clemencyca

January 17, 2026 —

At 12:38 a.m on Jan. 17, 2006, the state of California executed Clarence Ray Allen, 76, by lethal injection inside San Quentin State Prison. Allen had been convicted of three counts of first degree murder with special circumstances, and had been sent to Death Row in 1982, nearly a quarter of a century prior.

Now, on the 20th anniversary of the state’s most recent execution, civil rights advocates are pushing to make this California’s last execution ever by ending the state’s death penalty. They want Gov. Gavin Newsom to begin the lengthy legal process to commute the sentences of nearly 600 Death Row inmates and stop the charade of seeking the death penalty — a punishment that does little to deter capital crimes, and costs the state billions to pursue — only to see those inmates sit in capital punishment stasis for years….

READ FULL STORY HERE

SacBee: CA’s death penalty is broken, says Newsom. So why won’t he end it for good? Read More »

April 9, 2024 – California’s death penalty law was declared unconstitutional by the state Supreme Court in 1972 but was quickly reinstated by the voters. The statute survived initiatives in 2012 and 2016 that sought to repeal it. And despite Gov. Gavin Newsom’s moratorium on executions in 2019, the death penalty is still the law of the state, which has 640 condemned inmates, the most in the nation.

But the state’s public defender and civil rights groups say capital punishment, as practiced in California, is incurably racist — Blacks and Latinos are far more likely than whites to be sentenced to death, and murder defendants disproportionately face capital charges if their alleged victim was white. And they are asking the state Supreme Court to remove the death penalty from the law books.

By Bob Egelko, San Francisco Chronicle

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SF Chronicle: California’s death penalty is irreparably racist, lawsuit contends Read More »

April 4, 2024 – In recent months, Santa Clara County Dist. Atty. Jeff Rosen, once a prosecutor who believed in capital punishment and one who rejects association with the progressive prosecutor movement, has been quietly preparing to ask courts to change the penalties of 14 men from his county who are waiting for that ultimate sentence to be carried out.

By Anita Chabria, Los Angeles Times

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LA Times: Prosecutors put men on death row. This California D.A. wants to take them off Read More »

December 21, 2022 – Outgoing Oregon Governor Kate Brown got national attention when she commuted all 17 of her state’s death sentences to life in prison. Oregon had the luxury of *only* having to deal with 17 such sentences.

By David M. Greenwald, Executive Editor, Davis Vanguard

Davis Vanguard: Commentary: Pressure Now on Newsom, Biden to Do Something About Death Row Read More »

Jan. 9, 2023 –

Seeking to shut down the nation’s largest death row, the governor is proceeding with a mix of conviction and caution.

By Blake Hounshell, New York Times

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NY Times: Death Penalty in California Is a Puzzle for Newsom Read More »

December 21, 2022 – Gov. Gavin Newsom says clemency for the state’s Death Row prisoners has “long been considered” but some of the cases would require state Supreme Court approval.

By: Bob Egelko, San Francisco Chronicle

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Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Oregon cleared its death row. California Gov. Gavin Newsom says he’s considering it Read More »