The latest edition of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund's Death Row USA showed a continuing decline in the number of people on death rows across the country. As of January 1, 2013, there were 3,125 inmates under a sentence of death, a decrease of 43 from a year ago. Over the last decade, the size of death row has dropped almost 16%, from 3,703 inmates in 2000 to 3,125 in 2013. California continued to have the largest death row population (727), followed by Florida (413), Texas (300), and Pennsylvania (202). Neither California nor Pennsylvania has carried out an execution in at least 7 years. In Texas, minorities constitute 71% of the death row population. The report also contains information on executions. Nearly 77% of the murder victims in cases resulting in an execution since 1976 were white, even though nationally, about 50% of murder victims are black.
Gary Alvord, a Florida inmate who spent more time on death row than any other inmate in the country, died on May 19 of natural causes. Alvord was 66 years old and had been sentenced to death for murder almost 40 years ago, on April 9, 1974. He suffered from schizophrenia and had no close family. Bill Sheppard, who represented Alvord for almost four decades, said, “Gary is a product of a sick system. He was a living example of why we should not have the death penalty.... I would love for the state of Florida to tell us how much money they wasted trying to kill a guy they couldn't kill. The death penalty is getting us nothing but broke.” In the time Alvord spent on death row, 75 other inmates were executed in Florida, many of whom spent half as long as he did on death row. Alvord faced execution at least twice, but his severe mental illness prevented the execution from being carried out. In 1984, he was sent to a state hospital to receive treatment for his psychiatric condition, but doctors refused to treat him, citing the ethical dilemma of making a patient well enough so he can be killed. Alvord’s final appeal expired in 1998.
Nancy Mullane, a reporter for KALW Radio in San Francisco, is one of the few reporters to visit California's death row at San Quentin Prison. In the block she visited, there were 500 inmates, in 4-by-10 foot cells, stacked five tiers high. The cells are about the size of a walk-in closet. Many of the inmates have been on death row for over 20 years. Inmates can shower every other day. One of the inmates she met with, Justin Helzer, had stabbed himself in both eyes. He later committed suicide. California has the largest death row in the country with 727 inmates. No one has been executed in 7 years. 
A new animated film, The Last 40 Miles, will follow a death row inmate on his final journey from the Polunsky Unit in Livingston, Texas, to the death chamber in Huntsville. The film uses three forms of animation to tell the inmate's story, from his tragic childhood to the moment he is being escorted to the lethal injection chamber. The script was written by freelance journalist Alex Hannaford and is based on interviews he conducted with death row inmates for news stories. Hannaford described why he used the metaphor of the trip to the death chamber: "It struck me a long time ago that this was the last thing these men see as they're escorted from death row in Livingston to the death chamber at the Walls Unit in Huntsville. One of the last things they see is that big Texas sun rising over a vast lake. It's quite breathtaking." A trailer for the short film can be viewed 
On December 6, Bobby Tarver, who had spent 30 years on Alabama's death row, finally had his death sentence reduced to life without parole by a state judge because of his intellectual disability. Tarver was Mobile County's longest-serving death row inmate, having been convicted in 1982 of murdering a taxi cab driver. Last September, a federal judge overruled state court opinions and held that Tarver could not be executed because of his mental retardation, thus concluding a years-long legal battle about Tarver’s mental capacity. The final ruling came ten years after the U.S. Supreme Court held in Atkins v. Virginia (2002) that it was unconstitutional to execute defendants with mental retardation.
On October 23, the United Nations' special rapporteur on torture, Juan Mendez, told a UN General Assembly human rights committee that countries around the world are increasingly viewing capital punishment as a form of torture because of the severe mental and physical pain it inflicts on those sentenced to death. Mendez told the committee, “States need to re-examine their procedures under international law because the ability of states to impose and carry out the death penalty is diminishing as these practices are increasingly viewed to constitute torture.” Mendez urged all countries to consider repealing capital punishment because it is “cumbersome and expensive and you’re never sure you’re doing it in the right way.” Mendez also spoke about the “death row phenomenon," that is, conditions on death row that cause severe mental anguish and physical suffering. He said such deprivations include anxiety due to the threat of imminent execution, extended solitary confinement, and poor prison conditions.
Survivor on Death Row, a new e-book co-authored by death row inmate Romell Broom and Clare Nonhebel, tells the story of Ohio's botched attempt to execute Broom by lethal injection in 2009. In September of that year, Broom was readied for execution and placed on the gurney, but the procedure was terminated after corrections officials spent over two hours attempting to find a suitable vein for the lethal injection. Broom was removed from the death chamber and has remained on death row ever since. In the book, Broom discusses his troubled childhood and his life of over 25 years on death row, including his repeated requests for new DNA testing and a new legal team. Broom has always maintained his innocence. Jon Snow, a reporter for Channel 4 News in England, called the book "A horrifying story embracing all the evils of the death penalty. Bad forensics, dodgy DNA, awful lawyers, render this a must-read.”