USA:
Number of executions dropping in United States---Juries increasingly
looking at other sentencing options
In
the midst of a noisy debate over capital punishment in the United States,
a quiet change may have settled in: The number of new death penalty
sentences being imposed each year has dropped by nearly 1/2.
Juries
are looking more closely, as an alternative, at life in prison without the
possibility of parole.
Prosecutors
mindful of the cost death penalty trials entail and the minefield of legal
challenges that can get them reversed in court may be choosing their cases
more carefully.
"The
point we're coming to in America is that we are going to keep refining and
refining and refining those who are eligible for the death penalty,"
said Josh Marquis, a death penalty proponent who chairs the Capital
Litigation Committee of the National District Attorneys Association.
"It
should really be reserved for people like (Oklahoma City bomber) Timothy
McVeigh," added Marquis, the prosecutor for Clatsop County in Astoria,
Oregon.
According
to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, an average of 296 people were
added to death row each year from 1994 to 2000. The actual number of new
death sentences in 2000 was 226, well below the average, and the beginning
of a decline. The number fell to 155 in 2001, the lowest recorded since
1973.
A
continuing trend
The
bureau says it has not yet compiled statistics for 2002. But Richard
Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, says
his analysis of the total death row population numbers leads him to
believe the 2002 figure will again be around 155.
"There
is a reluctance by juries," he said. "The states we've heard
from say that cases where the death penalty is sought are more likely to
get a life sentence now. For one thing, juries are being told about this
option."
3
U.S. Supreme Court decisions since 1993 have said jurors must be told that
life without the possibility of parole is available as an alternative to
the death penalty, if the state involved has such a law on its books,
Dieter said.
36
of the 38 states which have death penalty laws also have life no-parole
statutes, he said.
"Our
sense is that there is also hesitation among juries because of all the
stories about innocence or unfair treatment (of those on death row). For
whatever reason they're returning more life sentences," he added.
The
American Civil Liberties Union Capital Punishment Project said in a recent
report that 108 people have been released from death row since 1973 after
evidence of their innocence was uncovered.
That
problem was painfully obvious in Illinois where investigations found 13
innocent prisoners awaiting execution. Former Illinois Gov. George Ryan
imposed a still-standing moratorium on executions and before leaving
office early this year emptied the state's death row, granting clemency to
167 condemned prisoners and pardoning 4 others who had been convicted of
murder.
Ryan's
move touched off a renewed debate over capital punishment in the United
States, which is alone among western democracies in still carrying it out.
Illinois
lawmakers revamped the state's laws but Ryan's successor has yet to decide
on the changes. They include such measures as reducing the number of
factors that can trigger the death penalty and allowing judges to file
dissents when they disagree with a jury's imposition of the death penalty,
making it easier for a prisoner to appeal.
Dieter
says the debate prompted legislative proposals for similar changes or
studies in about 17 states. While none has come realistically close to a
moratorium on executions, there will probably be studies of reform
measures in a dozen more states, he added.
Costs
are a factor
Marquis,
the Oregon prosecutor, said the cost to the justice system is a factor.
While prosecution costs rarely go beyond $10,000, he said, it's not
unusual for a defense to cost a half million dollars since "we
require not just due process but super due process in capital cases."
"The
goal is to seek the death penalty only for the worst of the worst,"
Marquis said.
U.S.
opinion polls have shown support for the death penalty rising in the last
few years -- except when respondents were offered the option of life
sentences without parole. A Gallup poll in May found 74 % of respondents
favored the death penalty for murderers but that fell to 53 % if life
without parole was available as an alternative.
Given
growing support for what Marquis called "true life" -- laws that
provide no parole options, even Texas -- which has executed more in the
modern era than any other state -- has begun to move toward a
life-with-no-parole option, he said.
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