New Study: Ending Death Penalty Could Save States Millions
Posted on Tue Oct 20, 2009 at 02:51:46 PM EST
Tags: death penalty (all tags)
The Death Penalty Information Center released a new study today (pdf) showing that states could save millions by ending the death penalty. A poll of police chiefs across the country was released with the report, Smart on Crime: Reconsidering the Death Penalty in a Time of Economic Crisis (pdf).
[The poll] found that they ranked the death penalty last among their priorities for crime-fighting, do not believe the death penalty deters murder, and rate it as the least efficient use of limited taxpayer dollars.
From DPIC:
“With many states spending millions to retain the death penalty, while seldom or never carrying out an execution, the death penalty is turning into a very expensive form of life without parole. At a time of budget shortfalls, the death penalty cannot be exempt from reevaluation alongside other wasteful government programs that no longer make sense,” said Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director of the Death Penalty Information Center and the report’s author.
[More...]
“The death penalty is a colossal waste of money that would be better spent putting more cops on the street. New Jersey threw away $250 million on the death penalty over 25 years with nothing to show for it. The death penalty isn't a deterrent whatsoever. New Jersey's murder rate has dropped since the state got rid of the death penalty. If other states abolished the death penalty, law enforcement wouldn’t miss it and the cost savings could be used on more effective crime-fighting programs,” said Police Chief James Abbott of West Orange, New Jersey. Abbott, a Republican, has served 29 years on the police force and was a member of the state commission that recommended the death penalty be abolished.
From the Executive Summary:
The death penalty in the U.S. is an enormously expensive and wasteful program with no clear benefits. All of the studies on the cost of capital punishment conclude it is much more expensive than a system with life sentences as the maximum penalty. In a time of painful budget cutbacks, states are pouring money into a system that results in a declining number of death sentences and executions that are almost exclusively carried out in just one area of the country. As many states face further deficits, it is an appropriate time to consider whether maintaining the costly death penalty system is being smart on crime.
How much does the death penalty cost? It varies, but the report says:
The high costs to the state per execution reflect the following reality: For a single death penalty trial, the state may pay $1 million more than for a non-death penalty trial.36 But only one in every three capital trials may result in a death sentence,37 so the true cost of that death sentence is $3 million. Further down the road, only one in ten of the death sentences handed down may result in an execution.38 Hence, the cost to the state to reach that one execution is $30 million. Sums like these are causing officials to rethink the wisdom of such expenditures.
Although arriving at the actual cost of the death penalty in a state is complicated, in some states $30 million per execution is a very conservative estimate.
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