual impairment and juvenile status; defendants that the Court has categorically excluded from death eligibility.

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

Document(s)

Elmer ‘Geronimo’ Pratt dies at 63; former Black Panther whose murder conviction was overturned

By Robert J. Lopez / Los Angeles Times, on 8 September 2020


2020

Academic report

United States


More details See the document

Elmer G. “Geronimo” Pratt, a former Los Angeles Black Panther Party leader whose 1972 murder conviction was overturned after he spent 27 years in prison for a crime he said he did not commit, has died. He was 63.

  • Document type Academic report
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Innocence,

Document(s)

Barbara Bechnel: Witness to the execution of Stanley Tookie Williams

By YouTube, on 1 January 2009


2009

Legal Representation


More details See the document

A witness to the lethal injection execution of Stanley Tookie Williams describes what she saw at his execution. Stanley Tookie Williams execution was botched and he experienced 35 minutes of pain because part of the lethal injection 3 drug procedure did not work effectively.

  • Document type Legal Representation
  • Themes list Networks,

Document(s)

The Juvenile Death Penalty Today: Death Sentences and Executions for Juvenile Crimes, January 1, 1973 – February 28, 2005

By Victor Streib / Ohio Northern University, on 8 September 2020


2020

Article

United States


More details See the document

This is Issue #77, the final issue of these periodic reports, having first been launched on June 15, 1984. On that date, the death penalty for juvenile offenders (defined as those under age 18 at the time of their crimes) was an obscure issue in law as well as in political and social arenas. During the last twenty-one years, these reports have been with us (1) through the intense litigation of the late 1980s, (2) through our society’s near hysteria about violent juvenile crime in the 1990s, (3) into the era of the international pressure on the United States to abandon this practice, and (4) now at the end of this practice. The validity and influence of these reports is indicated by thecitations to them in the opinions of leading courts, including the United States Supreme Court: Roper v. Simmons, 125 S.Ct. 1183, 1192, 1193, 1210, 1211, 1221 (2005); In re Stanford, 537 U.S. 968, 971 (2002); and Stanford v. Kentucky, 492 U.S. 361, 373 (1989). In the litigation leading up to the final juvenile death penalty case before the United States Supreme Court (Roper v. Simmons, 125 S.Ct. 1183 (2005)), the Missouri Supreme Court majority opinion included 12 citations to these reports: See Simmons v. Roper, 112 S.W.3d 397, 408, 409, 411 (Mo. 2003). This final issue of this periodic report is intended to document the status of the death penalty for juvenile offenders as ofthe day before the United States Supreme Court held this practice to be unconstitutional. These reports sketch the characteristics of the juvenile offenders and their crimes who have been sentenced to death, who have been executed, and who are currently under death sentences. —- See bottom left hand corner of web page.

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

Document(s)

Database Center for North Korean Human Rights – Briefings on public execution

By Database Center for North Korean Human Rights, on 8 September 2020


Article

Republic of Korea


More details See the document

NKDB hosts a monthly English language briefing and discussion on North Korean human rights every month with embassy officials, NGO staff, and NKDB staff as guests

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list Republic of Korea
  • Themes list World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, Death Penalty, Country/Regional profiles,

Document(s)

Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Decides

By Who Decides, Inc., on 1 January 2012


2012

Working with...


More details See the document

The objective of this initiative was to use “the product of art” as a vehicle to educate common people about the history and practice of capital punishment in America and to lift societies consciousness around the idea of endowing a National Death Penalty Museum to preserve its deep history.

  • Document type Working with...
  • Themes list Public debate,

Document(s)

China Executed 2,400 People in 2013, Dui Hua

By Dui Hua Human Rights Journal, on 1 January 2014


2014

Article

China


More details See the document

The Dui Hua Foundation estimates that China executed approximately 2,400 people in 2013 and will execute roughly the same number of people in 2014. Annual declines in executions recorded in recent years are likely to be offset in 2014 by the use of capital punishment in anti-terrorism campaigns in Xinjiang and the anti-corruption campaign nationwide.

  • Document type Article
  • Countries list China
  • Themes list Statistics,

Document(s)

Human Rights and the Death Penalty

By The Advocates for Human Rights, on 1 January 2012


2012

Campaigning


More details See the document

Four-page introduction to the status of the death penalty in international human rights law and the global trend abolition.

