Death Penalty News

The death row population in the U.S. has dropped below 2,000 for the first time since the 1980s, according to the latest report on national capital punishment trends released by the civil rights think tank Thurgood Marshall Institute (TMI) of the Legal Defense Fund (LDF). The Spring 2026 edition of Death Row U.S.A., which tracks state and national data on death row populations, executions, the race and sex of victims in execution cases, and the impact of moratoria and judicial reversals, shows that the nation’s death row population now stands at 1,993, down 47% from its peak of 3,726 in January 2001. The current death-row population is the smallest recorded in LDF’s more than 50 years of monitoring since December 1987, when 1,982 incarcerated people faced execution.

D4vd secures another court delay in his murder case, pushing the probable cause hearing to July 21 as his legal team reviews mounting evidence. D4vd walked into the Los Angeles courtroom Wednesday in an orange jail uniform and waist shackles, his legal team already preparing for another delay in what’s becoming a pattern of postponements in his murder case. The platinum-selling “Romantic Homicide” singer, 21, received his third hearing delay after his defense team requested additional time to review evidence, pushing the probable cause hearing from June 29 to July 21 with a status conference scheduled for July 7.

Richard R. Ramirez, who was sentenced to death for the 1983 rape and murder of a 22-year-old bank teller in Garden Grove, died in prison at age 66 on Sunday, May 24, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said. He died at a medical facility, authorities said, with his cause of death to be determined by the San Joaquin County coroner’s office. He was not the Night Stalker, who shared the same first and last names and was convicted of 13 murders and 30 other crimes committed up and down the state in the mid-1980s. That Richard Ramirez, also condemned to death, died in 2013 of natural causes.

⚠️ Some readers may find the following content distressing. Prosecutors have put forward worrying new details in their case against US singer D4vd. It comes after the Los Angeles Police Department arrested the 21-year-old star on 16 April in connection with the death of 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez. Prosecutors allege that Burke met Celeste when she was just 11, and claim that he started sexually abusing her when she was 13 and he was 18.

Scott Peterson's attorneys said they plan to appeal to a higher court. SAN MATEO, Calif. -- A California judge has denied Scott Peterson's attempt to present new evidence that his attorneys claim exonerates him in the murder of his wife and unborn son. Laci Peterson disappeared on Christmas Eve in 2002 when she was eight months pregnant. Her body was found in the San Francisco Bay in April 2003. Scott Peterson, 53, was arrested and charged with first-degree murder in the death of his wife and second-degree murder in the death of their unborn son. A jury found him guilty following a six-month trial in 2004.

US musician D4vd has pleaded not guilty to charges of first-degree murder in the death of a teenage girl who vanished last year. The singer, whose legal name is David Anthony Burke, is accused of murdering 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez, whose remains were found in September in a Tesla registered to his Texas address. Burke, 21, also was charged with murder for "financial gain" and with murder of a witness to an investigation, the Los Angeles district attorney said. He did not speak during his arraignment on Monday – his first court appearance since his arrest last week. His lawyers entered his plea on his behalf.

LOS ANGELES —Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan J. Hochman announced today that musician David Anthony Burke, professionally known as "d4vd," has been charged with the murder of 14-year-old Celeste R. The victim’s decomposed and dismembered remains were discovered in Burke's impounded vehicle in September 2025. “Celeste was just a child when David Burke allegedly engaged in repeated lewd and lascivious sexual relations with her,” Hochman said. “But Burke’s actions did not allegedly stop there. When she threatened to expose his criminal conduct and devastate his musical career, Burke allegedly murdered her, dismembered her body, and placed the remains in two bags in the front trunk of his car.”

Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche has directed federal prosecutors in Los Angeles to seek the death penalty against three members of a transnational street gang charged with murdering a former gang member who was cooperating with law enforcement on a racketeering and methamphetamine trafficking case, officials announced Thursday. In a letter to First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli on Wednesday, Blanche told prosecutors in the Central District of California they are “authorized and directed” to seek the death penalty against Dennis Anaya Urias, 27, Grevil Zelaya Santiago, 26, and Roberto Carlos Aguilar, 31. All are from South Los Angeles.

February 21, 2006, a California court’s deci­sion effec­tive­ly halt­ed the planned exe­cu­tion of Michael Angelo Morales, mark­ing the start of California’s 20-year mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tion sched­ul­ing and throw­ing into the spot­light the ten­sion between physi­cian par­tic­i­pa­tion in exe­cu­tions and their pledge to show ​“ the utmost respect for life .” " The events sur­round­ing Morales’s impend­ing fate brought to the sur­face the long-run­ning schism between law and med­i­cine, rais­ing the ques­tion of whether any ben­e­fi­cial con­nec­tion between the pro­fes­sions ever exist­ed in the exe­cu­tion con­text. History shows it sel­dom did. Decades of botched exe­cu­tions prove it. " — Professor Deborah Denno, The Lethal Injection Quandary: How Medicine Has Dismantled the Death Penalty

On the 20th anniversary of the execution of Clarence Ray Allen, civil rights advocates are urging California to make his execution the last by permanently ending the state’s death penalty. An article from The Sacramento Bee reports that advocates are calling on Gavin Newsom to begin the legal process to halt the sentences of nearly 600 people currently on death row.  On Jan. 17, 2006, at 12:38 a.m., the state of California executed Allen, 76, by lethal injection inside San Quentin State Prison. He had been convicted of three counts of first-degree murder with special circumstances and was sentenced to death in 1982. 

