Death Penalty - States

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After posting on CNN.com’s interview of Texas Death Row’s Hank Skinner earlier this week, readers wrote to let us know about more television coverage of Death Row and Death Penalty issues this fall.  Which is great news.  The more public awareness is brought to these issues the better,right?

After all, that’s the main purpose of this blog: to…

California re-instituted the death penalty in 1978; however, California has not executed anyone since February 2006, when Federal District Judge Jeremy Fogel stayed the execution of Michael Morales based upon Mr. Morales’ arguments against lethal injection as cruel and unusual punishment. 

Federal Judge Fogel Has a Big Decision to Make

Now, after four years have…

Once again, we welcome James Clark, Death Penalty Field Organizer for the ACLU of Southern California as we repost his recent article dealing with the financial realties of capital punishment upon a state’s budget. 

In the past, we’ve pointed to the obvious money motive for California – and other states – to end the death penalty on merely a bottom line, dollars and cents, approach.  (See, e.g., California Could Save $1 Billion By Abolishing Death Penalty.  How Bad Will It Get B4 They Do?)

However, today Mr. Clark provides us with the perspective of a Californian, speaking to his neighbors and friends who are living in the beautiful state we all know is facing financial ruin. 

Here is James Clark’s article (with his approval, of course).  It’s worth your time to read it:

How Would You Spend $64 Million?
by: ACLU
Fri Aug 13, 2010 at 11:32:01 AM PDT

By James Clark, Death Penalty Field Organizer, ACLU of Southern California

Remember that episode of The Simpsons where Homer is so broke he breaks into his daughter’s piggy bank, only to find it full of IOUs from himself?

On Wednesday, that scene was reenacted in Sacramento, with Gov. Schwarzenegger playing the role of Homer. The governor announced that he would be "borrowing" $64 million from the General Fund in order to move forward with one of his pet projects, the construction of a new death row facility at San Quentin. And $64 million is just the tip of the iceberg. Altogether, the new facility is expected to total upwards of $400 million. That’s half a million dollars per prison cell — roughly the cost of a nice house in California.

Of course, the General Fund is virtually broke already, so our governor is borrowing against nonexistent budget. And didn’t Gov. Schwarzenegger threaten that he wouldn’t sign a budget at all? Every government agency in the state is in fiscal emergency, our social safety net is in tatters, and the state is weeks away from paying state employees with IOUs.

Which is why building a new death row is exactly what we don’t need need right now.

California has by far the largest and most costly death row in the country, with over 700 inmates, nearly double the closest runner-up. All of these inmates live in a prison that predates the CivilContinue Reading California Death Penalty: Guest Blogger Asks How Would You Spend $64 Million?

Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court announced that it will hear Cullen v. Pinholster (09-1088), reviewing California’s federal Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on whether or not the death penalty should be reinstated for convicted murderer Scott Pinholster. 

Importance of mitigating factor was the key to Ninth Circuit’s decision.

The Ninth Circuit nixed capital…