Physician Participation in Executions:  Doug Berman provides this helpful link to an SSRN article by Ty Alper over at Sentencing Law and Policy.  The article, "The Truth About Physician Participation in Lethal Injection Executions," attempts to "expose two myths that have come to dominate the capital punishment discourse: first, that requiring physician participation would grind the administration of the death penalty to a halt; and second, that advocacy for such a requirement is a disingenuous abolitionist strategy as opposed to a principled remedial argument."  Alper says his research shows that doctors are willing to participate in executions, but States have "strategically emphasized" and "exaggerated" the positions of national medical associations in order to prove that doctors are unwilling to participate in executions.  Alper is a law professor at Berkeley Law and participates in the school's Death Penalty Clinic.  The Clinic submitted this brief in the landmark case Baze v. Rees.   CJLF's brief in that case is here. Alper takes issue with our position that opponents are deliberately trying to set up a Catch-22. See n. 34 in the paper and accompanying text. We stand by it.

Prison Rape Study Released:  Jordan Weissmann reports on Blog of Legal Times that a congressional commission on prison rape, headed by Judge Reggie Walton, has released its final recommendations for how prisons may control the sexual abuse of prison inmates. Weismann reports that the eight member panel recommended improvements in guard training, the method of reporting rapes, procedures used for investigations, as well as different disciplinary measures.  The commission was created by the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003.  Former-President George W. Bush appointed its members.  Judge Walton said that he planned to work with Attorney General Eric Holder Jr. to assure that the commission's standards are adopted at the federal and state level.  

Enviable Summer Schedules:  At Blog of Legal Times, Tony Mauro reports that the Supreme Court Justices are getting ready for a summer of lecturing and traveling.  According to Mauro, Justice Breyer and former Justice Sandra Day O'Connor will be speaking at the Aspen Ideas Festival in Aspen, Colorado while Justices Alito, Kennedy, Ginsburg, and Roberts are all scheduled to teach summer law courses in Europe.  Interestingly, almost all of the Justices will be lecturing in cooler, mountain climates.  With destinations like Aspen, Innsbruck and Salzburg, I'd be eager to escape the D.C. heat too.

Colorado Supermax Prison Getting Lots of Press:  Yesterday, Doug Berman's Sentencing Law and Policy featured a link to a 60 minutes story on ADX Florence, the Supermax federal prison in Colorado. Today, at Wall Street Journal Law Blog, Ashby Jones reports that one of the prisons most famous inmates, Terry Nichols, is unhappy with prison conditions at the Supermax facility.  Jones reports that Nichols has asked for a lawyer to help him in a lawsuit against the prison over the quality of the food.  An AP story reports that Nichols requested an attorney because he can't afford an attorney, has limited legal knowledge, and that his case is complex and requires "significant research."