Abolish the Death Penalty
The death penalty is the ultimate, irreversible denial of human rights. By working towards the abolition of the death penalty worldwide, Amnesty International USA's Program to Abolish the Death Penalty looks to end the cycle of violence created by a system riddled with economic and racial bias and tainted by human error. Please join us in taking action against the death penalty.
Tell China to abolish the Death Penalty for the New Year
Based on public reports, Amnesty International estimates that at least 1,010 people were executed and 2,790 sentenced to death in 2006 in China. The death penalty violates the Olympic ideal of preserving human dignity. Send a New Year greeting to Prime Minister Wen Jiabao before the end of January to urge him to respect the Olympic ideal, and to take positive steps towards abolishing the death penalty in China.
Send the postcard to the Chinese Prime Minister
Lethal Injection
All major health professional associations, worldwide and in the U.S., oppose the participation of their members in executions. Yet increasingly, executions – especially the practice of lethal injection – have drawn in health professionals, in violation of their fundamental ethical rule to "harm none."
| Read AI's Report | Read the press release
| Sign Amnesty's Declaration calling on states and health professionals worldwide to respect fundamental medical ethics. | Learn more about lethal injection
| Read the transcript of our online chat with Ty Alper, Counsel of Record for the amicus brief Michael Morales, et al. in the upcoming lethal injection Supreme Court case Baze v. Rees).
Good News!
On Friday August 3rd, the Georgia Supreme Court has agreed to hear Troy Davis' appeal to present new evidence! Troy Davis was sentenced to death for the murder of Police Officer Mark Allen McPhail; a murder he maintains he did not commit. There was no physical evidence against him and the weapon used in the crime was never found. Since the trial most of the witnesses have recanted their testimony, many alleging they were pressured or coerced by police.
| Sign the Petition that FAIRNESS MATTERS | Learn more about Troy Davis
Health professionals assist at the first execution by lethal injection in Guatemala, February 1998. © Jorge Uzon
Human Rights Goals
- Seek Understanding - Mental Illness
- The execution of those with mental illness or "the insane" is clearly prohibited by international law and virtually every country in the world. Despite these standards, and constitutional law, the USA continues to execute people with diagnosed schizophrenia, those that suffer from severe delusions, and others with clinically-labeled mental illnesses.
- Prevention Not Punishment: Educating the Public on the Intersection of the Death Penalty and Severe Mental Illness
- ABA Recommendation
- The Execution of Mentally Ill Offenders
- USA: Supreme Court tightens standard on 'competence' for execution, an analysis of the recent Supreme Court ruling in Panetti v. Quarterman
- Cruel and Inhumane: Executing the Mentally Ill, article from Amnesty Magazine
- Learn More About State Sponsored Killing in the USA
- Since 1977, over 1,000 people have been executed in the U.S.; there are currently around 3,500 men and women on death row across the country. Grassroots activists throughout the USA play an essential role in advocating against this human rights violation through monitoring cases, mobilizing around upcoming events, and lobbying for anti-death penalty legislation.
- Facts & Figures (including pending executions, executions by year, state, method)
- Fact Sheets
- Encourage Worldwide Abolition
- Around 133 countries have abolished the death penalty in law or practice. On average, in the past decade more than three countries a year have abolished the death penalty for all crimes. Despite international human rights standards, some nations still execute people. Around the world, the death penalty is used as a tool of political repression and a means to forever silence political opponents or eliminate politically "troublesome" individuals. » Learn more
- In 2006, 91 per cent of all known executions took place in six countries: China, Iran, Pakistan, Iraq, Sudan and the USA.
- International law prohibits the use of the death penalty for crimes committed by juveniles, yet the execution of child offenders continues in a few countries, particularly Iran.
- International Human Rights Standards
