New York Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver voiced seri­ous doubts about the neces­si­ty for cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in light of its high cost and the alter­na­tive sen­tenc­ing option of life with­out parole. Silver, who sup­port­ed the death penal­ty in the past, said: ​“I have some doubt whether we need a death penal­ty.… We are spend­ing tens of mil­lions of dol­lars [that] may be bet­ter spent on edu­cat­ing chil­dren.” He also remarked that the life-with­out-parole statute the state now has in place ensures that those con­vict­ed of mur­der can’t go free. Last year, New York’s Court of Appeals declared the state’s death penal­ty statute uncon­sti­tu­tion­al. Any attempt to cor­rect the uncon­sti­tu­tion­al pro­vi­sions in the law would have to be con­sid­ered and passed by the Assembly of which Silver is the Speaker. New York Senate Majority leader, Republican Joseph Bruno, has pre­dict­ed that the Assembly will not pass a bill attempt­ing to fix the statute. 

(Democrat and Chronicle, January 27, 2005). See Life Without Parole and Costs.

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