Death Penalty

A Death Penalty Lawyer Grapples With the End of Roe

PUBLISHED 6/2/2022 by

Conspicuously absent from the talking points promulgated by abortion opponents is what happens to girls and women who are forced to proceed with unwanted pregnancies. And what becomes of those children—the unaborted? Does being unwanted “cause” people to become criminals? No. But people navigate life with the tools they have. When trouble mounts for those kids, sweeping them into the school to prison pipeline, it is often the conservative, pro-life camp, who lead the charge to “lock them up and throw away the key.”

Where additional supports are absent, the trajectories of unwanted children should be of concern to us all, regardless of religious or political affiliation.

Bipartisan Group Urges Reconsideration of Melissa Lucio’s Death Sentence

PUBLISHED 4/25/2022 by
Bipartisan Groups Urge Reconsideration of Melissa Lucio’s Death Sentence

The state of Texas plans to put Melissa Lucio to death by lethal injection on Wednesday, April 27, which would make her the sixth woman executed in the U.S. in the last decade and the first Hispanic woman in Texas history.

But new evidence of Lucio’s interrogation reveals how unlikely it is that she is guilty—which is why a bipartisan group of Texas state lawmakers is asking authorities to reconsider the scheduled execution. They join hundreds of other Texans—including 225 anti-domestic violence groups, 130 faith leaders and 30 Latino organizations—in urging the Board of Pardons and Paroles and Governor Abbott to grant Lucio a reprieve.

Texas Set to Execute Melissa Lucio Despite Credible Claims of Innocence

PUBLISHED 3/15/2022 by

Texas plans to put Melissa Lucio to death on April 27, which would make her the sixth woman executed in the U.S. in the last decade and the first Hispanic woman in Texas history. Lucio was convicted of murder in 2008 for the death of her 2-year-old daughter, Mariah, which she and her family claim was instead a tragic accident. Her attorneys are fighting to overturn her conviction and set aside her execution date based on her continued innocence claims and other procedural issues.

“Research shows prosecutors frequently trivialize women’s experiences as victims of gender-based violence when they are charged with crimes,” said Sandra Babcock, director of the Cornell Center on the Death Penalty Worldwide and one of Lucio’s attorneys. “Yet Melissa was a victim long before she was a defendant.”

The Feminist Case for Ending the Death Penalty

PUBLISHED 7/13/2021 by
abortion pill supreme court lisa montgomery death penalty women

Feminists have every reason to be suspicious of capital punishment. Death penalty laws in the U.S. were enacted by legislatures dominated by men; death sentences are sought by prosecutors who are predominately men; juries that condemn defendants to death have historically been mostly male; and judges who sentence defendants to death are overwhelmingly male.

A “Prisoner of War” Story: The Life and Captivity of Lisa Montgomery—The First Woman To Be Executed by the Federal Government in 68 Years

PUBLISHED 1/11/2021 by
lisa montgomery the Only Woman on Federal Death Row

Early Wednesday morning, the U.S. government executed Lisa Montgomery after a flurry of legal efforts failed to outlast a Trump administration that was determined to put a lifelong victim of torture and severe mental illness to death.

Here, find an investigation of Lisa’s life, from a childhood of pain to motherhood behind bars—the story of a woman failed by every layer of our society, including, on the last night of her life, the United States Supreme Court.