PUBLIC OPINION: N.Y. Times Poll Finds A Majority of New Yorkers Now Support Alternatives to the Death Penalty

A recent New York Times poll found that 56% of sur­veyed New York vot­ers pre­fer a sen­tence of life in prison (either with­out parole or with the pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole) over the death penal­ty for peo­ple con­vict­ed of mur­der. Only 34% said they sup­port­ed the death penal­ty, a sig­nif­i­cant drop from the 48% who sup­port­ed it in 1994, just pri­or to New York’s rein­state­ment of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. This shift against the death penal­ty comes as state law­mak­ers are con­sid­er­ing whether to aban­don or try to fix New York’s uncon­sti­tu­tion­al death penal­ty statute. (New York Times, February 15, 2005). See Public Opinion and Life Without Parole.