On January 17, 2006, California exe­cut­ed Clarence Ray Allen — the last per­son put to death by the state. Two decades lat­er, California’s death row pop­u­la­tion has fall­en to 580 pris­on­ers , down from its peak near 750 in the mid-2010s . In the time since Mr. Allen’s exe­cu­tion, the death penal­ty in California has seen sus­tained scruti­ny as con­cerns with racial dis­crim­i­na­tion, inno­cence, and costs con­tin­ue to grow. Governor Gavin Newsom has placed a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions, death-sen­tenced pris­on­ers have been moved to less restric­tive con­di­tions in gen­er­al pop­u­la­tion, and advo­cates have urged the gov­er­nor to grant mass clemency.

A man sentenced to death for the 1980 rape and murder of a Seal Beach woman died in prison on Monday, Dec. 22 at the age of 80, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation announced Wednesday.  Benjamin W. Watta, formerly of Long Beach, was found unresponsive in his cell at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City around 11 a.m. on Monday during a count and pronounced dead by paramedics just after 11:30 a.m., the corrections agency said. The Del Norte County Coroner will determine his cause of death. 

More than two decades after Laci Peterson vanished from her Modesto, California, home, the murder case that captivated the nation continues to draw legal challenges, public debate and renewed attention. As the year comes to a close, Scott Peterson, convicted in 2004 of murdering his pregnant wife and their unborn son Conner, remains behind bars, serving life without the possibility of parole. His wife disappeared on Christmas Eve in 2002, and a few months later, the remains of Laci and Conner were found in the San Francisco Bay.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Lyle Menendez was denied parole Friday, a day after his younger brother Erik received the same recommendation by a California state board. Their separate hearings this week come nearly 30 years after the brothers were convicted of first-degree murder for the 1989 killings of their parents. They were sentenced to life in prison without parole in 1996. But after a Los Angeles judge reduced their sentences to 50 years to life in May, they immediately became eligible for parole under California law because they were under age 26 when they committed their crimes.

The board said he can next be eligible for parole in three years. Erik Menendez was denied parole during his first-ever parole hearing on Thursday, 36 years and one day after he and his brother killed their parents, Jose and Kitty Menendez. Erik Menendez, 54, attended the nearly 10-hour hearing via video from the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility in San Diego. The board said he can next be eligible for parole in three years.

In this month’s pod­cast episode of 12:01 The Death Penalty in Context, DPIC’s Managing Director Anne Holsinger speaks with Sam Levin, a cor­re­spon­dent with The Guardian who cov­ers crim­i­nal jus­tice and the legal sys­tem, and Jimmy Jenkins, a crim­i­nal jus­tice reporter for The Arizona Republic , about the chal­lenges they encounter when report­ing on the increas­ing secre­tive use of the death penal­ty. Mr. Jenkins has wit­nessed exe­cu­tions in Arizona and Mr. Levin has recent­ly inves­ti­gat­ed South Carolina’s return to exe­cu­tions after a 13-year pause.

Gov. Gavin Newsom still has a year and a half left in office, but advocates are starting their call now for him to commute, or reduce, all death sentences in California. The state has 585 people sentenced to death.  Throughout his time in the top office, Newsom has repeatedly spoken out against the death penalty system, calling it “a failure” that discriminates based on race and wealth with “no public safety benefit or value as a deterrent.”

LA Innocence Project says it will refile its case in Redwood City courthouse, believing new evidence "exonerates" him Scott Peterson’s hope that the California Court of Appeal would overturn his murder conviction were dashed this week when it instead directed his lawyers to return their case to the same Redwood City courthouse where he has had no luck over the past two decades convincing a jury or a string of judges he is innocent of killing his pregnant wife Laci and unborn son two decades ago. The Los Angeles Innocence Project, which took on the notorious case more than a year ago, had asserted in an 847-page petition that it had uncovered evidence that would “eviscerate” the prosecution’s original case and exonerate the former Modesto fertilizer salesman, including new witnesses who say they saw Laci walking her dog at a time prosecutors say she was already dead.

Florida executes suspected serial killer once eyed for possible link to the OJ Simpson case  A suspected serial killer once scrutinized for a possible link to the O.J. Simpson case that riveted the nation in the 1990s was executed Thursday in Florida for the murder of a woman found dead in a Tampa motel room.  Glen Rogers, 62, received a lethal injection at Florida State Prison near Starke and was pronounced dead at 6:16 p.m., authorities said. He was convicted in Florida of the 1995 murder of Tina Marie Cribbs, a 34-year-old mother of 2 he had met at a bar.

A suspected serial killer once scrutinized for a possible link to the O.J. Simpson case that riveted the nation in the 1990s is facing execution for a murder STARKE, Fla. -- A suspected serial killer once scrutinized for a possible link to the O.J. Simpson case that riveted the nation in the mid-1990s is scheduled to be executed Thursday in Florida for the murder of a woman in a Tampa motel room. Glen Rogers, 62, is set to receive a lethal injection at Florida State Prison near Starke, barring a last-day reprieve. He was convicted in Florida of the 1995 murder of Tina Marie Cribbs, a 34-year-old mother of two he had met at a bar.