NAACP Legal Defense Fund’s Most Recent Report Confirms Continued Decline of Death Row Population

As of October 2023, the num­ber of peo­ple in the United States sen­tenced to death or fac­ing the pos­si­bil­i­ty of a death sen­tence con­tin­ued its more than two-decade decline, accord­ing to the lat­est report issued by the NAACP Legal Defense Fund (LDF).

In its Fall 2023 edi­tion of Death Row USA (DRUSA), LDF reports that the num­ber of peo­ple on state, fed­er­al, and mil­i­tary death rows or fac­ing pend­ing cap­i­tal tri­als or resen­tenc­ing pro­ceed­ings has fall­en to 2,262. Of that total, LDF reports that 804 pris­on­ers or 35.5% are in states with mora­to­ria on exe­cu­tions, mean­ing there is no imme­di­ate threat of exe­cu­tion, and anoth­er 125 pris­on­ers are await­ing new sen­tenc­ing pro­ceed­ings. The total pop­u­la­tion is now at its low­est num­ber since 1989. 

LDF also released its Spring and Summer 2023 reports, which include infor­ma­tion regard­ing indi­vid­u­als who are on death row as the result of non-unan­i­mous jury sen­tences or judi­cial over­ride of jury deter­mi­na­tions for life. According to the Spring 2023 report, Alabama, and Florida account for 474 peo­ple on death rows, despite 324 peo­ple (68.4%) of them receiv­ing the death penal­ty from non-unan­i­mous juries or judi­cial over­ride. In Alabama, 129 of 167 (77.2%) death row pris­on­ers were sen­tenced non-unan­i­mous­ly or faced judi­cial over­ride, and in Florida, 193 of 307 (62.8%) peo­ple on death row were sen­tenced non-unan­i­mous­ly or by judicial override.