Law Commons^™

An Empirical Evaluation Of The Connecticut Death Penalty System Since 1973: Are There Unlawful Racial, Gender, And Geographic Disparities?, John J. Donohue

John Donohue

This article analyzes the 205 death-eligible murders leading to homicide convictions in Connecticut from 1973–2007 to determine if discriminatory and arbitrary factors influenced capital outcomes. A regression analysis controlling for an array of legitimate factors relevant to the crime, defendant, and victim provides overwhelming evidence that minority defendants who kill white victims are capitally charged at substantially higher rates than minority defendants who kill minorities, that geography influences both capital charging and sentencing decisions (with the location of a crime in Waterbury being the single most potent influence on which death-eligible cases will lead to a sentence of death), and …

Capital Punishment In Connecticut, 1973-2007: A Comprehensive Evaluation From 4686 Murders To One Execution, John J. Donohue

John Donohue

This study explores and evaluates the application of the death penalty in Connecticut from 1973 until 2007, a period during which 4686 murders were committed in the state. The objective is to assess whether the system operates lawfully and reasonably or is marred by arbitrariness, caprice, or discrimination. My empirical approach has three components. First, I provide background information on the overall numbers of murders, death sentences, and executions in Connecticut. The extreme infrequency with which the death penalty is administered in Connecticut raises a serious question as to whether the state’s death penalty regime is serving any legitimate social …

John Donohue, When Social Sciences Save Lives, John J. Donohue

John Donohue

If you think academic work can’t be “emotionally draining”, meet John Donohue, the C. Wendell and Edith M. Carlsmith Professor of Law at Stanford Law School, who’s teaching law and economics at Bocconi as a short-term visiting professor. In the last six years his academic interests led him to the death rows of Connecticut prisons and his work is the main piece of evidence in a trial which will decide the fate of five inmates sentenced to death and perhaps of six more.

Time To Kill The Death Penalty, John J. Donohue

John Donohue

Forty years ago this week, the U.S. Supreme Court in Furman v. Georgia struck down the death penalty on the ground that it was applied in an arbitrary manner. Four years later, the Supreme Court accepted the constitutionality of “new and improved” death penalty statutes that were supposed to eliminate the defects condemned in Furman. In bringing back the death penalty in 1976, the Court also cited studies suggesting that executions save lives.

Four decades later, there is plenty of evidence that the death penalty continues to be applied in an unfair manner and not a shred of evidence that …

Study Shows Scales Of Justice Askew When It Comes To Death Penalty, John J. Donohue

John Donohue

A former Yale Law School professor's long-running study now concludes that while extremely rare, the death penalty is a largely random punishment that often hangs on the accused's race and where in Connecticut the crime took place. John Donohue, now at Stanford University, looked at the application of the death penalty between 1973 and 2007, examining and rating 205 cases during a period when 4,686 murders occurred in the state.

The Random Horror Of The Death Penalty, Ny Times Editorial Board

John Donohue

The Supreme Court has not banned capital punishment, as it should, but it has long held that the death penalty is unconstitutional if randomly imposed on a handful of people. An important new study based on capital cases in Connecticut provides powerful evidence that death sentences are haphazardly meted out, with virtually no connection to the heinousness of the crime.

Estimating The Impact Of The Death Penalty On Murder, John Donohue, Justin Wolfers

John Donohue

No abstract provided.

Introduction To The Death Penalty Symposium, John Donohue, Steven Shavell

John Donohue

No abstract provided.

Review Of The Road To Abolition, John J. Donohue

John Donohue

The two most important questions about the death penalty in the United States today are should we get rid of it and will we get rid of it? While he contributors to this important and interesting new book are unanimous that capital punishment should be abolished, opinions differ on whether abolition is likely to occur in the US any time soon, and if so, how.

If one wants to gain a deeper understanding of the effort to eliminate capital punishment in the U.S. over the last forty years, and what the future holds for this harsh feature of American exceptionalism, …

The Impact Of The Death Penalty On Murder, John J. Donohue

John Donohue

Both history and daily crime sheets underscore a depressing capacity for human violence and inhumanity. Some scholars feel that eliminating capital punishment would be a step toward reducing the toll of human suffering, whereas others feel that retaining the death penalty will prevent some murders at least. Kovandzic, Vieraitis, and Boots (2009, this issue) provide a comprehensive ordinary least-squares (OLS) state panel data assessment of the most recent postmoratorium data available and reach a strong conclusion that the death penalty does not deter murder. This article is an important piece in the complex jigsaw puzzle that will illuminate which factors …