Death Penalty
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Share3170 people in the United States currently are under a death sentence. Since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, 1314 men, women, children, and mentally ill people have been shot, hanged, asphyxiated, lethally injected, and electrocuted by States and the federal government.
Mounting evidence shows that innocent people have been sentenced to death and that serious legal errors infect the administration of capital punishment. For every eight people executed in this country, one innocent person on death row has been identified and exonerated. In response to growing concerns about reliability, many states have suspended executions or experienced a decline in the use of capital punishment, but most southern states have continued to condemn and execute large numbers of people who disproportionately are poor and racial minorities.
Alabama currently has 192 men and women on its death row. Alabama sentences more people to death per capita than any other state, due in part to elected judges who are allowed to override a jury’s verdict of life. Alabama is the only state in the country that allows elected state court judges to override jury verdicts of life imprisonment and impose death sentences without strict limiting standards. About 21% of the people on Alabama's death row received a life verdict that was overridden by a trial judge.
Alabama is also the only state in the country without a state-funded program to provide legal assistance to death row prisoners. Nearly half of the people currently under sentence of death in Alabama were represented at trial by appointed counsel whose compensation for trial preparation was capped by law at just $1000.
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Alabama Death Row Map Interactive map shows current death sentences in Alabama.
Video: Bryan Stevenson on Up with Chris Hayes discusses economic arguments against the death penalty.
PDF: EJI Report on Judge Override
Judge Override in Alabama Facts and materials about Alabama's unique and arbitrary practice of permitting elected trial judges to override jury life verdicts and impose death sentences.
The Death Penalty in the U.S. Summarizing nationwide data on the death penalty.
The Death Penalty in Alabama Facts on Alabama’s death row, judicial override, inadequate counsel, racial bias, and more.
Alabama's Disproportionately High Rate of Death Sentencing Fact sheet showing that Alabama leads the nation in death sentencing and execution rate.
Alabama Executions Information about death row prisoners scheduled to be executed in Alabama and about recent executions, plus list of all executions in Alabama since the death penalty was reinstated.
"Death In Dixie" Film featuring former First Lady Rosalynn Carter explores race and the death penalty and profiles three Alabama wrongful conviction cases. Watch the preview and purchase the DVD.
Questions of Death Row Justice For Poor People in Alabama New York Times article on counsel for indigent capital defendants in Alabama.
Birmingham News Editorial Series on the Death Penalty in Alabama Series of articles examining Alabama’s Death Penalty.
Birmingham News Blog: Alabama Too Often Skirts Rules in Death Penalty Cases
Gadsden Times Editorial: Execution to Death Row
Protecting Human Rights from Death Article on the death penalty by Bryan Stevenson.
Speaking of Justice Bryan Stevenson speaks about Maryland Commission's recommendation to abolish death penalty.