Kentucky’s recently-formed Criminal Justice Policy Assessment Council will be examining the state’s criminal code, and is expected to examine a wide range of criminal justice issues—including the death penalty—in the first major overhaul of Kentucky’s criminal code since the 1970s. The council, which was formed by Gov. Matt Bevin, includes legislators, judges, criminal justice experts, and religious leaders, charged with producing a list of recommendations for Kentucky lawmakers. One council member, Bishop William Medley, of the Catholic Diocese of Owensboro, has expressed moral opposition to the death penalty, and received backing for repealing the punishment from some in the courts and the prosecution bar. Circuit Judge Jay Wethington, a former prosecutor who prosecuted death penalty cases told the Messenger-Inquirer that he was “going to side with … Bishop Medley” on that issue, but for different reasons. “We need to get rid of the death penalty,” he said. “We spend too much money for the results.” Meanwhile, three former Kentucky prosecutors wrote an op-ed for Louisville’s Courier-Journal urging abolition of the death penalty. Joseph Gutmann (pictured), Stephen Ryan, and J. Stewart Schneider discussed the results of a recent University of Kentucky poll, which found that a large majority (72.4%) of Kentuckians support a moratorium on executions. They noted that support for the death penalty has risen since 2011, when the American Bar Association released a study that found serious problems with Kentucky’s application of the death penalty. At that point, 62% of Kentuckians favored a suspension of executions. They conclude, “These poll results make it clear that Kentuckians’ concern about the fairness of the state’s criminal justice system is growing. As we have written before, replacing the death penalty with life without parole is the best approach for our state – protecting public safety, providing justice to the families of victims, removing the possibility that an innocent person will be executed and saving limited tax dollars.”

(J. Mayse, “Judges voice opinions on how to improve state’s penal code,” The Messenger-Inquirer, July 25, 2016; J. Gutmann, S. Ryan, and J. S. Schneider, “Support grows for suspending Ky. death penalty,” Courier-Journal, August 2, 2016.) See Public Opinion and Arbitrariness.

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