A new report released by the Tennessee Comptroller of the Treasury rec­om­mend­ed changes to the state’s cost­ly death penal­ty and called into ques­tion its effec­tive­ness in pre­vent­ing crime. The Office of Research not­ed that it lacked suf­fi­cient data to accu­rate­ly account for the total cost of cap­i­tal tri­als, stat­ing that ​“because cost and time records were not main­tained, the Office of Research was unable to deter­mine the total, com­pre­hen­sive cost of the death penal­ty in Tennessee.” Although not­ing that, ​“no reli­able data exists con­cern­ing the cost of pros­e­cu­tion or defense of first-degree mur­der cas­es in Tennessee,” the report con­clud­ed that cap­i­tal mur­der tri­als are longer and more expen­sive at every step com­pared to oth­er mur­der tri­als. In fact, the avail­able data indi­cat­ed that in cap­i­tal tri­als, tax­pay­ers pay half again as much as mur­der cas­es in which pros­e­cu­tors seek prison terms rather than the death penal­ty. Findings in the report include the following:

  • Death penal­ty tri­als cost an aver­age of 48% more than the aver­age cost of tri­als in which pros­e­cu­tors seek life imprisonment.
  • Tennessee District Attorneys General are not con­sis­tent in their pur­suit of the death penalty.
  • Surveys and inter­views of dis­trict attor­neys indi­cate that some pros­e­cu­tors ​“use the death penal­ty as a ​‘bar­gain­ing chip’ to secure plea bar­gains for lesser sentences.”
  • Previous research pro­vides no clear indi­ca­tion whether the death penal­ty acts as a method of crime prevention.
  • The Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals reversed 29 per­cent of cap­i­tal cas­es on direct appeal.
  • Although any trau­mat­ic tri­al may cause stress and pain for jurors, the vic­tims’ fam­i­ly, and the defendant’s fam­i­ly, the pres­sure may be at its peak dur­ing death penalty trials.

Read the The Tennessee Comptroller of the Treasury Office of Research’s Report, ​“Tennessee’s Death Penalty: Costs and Consequences.” See Costs.
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