John Connor, who served as chief spe­cial pros­e­cu­tor in Montana for 21 years and who pros­e­cut­ed five prison homi­cide cas­es, is now call­ing for the repeal of Montana’s death penal­ty. Connor orig­i­nal­ly believed that the death penal­ty was need­ed to keep cor­rec­tion­al offi­cers safe from inmates serv­ing life in prison with­out parole. But through his expe­ri­ence he found, ​“The real­i­ty is that the death penal­ty is not, and nev­er has been, a deter­rent. Prison safe­ty depends on prop­er staffing, equip­ment, resources and train­ing. Certainly the mon­ey spent on try­ing to put some­one to death for over 20 years could find bet­ter use in address­ing those prac­ti­cal needs of our correctional system.”

Connor praised the work of state cor­rec­tion­al offi­cers and said, ​“I would nev­er advo­cate for repeal­ing the penal­ty if I thought it placed our cor­rec­tion­al per­son­nel at risk. During the years I pros­e­cut­ed cas­es of vio­lence in the prison, I learned to great­ly admire and respect the ded­i­cat­ed cor­rec­tions pro­fes­sion­als that care for and man­age the inmate pop­u­la­tion … But the best way to pro­tect our cor­rec­tion­al pro­fes­sion­als is to rec­og­nize the need for a well-trained staff, for the com­mit­ment of ade­quate resources to oper­ate the insti­tu­tions safe­ly, and for inno­v­a­tive man­age­ment incen­tives that serve to reduce the oppor­tu­ni­ty for prison violence.”

The full arti­cle may be read below:

Guest Opinion: Death penal­ty drains jus­tice sys­tem resources

By John Connor

I served as chief spe­cial pros­e­cu­tor for the state of Montana for 21 years. During that time I was involved with the pros­e­cu­tion of many homi­cide cas­es, includ­ing five death penal­ty cas­es involv­ing homi­cides com­mit­ted by prison inmates against oth­er inmates. I also man­aged the pros­e­cu­tion of 14 inmates for the 1991 prison riot homi­cides.

I believed at the time that the death penal­ty was need­ed to keep cor­rec­tion­al offi­cers safe from inmates serv­ing a sen­tence of life with­out parole. Without the threat of exe­cu­tion, I thought, there would be no deter­rent to pre­vent such inmates from tak­ing the life of a cor­rec­tion­al offi­cer.

But my direct expe­ri­ence pros­e­cut­ing prison homi­cides changed my mind. I have come to believe that the death penal­ty is an incal­cu­la­ble drain on our lim­it­ed crim­i­nal jus­tice resources. It makes bizarre celebri­ties of the sen­tenced inmates while essen­tial­ly ignor­ing the suf­fer­ing that vic­tims’ fam­i­lies must endure through decades of legal scruti­ny. And frankly, it lessens our own human­i­ty. It is time for Montana to repeal it.

I would nev­er advo­cate for repeal­ing the penal­ty if I thought it placed our cor­rec­tion­al per­son­nel at risk. During the years I pros­e­cut­ed cas­es of vio­lence in the prison, I learned to great­ly admire and respect the ded­i­cat­ed cor­rec­tions pro­fes­sion­als that care for and man­age the inmate pop­u­la­tion in all of our state and coun­ty deten­tion facil­i­ties. Theirs is a thank­less, stress­ful respon­si­bil­i­ty for which they are paid very lit­tle, espe­cial­ly giv­en the demands of their jobs. Nonetheless, they con­tin­ue to labor in the most dif­fi­cult of envi­ron­ments for Montana’s cit­i­zens.

But the best way to pro­tect our cor­rec­tion­al pro­fes­sion­als is to rec­og­nize the need for a well-trained staff, for the com­mit­ment of ade­quate resources to oper­ate the insti­tu­tions safe­ly, and for inno­v­a­tive man­age­ment incen­tives that serve to reduce the oppor­tu­ni­ty for prison vio­lence.

After the 1991 riots in the Montana State Prison’s max­i­mum-secu­ri­ty unit, prison offi­cials exam­ined their pro­to­cols and made many pos­i­tive changes to height­en secu­ri­ty and ensure safe­ty. As a result of those changes, there have been no homi­cides in the max­i­mum secu­ri­ty unit since the riot. The drop in homi­cides is not because of the death penal­ty — which exist­ed in Montana both before and after 1991 and did noth­ing to deter the riots — nor because there are few­er dan­ger­ous peo­ple in the prison now than there once were. The decrease in homi­cides is a result of bet­ter pro­ce­dures and oth­er pos­i­tive changes to the man­age­ment of the prison.

The truth is that inmates serv­ing sen­tences of life with­out the pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole are not the pri­ma­ry threat to cor­rec­tions offi­cers’ safe­ty. Studies have shown that inmates serv­ing life sen­tences are actu­al­ly very man­age­able because they do not want to jeop­ar­dize the lim­it­ed priv­i­leges they can earn in the sys­tem. A well-man­aged prison with prop­er clas­si­fi­ca­tion and staffing can cre­ate incen­tives for lif­ers to behave while seg­re­gat­ing and pun­ish­ing those who are a threat before vio­lence ever occurs. Our prison sys­tem already knows how to do this.

The real­i­ty is that the death penal­ty is not, and nev­er has been, a deter­rent. Prison safe­ty depends on prop­er staffing, equip­ment, resources and train­ing. Certainly the mon­ey spent on try­ing to put some­one to death for over 20 years could find bet­ter use in address­ing those prac­ti­cal needs of our cor­rec­tion­al sys­tem.

John Connor prac­tices law in Helena.

(J. Connor, ​“Death Penalty drains jus­tice sys­tem resources,” Billings Gazette, March 22, 2009). See New Voices, Deterrence, Recent Legislative Activity, and Costs.

Citation Guide