  • Document type Campaigning
  • Themes list International law, Trend Towards Abolition,

Document(s)

So Long as They Die: Lethal Injections in the United States

By Human Rights Watch, on 1 January 2006


2006

NGO report


More details See the document

This 65-page report reveals the slipshod history of executions by lethal injection, using a protocol created three decades ago with no scientific research, nor modern adaptation, and still unchanged today. As the prisoner lies strapped to a gurney, a series of three drugs is injected into his vein by executioners hidden behind a wall. A massive dose of sodium thiopental, an anesthetic, is injected first, followed by pancuronium bromide, which paralyzes voluntary muscles, but leaves the prisoner fully conscious and able to experience pain. A third drug, potassium chloride, quickly causes cardiac arrest, but the drug is so painful that veterinarian guidelines prohibit its use unless a veterinarian first ensures that the pet to be put down is deeply unconscious. No such precaution is taken for prisoners being executed.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Lethal Injection,

Document(s)

Juvenile Offenders Awaiting Execution in Yemen : “Look at Us with a Merciful Eye”

By Human Rights Watch, on 1 January 2013


2013

NGO report

ar
More details See the document

The 30-page report found that at least 22 individuals have been sentenced to death in Yemen despite evidence that they were under age 18 at the time of their alleged crimes. In the last five years, Yemen has executed at least 15 young men and women who said they were under 18 at the time of their offense.

Document(s)

Foreign Nationals and the Death Penalty in the US

By Death Penalty Information Center / Mark Warren, on 1 January 2013


Article

United States


More details See the document

New information on foreign nationals facing the death penalty in the U.S. is now available through Mark Warren of Human Rights Research. This DPIC page includes information on 143 foreign citizens from 37 countries on state and federal death rows.

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

Document(s)

Take action on the death penalty

By The Advocates for Human Rights, on 8 September 2020


2020

Campaigning


More details See the document

Two-page guide with tips and contacts for individuals interested in getting started in anti-death penalty activism in the US.

  • Document type Campaigning
  • Themes list Public opinion,

Document(s)

The Death Penalty: The Ultimate Punishment

By Amnesty International, on 1 January 2008


2008

Campaigning

enfres
More details See the document

Campaigning toolkit published by Amnesty International. A 16-page detailed advocacy document explaining why the abolition of the death penalty is necessary and how the theories behind capital punishment get it wrong.

Document(s)

Death Penalty and Deterrence

By Amnesty International - USA, on 8 September 2020


2020

Arguments against the death penalty


More details See the document

An argument against deterrence is made by looking at a survey which found that during the last 20 years, the homicide rate in states with the death penalty has been 48 to 101 percent higher than in states without the death penalty.

  • Document type Arguments against the death penalty
  • Themes list Deterrence ,

Document(s)

The Prevalence and Potential Causes of Wrongful Conviction by Fingerprint Evidence.

By Simon A. Cole / Golden Gate University Law Review, on 1 January 2006


2006

Article

United States


More details See the document

As the number of post-conviction DNA exonerations mounted and the Innocence Project undertook to treat these exonerations as a data set indicating the principal causes of wrongful conviction, the absence of fingerprint cases in that data set could have been interpreted as soft evidence that latent print evidence was unlikely to contribute to wrongful convictions. That situation changed in 2004 when Stephan Cowans became the first – and thus far the only – person to be exonerated by DNA evidence for a wrongful conviction in which fingerprint evidence was a contributing factor. Cowans’s wrongful conviction in Boston in 1997 for the attempted murder of a police officer was based almost solely on eyewitness identification and latent print evidence. The Cowans case not only provided dramatic additional support for the already established proposition that wrongful conviction by fingerprint was possible, it also demonstrated why the exposure of such cases, when they do occur, is exceedingly unlikely. These points have already been made in a comprehensive 2005 study of exposed cases of latent print misattributions. In this article, I discuss some additional things that we have learned about the prevalence and potential causes of wrongful conviction by fingerprint in the short time since the publication of that study.

