In a new edi­to­r­i­al, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette argues that the death penal­ty is nev­er the jus­tice that is called for” and achieves noth­ing of val­ue except the sat­is­fac­tion of vengeance.” The Post-Gazette describes the death of 6‑week-old Leon Katz in June as an almost unfath­omable” crime and a vio­la­tion of pri­mor­dial inno­cence” — but argues that Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr.’s deci­sion to seek the death penal­ty against Nicole Virzi, Leon’s alleged killer, will only extend the pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al process pos­si­bly by decades” and pro­tect no one while cost­ing tax­pay­ers mil­lions of dol­lars.” The edi­tors point out that in the mod­ern era of the death penal­ty, Pennsylvania has spent over $1 bil­lion to sen­tence 400 peo­ple to death, but exe­cut­ed only three, few­er than the 10 peo­ple who have been exon­er­at­ed from death row. The com­mon­wealth has been under a death penal­ty mora­to­ri­um since 2015 and has not con­duct­ed an exe­cu­tion since 1999. There is no evi­dence that the death penal­ty deters vio­lent crime, the edi­tors argue, and it will only delay, and weak­en, the mea­sure of jus­tice the sys­tem can pro­vide” to baby Leon and his family.

Death sen­tences for women are exceed­ing­ly rare. Of the near­ly 9000 peo­ple in DPI’s Death Penalty Census who have been sen­tenced to death since 1972, only 177 (2%) have been women, and only 17 of those women (9.6%) have been exe­cut­ed. Only 7 women have been sen­tenced to death in Pennsylvania, the last in 2005, and all had their death sen­tences vacat­ed. The cas­es in which pros­e­cu­tors do choose to pur­sue the death penal­ty against female defen­dants often involve crimes against chil­dren. Scholars have sug­gest­ed that the death penal­ty is sought against women who are per­ceived as vio­lat­ing gen­der norms, such as the role of a moth­er or care­tak­er. However, most women who have been sen­tenced to death for killing chil­dren have ulti­mate­ly had their sen­tences vacat­ed or died before exe­cu­tion; the major­i­ty of American women who were exe­cut­ed (14/​17) were sen­tenced to death for the mur­ders of adults.

Citation Guide
Sources

Editorial Board, Baby Leon Katz deserves jus­tice. Pursuing the death penal­ty will only delay it, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, August 27, 2024; Cornell Center on the Death Penalty Worldwide, Judged for More Than Her Crime: A Global Overview of Women Facing the Death Penalty, Cornell Law School (2018).