A recent edi­to­r­i­al in the Salt Lake Tribune calls for Utahns and their elect­ed lead­ers to con­sid­er aban­don­ing the death penal­ty cit­ing that ​“state-spon­sored killing of a human being, no mat­ter how heinous the crime, is per­mit­ted by a sys­tem that has been proven beyond doubt to be inher­ent­ly capri­cious, unfair and shock­ing­ly fal­li­ble.” The edi­to­r­i­al also point­ed to the declin­ing use of the death penal­ty nation­wide, with an all-time high of 328 death sen­tences in 1994 com­pared to 106 death sen­tences in 2009, a down­ward trend dri­ven by the amount of inmates who have been freed from death row based on new evi­dence or recant­ed wit­ness tes­ti­monies. The edi­to­r­i­al con­cludes, ​“There sim­ply is no deny­ing that our sys­tem of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the United States is unal­ter­ably bro­ken. To con­tin­ue to adhere to it is to tread beyond the bounds of what con­sti­tutes a humane, moral and just soci­ety.” Read full editorial below.

Death penal­ty: Neither just nor moral 
Tribune Editorial

More than a decade has passed since the state of Utah exe­cut­ed a con­vict­ed mur­der­er. Now, as the state pre­pares to once again apply the death penal­ty, is a good time for Utahns and their elect­ed lead­ers to con­sid­er aban­don­ing this archa­ic and deeply flawed form of punishment.

In the inter­im between the exe­cu­tion of Joseph Mitchell Parsons in 1999 and the expect­ed set­ting of a death date for Ronnie Lee Gardner, the legal, moral and eth­i­cal argu­ments sup­port­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in Utah have been erod­ing like sand cas­tles at high tide.

That is because the state-spon­sored killing of a human being, no mat­ter how heinous the crime, is per­mit­ted by a sys­tem that has been proven beyond doubt to be inher­ent­ly capri­cious, unfair and shock­ing­ly fal­li­ble. And, one by one, state leg­is­la­tures across the coun­try are decid­ing that they can no longer jus­ti­fy, even for mere­ly finan­cial rea­sons, retain­ing the death penal­ty as their supreme form of pun­ish­ment. Already, 15 states have dropped the death penal­ty and some dozen oth­ers have looked at fol­low­ing suit. Lifetime impris­on­ment under severe restric­tions, arguably worse than death, has become the preferred alternative.

Gardner, 49, was sen­tenced to die in 1985 for the shoot­ing death of attor­ney Michael Burdell dur­ing an escape attempt at a Salt Lake City cour­t­house. Gardner, who had been brought to the cour­t­house for a hear­ing on rob­bery and mur­der charges (he was lat­er con­vict­ed), also wound­ed a court bailiff before he was shot in the shoul­der and recap­tured. Earlier this month, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear his lat­est appeal and the Utah Attorney General’s Office has asked a judge to set a date for his exe­cu­tion by lethal injection.

The wel­come retreat from the death penal­ty in the United States began after 1994, a year in which there was an all-time high of 328 death sen­tences since the Supreme Court restored cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in 1976. Last year brought just 106 new sen­tences. The down­ward trend has been dri­ven by high-pro­file cas­es in which inmates have been sprung from death row by new evi­dence based on DNA test­ing, or by key pros­e­cu­tion wit­ness­es recant­i­ng their testimony.

The Death Penalty Information Center has iden­ti­fied 129 inmates who have been released from death row since 1977 owing to new evi­dence. Nine were exon­er­at­ed and freed last year after serv­ing a com­bined 121 years behind bars.

There sim­ply is no deny­ing that our sys­tem of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the United States is unal­ter­ably bro­ken. To con­tin­ue to adhere to it is to tread beyond the bounds of what con­sti­tutes a humane, moral and just society.

(Salt Lake City Tribune, April 17, 2010). See also Innocence and Sentencing. Read more Editorials.

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