The Act seeks to ensure the fair administration of the death penalty and minimize the risk of executing innocent people.
The Justice For All Act is the product of a bi-partisan, bicameral compromise led by then-Senate Judiciary Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-UT), Ranking Member Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA), then-House Judiciary Chairman F. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI) and Rep. William Delahunt (D-MA).
[2] The text of the Act amended the United States Code to include procedures for post-conviction DNA testing in federal court.
The act additionally contains provisions for increasing the quality of representation for indigent defendants in state capital cases, and for compensating victims of wrongful conviction.
But by 2002, more than 100 people have been released from death rows across the United States after it was found that they were wrongfully convicted because of procedural errors or newly discovered evidence of their innocence.
Thirty-six states and the federal government have enacted legislation that permits the courts to impose death as a criminal sentence.