Tinkering with the machinery of death: an analysis of the impact of legislative reform on the sentencing of capital murderers in Texas

Life and death in the lone star state: Three decades of violence predictions by capital juries

“…Under this special issue, Texas has performed 38% (446/1181) of the executions in the United States in the past three decades (Death Penalty Information Center, 2009). Though future violence is not the only capital sentencing consideration posed to capital jurors,1 capital jury research has repeatedly concluded that expectations of future violence are a compelling factor in death sentence determinations (Blume, Garvey, & Johnson, 2001; Brock, Sorensen, & Marquart, 2000; Costanzo & Costanzo, 1994; Sandys, Pruss, & Walsh, 2009; White, 1987). The dominance of this apprehension in death verdicts may be related to the murderous severity of the projected future violence.…”

Capital jury decision-making: The limitations of predictions of future violence.

“…The specter that a capital defendant will commit violence in the future is among the most compelling aggravating factors in the jury’s death deliberations (Brock, Sorensen, & Marquart, 2000; Costanzo & Costanzo, 1994; Sandys, Pruss, & Walsh, in press; White, 1987). This finding is consistently demonstrated in both mock jury studies and in post-trial interviews of capital jurors.…”

Race and the Decision to Seek the Death Penalty in Federal Cases

“…As in the research on prosecutorial charging decisions, circumstances of the offense have also been shown to be related to death-penalty sentencing. These circumstances include whether the offense involved more than one offender (Brock, Sorensen, and Marquart, 2000); was particularly heinous, cruel, or involved torture (Klein and Rolph, 1991;Morton and Rolph, 2000); and whether there was more than one aggravating factor or felony committed along with a homicide (Baldus, Pulaski, and Woodworth, 1983;Keil and Vito, 1990;Radelet and Pierce, 1991;Williams and Holcomb, 2001). Research suggests that the likelihood of a death sentence increases if the crime took place in a store or other business (Morton and Rolph, 2000), if it was intentional and undertaken for personal gain (Keil and Vito, 1990;Morton and Rolph, 2000), if there were multiple victims (Keil and Vito, 1990;Radelet and Pierce, 1991;Morton and Rolph, 2000;Williams and Holcomb, 2001), and if the offender used a firearm (Baldus, Pulaski, and Woodworth, 1983;Morton and Rolph, 2000).…”

“…Several studies report that defendants are more likely to be sentenced to death if they were strangers to their victims than if they were related to or acquainted with their victims (Baldus, Pulaski, and Woodworth, 1983;Morton and Rolph, 2000). Regarding defendant characteristics, death-penalty sentences have been associated with the defendant's criminal record (Baldus, Pulaski, and Woodworth, 1983;Morton and Rolph, 2000;Brock, Sorensen, and Marquart, 2000) and age (older defendants are more likely than younger ones to receive the death penalty) (Williams and Holcomb, 2001). Defendants whose victims are female (Baldus, Pulaski, and Woodworth, 1983;Gross and Mauro, 1989;Radelet and Pierce, 1991;Williams and Holcomb, 2001) or on-duty police officers or firefighters are also more likely to receive death-penalty sentences (Baldus, Pulaski, and Woodworth, 1983).…”