Amherst professor Austin Sarat reflects on capital punishment in 2022, pointing out that while it has continued its decades-long decline, it is still plagued with serious injustices. Professor Sarat argues that as abolitionists litigate to stop death sentences and executions, we must remember that the fight must ultimately be won in the political arena rather than only in the courts.
Many executions in 2022 were “botched,” with lethal injections exacting torture on many death row inmates. The Supreme Court has continued its role in supporting the overall constitutionality of the death penalty, in contrast to evolving public opinion against it.
Oregon’s Democratic governor emptied death row and Nevada’s tried, even as some red states try to ramp up their killing. But partisan divides on capital punishment remain complex.
Loden and four other death row inmates filed a lawsuit in 2015 challenging the state’s three-drug lethal injection protocol as cruel and unusual punishment, which is banned by the Eighth Amendment.