Entries by Bella Sasselli

One of the most com­mon myths about the death penal­ty is that it costs less than sen­tenc­ing some­one to spend the rest of their life in a max­i­mum secu­ri­ty prison, because many assume that the state saves mon­ey when an exe­cut­ed per­son no longer requires con­fine­ment in prison, health care, or relat­ed expens­es. But this assump­tion has been repeat­ed­ly proven to be wrong. Several fac­tors con­tribute to the high cost of the death penal­ty, includ­ing prosecution and…

On June 26, 2025, more than 200 Californians and rep­re­sen­ta­tives of civ­il rights orga­ni­za­tions gath­ered at the state Capitol to urge California Governor Gavin Newsom to com­mute all death sen­tences. Speakers at the gath­er­ing called California’s death penal­ty statute uncon­sti­tu­tion­al and not­ed per­sis­tent evi­dence of racial bias, his­toric ties to lynch­ing, inef­fec­tive pro­tec­tion of inno­cent lives, and high costs. California, home to the nation’s largest death row, is…