In the most com­pre­hen­sive exam­i­na­tion of a statute in the his­to­ry of the New York State Legislature, state law­mak­ers released a report high­light­ing the tes­ti­mo­ny of 170 wit­ness­es at five statewide hear­ings on the state’s death penal­ty law. The report, issued by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver along with the Chairs of the Committees on Codes, the Judiciary and Correction, is a thor­ough exam­i­na­tion of the statute and its troubled history. 

“We have spent more than $170 mil­lion admin­is­ter­ing the death penal­ty since 1995, but not a sin­gle per­son has been exe­cut­ed dur­ing that time,” said Joseph Lentol, Chair of the Committee on Codes, who also not­ed that only sev­en per­sons had been sen­tenced to death and that the first four of these sen­tences to reach the Court of Appeals had been struck down on var­i­ous grounds. He con­tin­ued, ​“These facts obvi­ous­ly cried out for a thor­ough exam­i­na­tion of whether the death penal­ty should be re-enact­ed in New York.”

​“When the Court of Appeals in essence struck down New York’s death penal­ty law in LaValle, we in the Legislature faced an impor­tant choice: act quick­ly or act delib­er­ate­ly. We chose the lat­ter option and con­duct­ed a series of extra­or­di­nary pub­lic hear­ings to solic­it the widest pos­si­ble range of views on the death penal­ty in New York before decid­ing what action, if any, to take with respect to the statute,” said Silver. The report presents a detailed dis­cus­sion of racial prob­lems, reli­gious views, men­tal ill­ness, costs, inno­cence, and deter­rence, among oth­er sub­jects.

Helene Weinstein, Chair of the Judiciary Committee, not­ed that tes­ti­mo­ny heard dur­ing the hear­ings revealed that much of the legal land­scape sur­round­ing the death penal­ty had changed in the years since New York re-enact­ed its statute, includ­ing a series of over­turned wrong­ful con­vic­tions and the devel­op­ment of inves­ti­ga­tion tech­nolo­gies such as DNA. ​“During our hear­ings, we heard tes­ti­mo­ny from a num­ber of per­sons who had been wrong­ful­ly con­vict­ed of mur­der and, in some cas­es, placed on death row before being exon­er­at­ed. The crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem makes mis­takes, but when the death penal­ty is applied, those mis­takes can nev­er be cor­rect­ed,” she said.

Jeffrion Aubry, Chair of the Committee on Correction, said that the most com­pelling tes­ti­mo­ny came from vic­tims’ fam­i­ly mem­bers. He stat­ed, ​“Persons who had suf­fered incon­ceiv­able loss opened their hearts and told us what they thought was the most appro­pri­ate way to bring the killers of their loved ones to jus­tice. These coura­geous indi­vid­u­als pre­sent­ed var­ied views on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. We heard their sto­ries and have pre­sent­ed their views in this land­mark report.”

(Press Release, New York State Assembly, ​“Assembly Releases Death Penalty Report,” April 4, 2005). Read the Press Release. Read the Complete Report. See also DPIC’s Web Page on People v. LaValle.
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