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Evaluations of Violence Risk in Capital Sentencing
Book chapter

Evaluations of Violence Risk in Capital Sentencing

Michael E Keesler, David DeMatteo, Natalie M Anumba and Daniel C Murrie
Forensic Mental Health Assessments in Death Penalty Cases
01 Mar 2011
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195385809.003.0027

Abstract

future dangerousness capital sentencing Barefoot v. Estelle violence base rates violence risk assessment prison violence
The United States Supreme Court has consistently conveyed that the death penalty must be an individualized determination, and many states have concluded that a defendant’s potential for future violence is an important consideration when assigning a death sentence. Therefore, courts have often turned to forensic mental health professionals for assessment of violence risk, or “future dangerousness,” at capital sentencing. However, there is much room for misinformation and poor practice in risk assessments at capital sentencing. So this chapter details the data crucial to violence risk assessments at capital sentencing—particularly base rates of violence in prisons and empirically-supported risk factors for prison violence—and provides practical guidance on using those data to perform a scientifically sound violence risk assessment at capital sentencing.

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