United States

RetentionistLegal status of the death penalty*
2654Number of individuals currently under sentence of death
18Executions in 2022
11Executions in 2021
17Executions in 2020

2022Last known execution
Lethal Injection, ShootingMethod(s) of execution
YesParty to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
NoParty to the Second Optional Protocol to the ICCPR, aiming at the abolition of the death penalty
YesParty to the American Convention on Human Rights
NoParty to the Protocol to the American Convention on Human Rights to Abolish the Death Penalty
NoUN Moratorium Resolution (2010): cosponsor
AgainstUN Moratorium Resolution (2010): vote
NoUN Moratorium Resolution (2010): has signed the Note Verbale of Dissociation
NoUN Moratorium Resolution (2012): cosponsor
AgainstUN Moratorium Resolution (2012): vote
NoUN Moratorium Resolution (2012): has signed the Note Verbale of Dissociation
NoDoes the country have a mandatory death penalty?
2023-05-23Last update


Source: Cornell Center on the Death Penalty Worldwide
*Source of classification: Amnesty International

Related document(s)

Document(s)

DP3 Study: After 1,600 Executions, the Public and Police are Safer in States with No Death Penalty

By Death Penalty Policy Project, on 18 November 2024


2024

Arguments against the death penalty

United States


More details See the document

The Death Penalty Policy Project has published a comprehensive study analyzing over three decades of FBI homicide data. The findings reveal that U.S. states without the death penalty or with moratoria on executions are safer for both the public and police. By contrast, states actively carrying out executions rank among the least safe in the U.S. The study challenges long-held deterrence arguments and underscores the death penalty’s ineffectiveness as a public safety policy.

  • Document type Arguments against the death penalty
  • Countries list United States

Document(s)

Issues Impacting LGBTQ+ Prisoners

By Death Penalty Information Center, on 3 September 2024


2024

NGO report

Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment and Punishment

Fair Trial

United States


More details See the document

LGBTQ+ people, especially people of color and low income, experience high levels of policing and criminalization, leading to an overrepresentation of these individuals in the incarcerated population. A 2017 study from researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles School of Law, suggests that LGBTQ+ people are three times as likely to be incarcerated than the general population. Once incarcerated, LGBTQ+ people are often subjected to violence from correctional staff and fellow prisoners, as well denied medical care and access to mental health services.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment and Punishment / Fair Trial

Document(s)

Lethal Election: How the U.S. Electoral Process Increases the Arbitrariness of the Death Penalty

By Death Penalty Information Center, on 1 July 2024


2024

NGO report

Public Opinion

United States


More details See the document

Key Findings

Elected supreme court justices in Georgia, North Carolina, and Ohio are twice as likely to affirm death penalty cases during an election year than in any other year. This effect is statistically significant when controlling for the number of cases each year.

Changing public opinion means that zealous support for the death penalty is no longer a litmus test for elected officials in many death penalty jurisdictions. Today’s elections feature viable candidates who criticize use of the death penalty and pledge reforms or even non-use, reflecting the significant decline in public support for the death penalty.

Elected governors were more likely to grant clemency in the past when they did not face voters in an upcoming election. Concerns about voter “backlash” have eased today with declining public support and low numbers of new death sentences and executions, and have led to an increased number of prisoners benefiting from clemency grants, especially mass grants, in recent years.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Public Opinion

Document(s)

Broken Promises: How a History of Racial Violence and Bias Shaped Ohio’s Death Penalty

By Death Penalty Information Center , on 14 May 2024


2024

NGO report

Fair Trial

Innocence

Trend Towards Abolition

United States


More details See the document

In January 2024, Ohio lawmakers announced plans to expand the use of the death penalty to permit executions with nitrogen gas, as Alabama had just done a week earlier. But at the same time the Attorney General and the Ohio Prosecuting Attorneys Association are championing this legislation, a bipartisan group of state legislators has introduced a bill to abolish the death penalty based on “significant concerns on who is sentenced to death and how that sentence is carried out.” The competing narratives make it more important than ever for Ohioans to have a meaningful, accurate understanding of how capital punishment is being used, including whether the state has progressed beyond the mistakes of its past.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list United States
  • Themes list Fair Trial / Innocence / Trend Towards Abolition
Other documents
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Members

American Friends Service Committee
California People of Faith
Catholic Mobilizing Network
Center for Constitutional Rights
Citizens United for Rehabilitation of Errants (CURE)
Cornell Center on Death Penalty Worldwide
Death Penalty Focus
Equal Justice USA
Journey of Hope… From Violence to Healing
Kids Against the Death Penalty
Michigan Committee Against Capital Punishment
National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL)
National Lawyers Guild (NLG)
New Hampshire Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty (NHCADP)
Parliamentarians for Global Action (PGA)
People of Faith Against the Death Penalty
The Advocates for Human Rights
ACS Logo The American Constitution Society (ACS)
Themis Fund / The 8th Amendment Project
Witness to Innocence

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