This webinar will discuss advanced strategies for records collection in capital cases and strategies for division of labor in PD offices when there are investigators and mitigation specialists working on a case. Topics covered will include when to use a release, court order or subpoena, when in person versus remote searches are appropriate, timelines for how long records collection takes, how to get records from closed institutions and much more.

Presenters:

Stacie Brown, Mitigation Specialist, ACLU Capital Punishment Project, Durham, NC

Marty Aronson, Senior Investigator, Allegheny County Public Defenders, Pittsburgh, PA

Alexis Climes, Manager of Investigations, Allegheny County Public Defenders, Pittsburgh, PA

Presenters:

Bradley Bridge, Esq., Assistant Defender, Defender Association of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA

Dana L. Cook, MSW, Director of Social Services Training and Recruitment, Defender Association of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA

Abd’allah W. Lateef, Deputy Director, Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth (CFSY), Philadelphia, PA

This session will serve as an opportunity to look back to what we knew and what we learned during Miller resentencings in preparation for potential Lee resentencings. It will cover perspectives from the attorney, mitigation specialist and client point of view. The legislature’s deadline to enact a statute is July 24th, 2026, so at the time of this webinar, we will have a better sense of whether individuals will be preparing for parole hearings or resentencing hearings and what the timeline would be for both. While the advocacy is largely the same, there are critical differences. Anyone interested in representing individuals affected by the Lee decision should attend to learn about what will be required for quality individualized representation.

This webinar will discuss women’s mental health as it relates to pregnancy, postpartum and other reproductive events which have substantial impact on maternal mental health. While the webinar will focus on capital cases, it will be applicable to any female client in the criminal justice system.

Presenter:

Dr. Brooke Laufer, Clinical Psychologist, Evanston IL

Brooke Laufer is a Clinical Psychologist with a group practice and also trains and supervises new therapists. She specializes in the evaluation and treatment of perinatal mental illness. Her focus is on postpartum psychosis and its interaction with criminal behavior. Dr. Laufer runs groups for survivors of postpartum psychosis, does research, writes articles, and speaks on this topic. She also serves as an expert witness in cases of child abuse, neonaticide, infanticide and battered women syndrome. Her book, Uncovering the Act of Maternal Infanticide from a Psychological, Political, and Jungian Perspective, was published by Routledge in 2024. For more information, visit www.drbrookelaufer.com

Intellectual disability is one of two categorical bans for the death penalty and capital defense best practices dictate that defense teams should assume their client has Intellectual Disability until they prove otherwise.

This webinar will discuss investigating and litigating Intellectual Disability in a capital case with a focus on the necessary three-pronged approach: IQ score, Adaptive Deficits (limitations in conceptual, social, and practical skills) and Developmental Onset (before age 18).

Presenters:

James R. Patton, Ed.D., Professor of Instruction, Department of Special Education, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX

Frances Harvey, Esq., Executive Director, Atlantic Center for Capital Representation, Philadelphia PA

Presenters:

Alexandra Dolan, MSS, LSW, Program Manager for Education and Advocacy, Support Center for Child Advocates, Philadelphia PA

Nathan Riley, CEA Peer Advocate Trainer, Support Center for Child Advocates, Philadelphia, PA

Meghan Johnson, MPH, Director of the Center of Excellence in Advocacy, Support Center for Child Advocates, Philadelphia PA 

This training aims to provide defense attorneys with tools for representing their clients from the perspective of child advocates and clients themselves. Participants will learn about ways to minimize secondary trauma through their representation of individuals facing capital and excessive punishments. 

Presenters:

Lauren Gottesman, Esq., Senior Staff Attorney at the Innocence Project’s Strategic Litigation Department​, Philadelphia, PA

Nilam Sanghvi, Esq.,  Legal Director of the Pennsylvania Innocence Project, Philadelphia, PA

Liz DeLosa, Esq., Managing Attorney of the Pittsburgh Office of the Pennsylvania Innocence Project, Pittsburgh, PA 

This training aims to provide defense attorneys with new tools with which to litigate their confession cases at the pre-trial, trial, and post-conviction stages. The training will begin with a summary of the most relevant social science on coercive police interrogation and coerced confessions. It will then address strategies for strengthening suppression arguments on voluntariness and Miranda grounds, as well as strategies for dealing with the PA Supreme Court's current rule prohibiting the admission of false confession expert testimony. Lastly, the training will also discuss raising novel post-conviction claims -- namely, a newly-discovered-evidence claim based on the evolution of the science on confessions and interrogations. 

Presenters:

Frances Harvey, Esq., Staff Attorney, Atlantic Center for Capital Representation, Philadelphia, PA 

Marc Bookman, Esq., Legal Director, Atlantic Center for Capital Representation, Philadelphia, PA 

This session will cover general concepts for capital case discovery including processes around aggravators, mitigation, victim impact and reciprocal discovery.

Presenters:

Russ Stetler, Former National Mitigation Coordinator, Berkeley, CA

Julie Hyman, LSW, MSSP, Public Defender Association of PA, Philadelphia PA

This session will cover critical questions in law and ethics for lawyers and non-lawyers in capital cases. Some of the topics include what information gets written down versus what gets discussed in person, admissibility issues, ethical dilemmas for Social Workers, considerations for what is discoverable at all stages of the case, how lawyers can shield their mitigation specialist and much more.

