Newly available evidence shows that Oklahoma's death penalty unconstitutionally discriminates on the basis of race, according to petitions filed by lawyers seeking to overturn the death sentences imposed on two African-American defendants, Julius Darius Jones (pictured) and Tremane Wood. Jones—a high school athlete and honor student who did not fit the description of the shooter and who has continuously maintained his innocence—and Wood were convicted and sentenced to death for killing white male victims in separate cases. Both men's claims are based on data from a study of race and the death penalty that was released as part of the April 2017 report of the Oklahoma Death Penalty Review Commission showing that, for the period 1990-2012, Oklahoma defendants convicted of killing white victims were more than twice as likely to be sentenced to death as those convicted of killing victims of color. For cases like Jones's and Wood's that involved only white male victims, defendants were nearly three times more likely to be sentenced to death. The study also showed that defendants of color were nearly three times more likely to be sentenced to death if convicted of killing a white victim than a victim of color and nearly twice as likely as a white defendant to be condemned for killing a white victim. Jones's petition argues that his death sentence violates the state and federal constitutions because he "faced a greater risk of execution by the mere happenstance that the victim who he was accused and convicted of killing was white.” Both Jones and Wood were capitally charged in Oklahoma County, one of the 2% of American counties responsible for more than half of all prisoners on the nation's death rows. 54 men and women were sent to death row during the 21-year administration of District Attorney “Cowboy” Bob Macy, who retired in 2001. The judge who presided over Wood's trial has made openly racist remarks, saying in 2011 that Mexicans are “nothing but filthy animals.”  Jones was sentenced to death by a nearly all-white jury, following what his current lawyers describe as “pervasive and highly racialized pre-trial media coverage” and “racialized remarks made by prosecutors and at least one juror” during his trial. Jones has also filed a motion with the Oklahoma County court seeking DNA testing on a red bandana that an eyewitness said the shooter was wearing over his face at the time of the murder. His lawyers say the bandana may contain DNA evidence that would identify the shooter and exonerate Jones.

(D. Shelden, “Attorneys believe race study shows Oklahoma inmate Julius Jones’ death sentence is unconstitutional,” The City Sentinel, July 26, 2017; "Race and Death Sentencing for Oklahoma Homicides, 1990-2012," in Report of the Oklahoma Death Penalty Review Commission, Appendix 1A, April 25, 2017.) Read the Jones’ petition here and the Wood petition here. See Oklahoma, Race, and Innocence.

After a hiatus of 3½ years, Ohio resumed executions on July 26, putting Ronald Phillips (pictured, photo credit: Forgiveness Foundation) to death with a three-drug combination of the sedative midazolam, the paralytic drug rocuronium bromide, and the heart-stopping drug potassium chloride. Phillips was pronounced dead at 10:43 a.m. It was the state's first execution since the botched execution of Dennis McGuire on January 16, 2014, and the 15th in the U.S. in 2017. Phillips' execution is the first of four executions that Ohio has scheduled for this year and of 27 scheduled through 2020. Ohio's resumptions of executions is expected to contribute to a small increase in executions in the U.S. this year, although the annual total is likely to remain among the lowest in the last quarter century. Phillips was executed despite the efforts of a diverse range of groups, including former attorney generals, justice reform advocates, exonerees, faith leaders, and editorial writiers, urging Governor John Kasich not to resume executions before Ohio addressed serious systemic flaws in its death penalty process that had been identified by a statewide death penalty task force. Phillips had sought a stay of execution until an ongoing challenge to Ohio's lethal-injection process is finally resolved, and his application drew support from fifteen pharmacology professors who filed a brief calling midazolam "unsuitable" and its as an execution drug "profoundly troubling." Justices Sotomayor and Ginsburg dissented from the denial of the stay, saying the court's action constituted a “failure to step in when significant issues of life and death are present.” Ohio officials said the execution proceeded without incident. Allen L. Bohnert, one of the lawyers who represents prisoners in the ongoing lethal-injection litigation, released a statement saying: "While Ohio will try to characterize today’s execution as 'problem-free,' do not be fooled." By choosing to inject the paralytic drug "extremely quickly," he said, Ohio "hid[ ] the real facts behind an artificial chemical curtain, . . . masking the problems with midazolam seen in multiple other executions." He urged the state to "heed the warnings of numerous pharmacists, pharmacologists, and anesthesiologists . . . and immediately halt any further use of midazolam and the paralytic drug in lethal injection executions." Ohio has executed 53 prisoners since the turn of the century—the most of any northern state and more than the combined total of every other northern state east of the Mississippi. Ohio ranked with Texas and Oklahoma as the only states to have executed at least one prisoner each year from 2001 to 2014.

The Supreme Court also denied Phillips' petition to review his claim that the death penalty should not be applied to teenage offenders. Phillips was nineteen at the time of the murder. 

(M. Berman, "Ohio executes Ronald Phillips, resuming lethal injections after three-year break," The Washington Post, July 26, 2017; J. Carr Smyth, "Child killer put to death in 1st Ohio execution in 3 years," Associated Press, July 26, 2017; "Gov. Kasich must halt July 26 execution of Ronald Phillips: editorial," Cleveland Plain Dealer, July 25, 2017; "Pharmacology Profs Call Drug in Ohio Execution 'Unsuitable'," Associated Press, July 24, 2017.) Read Justice Sotomayor's dissent from the denial of a stay of execution here and the Statement of Allen L. Bohnert here.