A recent arti­cle in the American Police Beat high­lights the con­cerns that police chiefs have with the costs and inef­fec­tive­ness of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. The arti­cle notes, ​“The prob­lem, accord­ing to the police chiefs is the fact that cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment is cost­ing states hun­dreds of mil­lions of dol­lars for rel­a­tive­ly few exe­cu­tions and noth­ing in the way of crime deter­rence… Hiring more police offi­cers, fight­ing drug abuse, longer prison sen­tences and improved crime data­bas­es all are high­er pri­or­i­ties for top cops than cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment.” The arti­cle makes ref­er­ence to an opin­ion sur­vey of police chiefs com­mis­sioned by the Death Penalty Information Center. (See ​“Smart on Crime”).

(APB Staff, ​“Death penal­ty comes with a hefty price tag,” American Police Beat, Dec. 31, 2009). See also Costs and New Voices.

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