United States
Death penalty and prisoners' rights · Archive since 1999
Data card
- Legal status
- Retentionist
- Executions recorded in 2026
- 16
- Executions recorded in 2025
- 47
- First news item in the archive
- JANUARY 1, 1999 · The pace of USA executions is on the rise, pushed by...
- News items in the archive
- 1,546
Source: Hands Off Cain database, updated to 2026.
United States is classified as Retentionist in the Hands Off Cain database, updated to 2026. In 2026 the association recorded 16 executions in the country, against 47 the year before. The archive holds 1,546 news items on United States, from 1999 to today.
In the United States the death penalty is a matter for the individual states as well as the federal government: some have abolished it, some retain it without applying it, and some carry out executions regularly. The prevailing method is lethal injection, and several states have reintroduced alternative methods.
Its death rows are among the most populated in the world and the wait often lasts decades. The debate concerns the availability of the drugs, wrongful convictions and the conditions of isolation. The archive follows executions, stays, commutations and court decisions, state by state.
Latest news
FEBRUARY 16, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Pennsylvania. An intervention by Mumia Abu Jamal from prison
The now 72-year-old former Black Panther militant has been in prison for 45 years
FEBRUARY 13, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - DPIC Report on “Women and the Death Penalty”
FEBRUARY 13, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Federal Judge: Government Is Not Above the Law, Nor Are Former Death-Row Inmates Beneath Its Protection
FEBRUARY 11, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Federal Judge Blocks Transfer of Former Federally Death-Sentenced Prisoners to Supermax Prison
FEBRUARY 5, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Pentagon Official Rejects Plea Deal in U.S.S. Cole Bombing Case
Guantanamo trial against Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri to begin in summer
JANUARY 30, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Luigi Mangione won’t face most serious federal charges, judge rules
JANUARY 17, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Trump’s vendetta against federal death row inmates
Sends prisoners who received commutations to “Alcatraz of the Rockies”
JANUARY 17, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Why Is It So Hard to Set a 9/11 Trial Date?
Here’s What to Know
JANUARY 14, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - New Analysis of Racial Bias and Death Eligibility in 2025
JANUARY 10, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - California. Lush Cosmetics Launches Campaign to End Death Penalty
JANUARY 6, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - 2025 Was Not a Good Year for Clemency in Capital Cases
- JANUARY 5, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTY
USA - Florida. Nonunanimous death penalty verdicts upheld by Supreme Court
JANUARY 5, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Florida. Marcelle Waldon, 42, Black, sentenced to death
JANUARY 2, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Contradictions in the war on drugs
On the (drone) killings of drug couriers
JANUARY 1, 2026United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Oklahoma. Why Is Richard Glossip Still in Jail?
DECEMBER 31, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - The Guardian looks on American death penalty
- DECEMBER 30, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTY
USA - Impending/scheduled executions
DECEMBER 30, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Florida. TFDP's Year End Report: 19 executions, 5 death sentences
DECEMBER 28, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Georgia. Georgia Stacey Humphreys' execution warrant expired
DECEMBER 18, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Arizona. Cleophus Cooksey, 43, Black, sentenced to death
DECEMBER 15, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - DPIC Year End Report 2025
More executions than new death sentences
DECEMBER 11, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Poll: Majority of U.S. Catholics support death penalty
Despite Catechism
- DECEMBER 9, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTY
USA - Roundup of 2025 Legislation to Modify Execution Protocols
- DECEMBER 5, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTY
USA - Col. Jonathan Vaughn to Lead Guantánamo Defense Teams
NOVEMBER 20, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Trump would like to sentence parliamentarians who oppose him to death for ‘treason’
NOVEMBER 19, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - ACLU Report Exposes Systemic Failures in Death Penalty System
"Fatal Flaws"
NOVEMBER 18, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYIRAN - Another Iranian–American Imprisoned: Afarin Mohajer
NOVEMBER 7, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Prisoners off death row protest transfer to supermax lockup
NOVEMBER 6, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - States’ death penalty policies are heading in sharply different directions
NOVEMBER 5, 2025United StatesDEATH PENALTYUSA - Gallup poll: 52% of Americans in favor of the death penalty. 41% amongst younger Americans