death row

June 22, 2022 - Soon Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) will have appointed a majority of justices on his state's Supreme Court, just as it considers striking down precedents guaranteeing abortion rights. He's considering a judge who'd bring to the court sorely needed gender and racial diversity — but not ideological diversity.

March 3, 2022 - While reporting on the human rights crisis in Alabama's prisons, journalist Beth Shelburne began corresponding with incarcerated men in the state about their fight to read. She recounts their ongoing battles against censorship inside an irrational system where books and magazines are treated like dangerous contraband.

June 3, 2020 - Stacked with appointments from Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, the Florida Supreme Court is quickly overturning previous decisions that barred the death penalty for some defendants with intellectual disabilities and those who were sentenced by non-unanimous juries.

February 13, 2020 - Supreme courts in every other Southern state have addressed the problem of racist jury selection. But in the decades since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled such discrimination unconstitutional, North Carolina courts have turned away every claim.

September 4, 2019 - A gathering of conservative anti-death penalty activists in New Orleans this month could help shift the debate over capital punishment in Louisiana and across the South.

April 12, 2017 - The effort to release a North Carolina man who many believe has been imprisoned for over 20 years for a murder he did not commit is getting renewed attention — and shining a spotlight on a criminal justice system that's seven times more likely to convict innocent Black people of murder than innocent whites.

October 18, 2006 - If ever criminal defendants need quality representation, it's when their life is on the line. But at least 37 people currently on North Carolina's death row -- and at least 16 people executed by the state since 1977 -- did not have lawyers at trial who would meet today's minimum standards of qualification for capital defense attorneys.