Capital Punishment
What you need to know
8
Since the year 2000, 8 men have been exonerated and freed from Louisiana's death row, most recently in April 2017
148
Between 1973 and 2015, 148 innocent death-row prisoners in 26 different states were exonerated and released.
76%
Seventy-six percent of executions imposed nationwide since 1976 were for killing (at least one) white victim.
The death penalty in Louisiana is a broken process from start to finish. Death sentences are predicted not by the heinousness of the crime but by the poor quality of the defense lawyers, the race of the accused or the victim, and the county and state in which the crime occurred. From 1976 to 2015, 1,392 executions occurred in the United States, and 995 of them took place in the South. Time and time again, we have proven that the criminal justice system fails to protect the innocent and persons with serious mental disabilities and illnesses from execution. Even the administration of executions is utterly flawed: Every method of execution comes with an intolerably high risk of extreme pain and torture.
There are currently 76 people on Death Row in Louisiana. Since 2014, two people — both tried, convicted, and sentenced in Caddo Parish — have been exonerated and released.
In 2017, Louisiana's legislature considered, but ultimately didn't pass, a bill to end the death penalty. Public support for the death penalty is falling; the numbers of new death sentences and executions are both rapidly decreasing. The time has come for us to end this barbaric practice.
The Latest
National Civil Rights Organizations Call on Louisiana Governor, Pardon Board to Commute Death Sentences
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