NEW VOICES: Law Enforcement Officials in Washington, Texas Call for End of Their States’ Death Penalties

Drawing on their expe­ri­ence in the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem, elect­ed law enforce­ment offi­cials in Washington and Texas have urged repeal of their states’ death-penalty laws. 

In Washington, King County (Seattle) pros­e­cu­tor Dan Satterberg (pic­tured, left), a Republican, tes­ti­fied January 22 before the Senate Law and Justice Committee in favor of a bipar­ti­san leg­isla­tive pro­pos­al to repeal Washington’s cap­i­tal-pun­ish­ment statute. Telling the Texas Tribune “[w]e’re killing the wrong peo­ple,” for­mer Dallas County sher­iff Lupe Valdez (pic­tured, right), cur­rent­ly a can­di­date for the Democratic Party nom­i­na­tion for gov­er­nor of Texas, announced her oppo­si­tion to Texas’s death penalty. 

Satterberg’s tes­ti­mo­ny came on the heels of an op-ed he wrote in The Seattle Times in sup­port of SB6052, a bill that would prospec­tive­ly abol­ish cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Satterberg, who has worked in the King County pros­e­cu­tor’s office for 27 years and wit­nessed Washington’s last exe­cu­tion in 2010, wrote: ​“It is my duty to report that the death penal­ty law in our state is bro­ken and can­not be fixed. It no longer serves the inter­ests of pub­lic safe­ty, crim­i­nal jus­tice, or the needs of victims.” 

Sitting along­side Democratic Attorney General Bob Ferguson, Satterberg told the com­mit­tee, ​“If you look at it care­ful­ly and take away the pol­i­tics and the emo­tion, by any mea­sure this does­n’t work. Our crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem would be stronger with­out the death penalty.” 

The abo­li­tion bill was intro­duced by Republican state Sen. Maureen Walsh, with bipar­ti­san co-spon­sor­ship, at Ferguson’s request. In a news release, Ferguson said: ​“The death penal­ty is expen­sive, unfair, dis­pro­por­tion­ate — and it doesn’t work. More than a third of all U.S. states have abol­ished the death penal­ty. Washington should join them.” The bill passed the com­mit­tee by a 4 – 3 vote on January 25. 

In a Texas can­di­date’s forum in Austin, Valdez — who served as sher­iff from 2005 to 2017 before resign­ing to run for gov­er­nor — ref­er­enced on-going con­cerns about wrong­ful cap­i­tal con­vic­tions and wrong­ful exe­cu­tions. ​“Some of those [sen­tenced to death in Texas] have been exon­er­at­ed,” Valdez said. ​“We can­not con­tin­ue being in a sit­u­a­tion where we risk killing a per­son who is not guilty.” 

Since 1973, 13 peo­ple have been exon­er­at­ed from death row in Texas, and ques­tions have been raised about the guilt of sev­er­al exe­cut­ed pris­on­ers, includ­ing Carlos DeLuna, Cameron Willingham, and Robert Pruett. Valdez joined anoth­er lead­ing Democratic con­tender for gov­er­nor, busi­ness­man Andrew White, in oppos­ing the death penal­ty. Incumbent Governor Greg Abbott, a for­mer Texas attor­ney gen­er­al, is a strong sup­port­er of capital punishment.