Arizona Prisons

Pima County Attorney Laura Conover has called for a better review of the death penalty, after top state officials announced last week they were ready to resume executions.

The former federal magistrate who Gov. Katie Hobbs hired to study the execution process said Wednesday that he was dismissed because he was telling the governor something she didn't want to hear: There is no humane way to kill someone with lethal injection.

Arizona is set to resume executions of inmates on death row as soon as this coming year. The decision from Attorney General Kris Mayes comes after Gov. Katie Hobbs dismissed the person she hired to draft a report on the process in the state.

People were dying in the Pima County Jails at higher rates than the rest of the country. But, there was a single death in the Pima County Jails this year, which is a major shift.

A new report from the Government Accountability Office finds the number of non-U.S. citizens in prisons here has been in decline over the last few years.

In 2023, the Arizona district court issued another injunction to speed up the process, ordering the state to improve its health-care staffing, bring in additional physicians and hit benchmarks laid out by the court. In 2024, though, the problems remain

Retired Pima County Superior Court judge John Leonardo sent a lot of people to prison in his long career on the bench. But, the one defendant that still haunts him was Carl Ray Buske, an aviation mechanic who was convicted for the possession of 29 printed images of child pornography.

Over the summer, many libraries introduce reading programs to keep kids interested in books and avoid the so-called "summer reading slump" between school years. In Maricopa County, that sentiment extends to children in juvenile detention.

The question of whether Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell has the statutory authority to seek a warrant of execution is now before the Arizona Supreme Court.

A federal judge has ordered the state Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry to ensure an autopsy is completed for an inmate who died June 30.