A key US Senate panel has approved a package of death penalty reforms, including post-conviction access to DNA tests and improving the quality of lawyers for poor defendants in capital cases.
The Senate Judiciary committee agreed to the Innocence Protection Act which provides safeguards to prevent wrongful convictions and executions through authorizing DNA testing where the testing has the potential to produce new evidence.
It would also prohibit states from denying state prisoners access to evidence for the purpose of DNA testing, and prohibit the destruction of biological evidence in a criminal case while the defendant is in jail.
On the legal side, following reports of lawyers sleeping through their clients' cases or of incompetent counsel, the measure establishes a grant program to improve the quality of legal representation to poor defendants in death penalty cases.
The bill also increases the amount of damages that the US Court of Federal Claims can award against the United States in cases of unjust imprisonment from $5,000 to $10,000 dollars per year.
The 7-2 vote on the measure comes amid increased national arguments about how the death penalty sentence is administered. The bill must now go the Senate floor. Similar legislation is being considered by the House.
On July 1, a US federal judge declared the federal death penalty unconstitutional on the grounds that innocent people could be executed. Around two dozen people are currently on death row in the US federal system.
At the state level, nationwide more than 3,500 people await execution, including about 800 in nine states where judges are allowed to impose capital punishment: Alabama, Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Idaho, Indiana, Montana and Nebraska.
Thirty-four people have been executed in the United States since the beginning of the year, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, an anti-death penalty group.
AFP