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

Document(s)

The Last Holdouts: Ending the Juvenile Death Penalty in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Pakistan, and Yeman

By Human Rights Watch, on 1 January 2008


2008

NGO report

ar
More details See the document

In this 20-page report, Human Rights Watch documents failures in law and practice that since January 2005 have resulted in 32 executions of juvenile offenders in five countries: Iran (26), Saudi Arabia (2), Sudan (2), Pakistan (1), and Yemen (1). The report also highlights cases of individuals recently executed or facing execution in the five countries, where well over 100 juvenile offenders are currently on death row, awaiting the outcome of a judicial appeal, or in some murder cases, the outcome of negotiations for pardons in exchange for financial compensation

Document(s)

Death Penalty Trends

By Amnesty International - USA, on 1 January 2013


2013

Arguments against the death penalty


More details See the document

This sheet speaks about the trend towards abolition of the death penalty, aswell as declining public support for it.

  • Document type Arguments against the death penalty
  • Themes list Trend Towards Abolition,

Document(s)

Religion and the Death Penalty

By Death Penalty Information Center, on 8 September 2020


2020

Arguments against the death penalty


More details See the document

In recent years, a growing number of religious organizations have participated in the nation’s death penalty debate. The purpose of this Web page is to provide access to information regarding the efforts of these faith groups and to highlight recent developments related to religion and the death penalty.

  • Document type Arguments against the death penalty
  • Themes list Religion ,

Document(s)

Death Penalty and Innocence

By Amnesty International - USA, on 8 September 2020


Arguments against the death penalty


More details See the document

This webpage talks about innocence and the death penalty: Examples of innocence in three cases in the United States and factors leading to wrongful conviction.

  • Document type Arguments against the death penalty
  • Themes list Innocence,

Document(s)

Death Penalty and Arbitrariness

By Amnesty International - USA, on 8 September 2020


Arguments against the death penalty


More details See the document

This sheet details the factors which contribute to the arbitrariness of the death penalty in the USA.

  • Document type Arguments against the death penalty
  • Themes list Arbitrariness,

Document(s)

Sri Lankan expert needed to conduct study on the death penalty – Terms of reference

By World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, on 23 December 2021


2021

World Coalition


More details Download [ pdf - 83 Ko ]
  • Document type World Coalition

Document(s)

Death Penalty and Race

By Amnesty International - USA, on 8 September 2020


2020

Arguments against the death penalty

es
More details See the document

From initial charging decisions to plea bargaining to jury sentencing, African-Americans are treated more harshly when they are defendants, and their lives are accorded less value when they are victims.

Document(s)

Death Penalty and Mental Illness

By Amnesty International - USA, on 1 January 2013


2013

Arguments against the death penalty

es
More details See the document

The execution of those with mental illness or “the insane” is clearly prohibited by international law. Virtually every country in the world prohibits the execution of people with mental illness. This webpage explores international law and the death penalty in relation to the USA.

Document(s)

Death Penalty Cost

By Amnesty International - USA, on 8 September 2020


2020

Arguments against the death penalty

es
More details See the document

This factsheet deals with the cost of the death penalty in the United States using figures from a study conducted by the Californian Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice.

Document(s)

Pathways to Justice: Implementing a Fair and Effective Remedy following Abolition of the Mandatory Death Penalty in Kenya

By The Death Penalty Project, on 1 January 2019


2019

NGO report


More details See the document

This report draws on experiences in other jurisdictions where capital sentencing laws have been struck down or abolished, thereby generating the need for prisoners already unlawfully sentenced to death to be given substitute sentences. It delineates the ways in which other common law jurisdictions have addressed the practical and procedural challenges of resentencing following the abolition of the mandatory death penalty – navigating potential human rights infringements and ensuring that satisfactory requirements of due process are met. Resentencing procedures must also be scalable and practically accessible to the large number of individuals (thousands in the case of Kenya) entitled to relief.

