The lat­est edi­tion of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund​’s Death Row USA shows a decrease of 52 inmates between January 1 and October 1, 2011. Over the last decade, the total pop­u­la­tion of state and fed­er­al death rows has decreased sig­nif­i­cant­ly, from 3,682 inmates in 2000 to 3,199 inmates as of October 2011. California con­tin­ues to have the largest death row pop­u­la­tion (721), fol­lowed by Florida (402), Texas (317), Pennsylvania (213), and Alabama (204). Neither California nor Pennsylvania have car­ried out an exe­cu­tion in the past six years. The report also con­tains infor­ma­tion on the race of defen­dants and vic­tims in the under­ly­ing mur­ders for those exe­cut­ed since 1976. Among those, there were 261 instances of a black defen­dant exe­cut­ed for the mur­der of a white vic­tim (account­ing for 20% of all exe­cu­tions since 1976). Conversely, there were only 17 instances where a white defen­dant was exe­cut­ed for the mur­der of a black victim.

In juris­dic­tions hav­ing 10 or more inmates on death row, the states with the high­est per­cent of minori­ties on death row were:

- Texas (71%)
 — Delaware (71%)
 — Connecticut (70%)
 — Louisiana (69%)
 — Pennsylvania (69%)

(NAACP Legal Defense Fund, ​“Death Row USA,” October 1, 2011, post­ed March 23, 2012). See also Death Row and Studies.

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