An edi­to­r­i­al pub­lished by the Lexington Herald-Leader not­ed that sup­port for Kentucky’s death penal­ty has declined since the state resumed exe­cu­tions a decade ago. The paper stat­ed that 68% of state res­i­dents ques­tioned in a recent poll pre­ferred a long prison sen­tence over exe­cu­tion for those con­vict­ed of mur­der. The Herald-Leader con­clud­ed that Kentuckians’ grow­ing unease about cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment is reflec­tive of a broad­er nation­al trend away from the death penal­ty and that the death penal­ty is often more a mat­ter of chance than of jus­tice. The edi­to­r­i­al stat­ed:

It’s inter­est­ing that pub­lic sup­port for the death penal­ty has declined in the almost 10 years since Kentucky resumed exe­cu­tions.

Most Kentuckians still say they sup­port cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. But giv­en the choice of sen­tenc­ing a con­vict­ed mur­der­er to death or a long prison term, 68 per­cent say prison is the appro­pri­ate sen­tence.

Just 30 per­cent pick death, accord­ing to the University of Kentucky Survey Research Center.

In 1997, sup­port was about equal for the death penal­ty and a long prison term, at just under 40 per­cent.

A num­ber of expla­na­tions are pos­si­ble for the shift in pub­lic opin­ion: Mistaken con­vic­tions revealed by DNA evi­dence. A dis­turb­ing num­ber of inno­cent peo­ple who inde­pen­dent inves­ti­ga­tions have dis­cov­ered on Death Row. (Illinois had so many that it put a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions.) Bad press about lethal injec­tion, which was sup­posed to be more humane.

Or maybe it’s just a grow­ing unease that decid­ing who lives and dies isn’t a job that gov­ern­ment does very well.

Some crimes are so heinous that death seems the only fit­ting pun­ish­ment. But after watch­ing the high­ly imper­fect process of decid­ing who gets death and who does­n’t, most Kentuckians are more com­fort­able putting a vio­lent crim­i­nal away for a long time.

After all, some­one who’s mis­tak­en­ly impris­oned can be set free.

Whatever the rea­sons, Kentucky seems to be part of a larg­er trend.

A Gallup Poll ear­li­er this year found that 65 per­cent of Americans sup­port the death penal­ty, down from 80 per­cent in 1994. Given the choice of life with­out parole as an alter­na­tive to exe­cu­tion, more chose life with­out parole (48 per­cent) than death (47 per­cent.)

The num­ber of exe­cu­tions in 2006 was down, even in such bas­tions of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment as Texas.

Kentucky has exe­cut­ed two peo­ple in the 30 years since the death penal­ty was rein­stat­ed, one in 1997 and the oth­er in 1999.

So maybe cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment is doomed. The death penal­ty will become obso­lete, at no polit­i­cal risk to any­one, as juries choose long prison terms over death sen­tences.

That prob­a­bly would hap­pen if juries in cap­i­tal cas­es reflect­ed pub­lic sen­ti­ment. But they often don’t. Prosecutors use their selec­tion options to empan­el juries that are more pro-death penal­ty than the gen­er­al pub­lic.

Under such cir­cum­stances, a sen­tence of death becomes even more a mat­ter of chance than jus­tice.

That puts more pres­sure on every­one in the sys­tem to get things right.

(Lexington Herald-Leader, January 3, 2007). See Editorials, Public Opinion, and Life Without Parole.

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