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

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in 2020: Year-End Report

By Death Penalty Information Center, on 1 January 2020


2020

NGO report

United States


More details See the document

2020 was abnormal in almost every way, and that was clearly the case when it came to capital punishment in the United States. The interplay of four forces shaped the U.S. death penalty landscape in 2020: the nation’s long-term trend away from capital punishment; the worst global pandemic in more than a century; nationwide protests for racial justice; and the historically aberrant conduct of the federal administration. At the end of the year, more states had abolished the death penalty or gone ten years without an execution, more counties had elected reform prosecutors who pledged never to seek the death penalty or to use it more sparingly; fewer new death sentences were imposed than in any prior year since the Supreme Court struck down U.S. death penalty laws in 1972; and despite a six-month spree of federal executions without parallel in the 20th or 21st centuries, fewer executions were carried out than in any year in nearly three decades.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list United States

Document(s)

The death penalty wordwide: developments in 2004

By Amnesty International, on 1 January 2005


2005

NGO report

fres
More details See the document

This document covers significant events concerning the death penalty during the year 2004. Five countries abolished the death penalty for all crimes, bringing to 84 the number of totally abolitionist countries at year end. Scores of death sentences were commuted in Malawi and Zambia, and moratoria or suspensions of executions were being observed in several other countries. Other subjects covered in this document include significant judicial decisions; the use of the death penalty against the innocent; resumptions of executions; and campaigning activities to promote abolition.

Document(s)

Death sentences and executions in 2010

By Amnesty International, on 1 January 2011


2011

NGO report

fres
More details See the document

In the last decade, more than 30 countries have abolished the death penalty in law or practice. Fifty-eight countries worldwide now retain the death penalty for ordinary crimes, and less than half of these carried out executions in 2010. This report analyzes some of the key developments in the worldwide application of the death penalty in 2010, citing figures gathered by Amnesty International on the number of death sentences handed down and executions carried out during the year.

Document(s)

West Africa: Time to abolish the death penalty

By Amnesty International, on 1 January 2003


2003

NGO report

fr
More details See the document

This doument summarizes each of the 16 ECOWAS countries’ legislation on the death penalty, provides information on the most recent executions and convictions and notes the view currently taken by the governments concerned. Two thirds have already abolished the death penalty

Document(s)

The Death Penalty in the OSCE Area: Background Paper 2019

By Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), on 1 January 2019


2019

International law - Regional body


More details See the document

Fifty-five (55) OSCE participating States have either completely abolished the death penalty or maintain moratoria on executions as an important first step towards abolition. However, in a global context where discussions focus on the threat of terrorism and a need to be tough on crime, it is perhaps not surprising that the question of reintroducing the death penalty surfaces at times, including in the OSCE region. It is, therefore, a good moment to reflect on the reasons why there is still support for the death penalty, considering the growing understanding that capital punishment is a cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment. Some of the most persistent arguments used to justify the use of the death penalty and its possible reintroduction will be discussed in the report.

  • Document type International law - Regional body
  • Themes list Trend Towards Abolition,

Document(s)

The Death Penalty In 2018: Year End Report

By Death Penalty Information Center / Death Penalty Information Centre, on 1 January 2018


2018

NGO report


More details See the document

New death sentences and executions remained near historic lows in 2018 and a twentieth state abolished capital punishment, as public opinion polls, election results, legislative actions, and court decisions all reflected the continuing erosion of the death penalty across the country.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Themes list Death Penalty,

Document(s)

Triggers for the abolition of the death penalty in Africa: a Southern African perspective

By Fédération Internationale des Ligues des Droits de l'Homme (FIDH), on 1 January 2017


2017

NGO report

fr
More details See the document

In Africa, more than 80% of countries have abolished the death penalty in law or in practice, with only 10 countries executing within the past decade, said FIDH and DITSHWANELO in their joint study, “Triggers for the abolition of the death penalty in Africa: a Southern African perspective”.The 36 pages study identifies the triggers leading to the abolition of the death penalty in Africa. It was released simultaneously with a documentary called #Gambia has decided which shows the current abolitionist process experienced in The Gambia.

Document(s)

Going backwards The death penalty in Southeast Asia

By International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), on 1 January 2016


2016

NGO report


More details See the document

Over the past year, Southeast Asia has witnessed significant setbacks with regard to the abolitionof the death penalty. Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore have all carried out executions. It isunknown whether any executions were carried out in Vietnam, where statistics on the deathpenalty continue to be classified as ‘state secrets.’ In the name of combating drug trafficking,Indonesian President Joko Widodo is rapidly becoming Southeast Asia’s top executioner. ThePhilippines, which effectively abolished the death penalty for all crimes in 2006, is consideringreinstating capital punishment as part of President Rodrigo Duterte’s ill-conceived and disastrous‘war on drugs.’

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