Presenter:

Dana Cook, MSW, Mitigation Specialist at the Defender Association of Philadelphia, Founding Co-Director of ACCR, Philadelphia, PA

This session is a skill building workshop for working with traumatized clients. Through her presentation, Dana Cook hopes to cover understanding the trauma-informed approach to building client alliances, identifying and understanding the signs and symptoms of trauma, building the toolkit for working with trauma-impacted clients, strategies for minimizing re-traumatization and the importance of self-care.

Presenters:

Catherine Cerulli, JD, Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatry, University of Rochester Medical Center, Rochester, NY

Christie Petrenko, Ph.D., Clinical Psychologist and Researcher, Mt. Hope Family Center, Rochester, NY

The term fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) refers to the wide range of physical, behavioral, and cognitive impairments that occur due to alcohol exposure before birth (also known as prenatal alcohol exposure). FASDs can have lifelong effects, including problems with behavior and learning as well as physical problems.

The few studies that have identified incarcerated individuals with FASD estimate that the number of undiagnosed persons in correctional facilities is high. Based on available Canadian data, this study estimates that youths with FASD are 19 times more likely to be incarcerated than youths without FASD in a given year. (https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6973953/#:~:text=The%20few%20studies%20that%20have,FASD%20in%20a%20given%20year.)

Presenter:

Dr. Kim Gorgens, Professor of Psychophysiology, Clinical Neuropsychology and Psychology of Criminal Behavior at the University of Denver, Denver, CO.

Dr. Gorgens manages a large portfolio of brain injury related research and has lectured extensively on those issues around the world. She has a 2010 TED talk on youth sports concussion and a 2018 TED talk on brain injuries in criminal justice with 3.5M views. She has a small forensic neuropsychology practice with juvenile and death penalty cases and is active in legislative and policy development around best practices in brain injury. Her research studies the reported injury history, cognitive function, and brain biomarkers of all vulnerable populations including young and older athletes, probationers and inmates, persons who are unhoused, and women who have been exposed to interpersonal violence.  

Presenter:

Sean O’Brien, Professor of Law, University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law, Kansas City, MO

Even experienced practitioners can overlook symptoms of mental impairment. This session will cover easily overlooked signs of mental illness and provide guidance on strategies for avoiding this pitfall.

Presenter:

Jerome Del Pino, Esq., Attorney for the Federal Capital Appellate Resource Counsel Project, Nashville, TN

When selecting a jury, both parties may remove potential jurors using an unlimited number of challenges for cause (e.g., stated reasons such as bias) and a limited number of peremptory challenges (i.e., do not need to state a reason).

At the trial of James Kirkland Batson for burglary and receipt of stolen goods, the prosecutor used his peremptory challenges to remove all four African Americans from the jury pool. Batson challenged the removal of these jurors as violating his Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment(link is external).

This session will cover how to raise challenges to the jury pool as well as Batson challenges.

Presenter:

Victoria Reynolds, Ph.D., Clinical Psychologist & Forensic Trauma Consultant, Hillsborough, NC

This session will cover childhood trauma including how it shapes development, it’s neurobiological impacts, stress responses and adaptations, alterations in memory and the implications for interacting with your capital client and collecting a trauma history.

Victoria Reynolds Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist who specializes in the assessment and treatment of the impacts of complex trauma (such as physical and sexual abuse, neglect, etc.) on child and adult development and behavior. She got her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Duke University. She consults as a national forensic trauma expert on State and Federal Capital cases, female cases involving domestic violence, as well as on military and civilian sexual assault cases. In her clinical practice, she treats trauma-exposed journalists, and is a listed clinical provider in the Journalist Traumatic Stress Network affiliated with Columbia School of Journalism.

Presenters:

Evan Matshes MD FRCPC, Medical Director & Chief Forensic Pathologist at NAAG Forensic PC, San Diego ,CA

This session is the first of a two part series covering Abusive Head Trauma (AHT), including Shaken Baby Syndrome— which most often involves shaking, blunt impact, or a combination of both in infants and young children, which can lead to neurological injury. Dr. Matshes is a Board Certified Anatomic and Forensic Pathologist and the Medical Director at NAAG Forensic PC. His presentation will cover topics such as the Historical Underpinnings of AHT (1968-1987), The Pediatric Forensic Autopsy, Clinical Markers Suggestive of AHT or Abuse and working with Experts in AHT or abuse cases.

The second part will be presented on April 24th, 2024 from 3:00-4:30PM EST will cover litigation strategies when dealing with an AHT or Shaken Baby Syndrome diagnosis.

Presenters:

Kaylyn Christian, Director of Mitigation, Atlantic Center for Capital Representation, Philadelphia, PA

Elizabeth Wood-Bennett, Esq, PDAP's Assistant Training Director for Eastern Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA

This session will cover the tools that capital defense teams use to collect social history information and the best document gathering practices. If you have interns working in your office, this would be a great session for them to attend as we will cover how to start collecting and organizing the information from the case outset.