Race of Death Row Inmates Executed Since 1976

National Statistics on the Death Penalty and Race

Execution information accurate as of July 7, 2017 following an execution in Virginia.

Race of Defendants Executed in the U.S. Since 1976

BLACK	502	34.5%
LATINO	120	8.3%
WHITE	811	55.6%
OTHER	23	1.6%

NOTE: The federal government counts some categories, such as Hispanics, as an ethnic group rather than a race. DPIC refers to all groups as races because the sources for much of our information use these categories.

race chart 1

Race of Victims Since 1976

BLACK	327	15.3%
LATINO	149	6.9%
WHITE	1616	75.6%
OTHER	45	2.1%

NOTE: Number of Victims refers to the victims in the underlying murder in cases where an execution has occurred since the restoration of the death penalty in 1976. There are more victims than executions because some cases involve more than one victim.

Race of Victim Figures up to 7/1/2016 from NAACP-LDF "Death Row USA (July 1, 2016)" in addition to DPIC data.

race chart 2

"In 82% of the studies [reviewed], race of the victim was found to influence the likelihood of being charged with capital murder or receiving the death penalty, i.e., those who murdered whites were found more likely to be sentenced to death than those who murdered blacks."
- United States General Accounting Office, Death Penalty Sentencing, February 1990

Persons Executed for Interracial Murders in the U.S. Since 1976

The cases represented here are cases of one defendant executed for the murder of one or more victims of one race. Cases involving multiple victims of several different races are not included here.

White Defendant / Black Victim (20)

Black Defendant / White Victim (287)

Executions for Interracial Murders

Current U.S. Death Row Population by Race

BLACK	1215	41.87%
LATINO	380	13.09%
WHITE	1226	42.25%
OTHER	81	2.79%

Death Row Population Figures from NAACP-LDF "Death Row USA (October 1, 2016)"

Current Death Row Populations by Race
as of October 1, 2016

State	Total	Black	White	Latino	Native Amer.	Asian	Unknown
Alabama	194	103	88	2	0	1	0
Arizona	125	16	75	28	3	3	0
Arkansas	36	20	16	0	0	0	0
California	745	270	250	185	11	29	0
Colorado	3	3	0	0	0	0	0
Delaware	17	10	4	3	0	0	0
Florida	395	153	208	31	1	2	0
Georgia	67	34	30	3	0	0	0
Idaho	9	0	9	0	0	0	0
Indiana	12	3	9	0	0	0	0
Kansas	10	3	7	0	0	0	0
Kentucky	34	6	28	0	0	0	0
Louisiana	76	50	22	3	0	1	0
Mississippi	48	26	21	0	0	1	0
Missouri	26	9	17	0	0	0	0
Montana	2	0	2	0	0	0	0
Nebraska	10	2	3	5	0	0	0
Nevada	80	30	39	9	0	2	0
New Hampshire	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
New Mexico	2	0	2	0	0	0	0
North Carolina	155	80	62	5	7	1	0
Ohio	142	76	61	3	0	2	0
Oklahoma	48	21	23	2	2	0	0
Oregon*	34	3	26	3	1	0	1
Pennsylvania	175	94	63	16	0	2	0
South Carolina	41	22	18	1	0	0	0
South Dakota	3	0	3	0	0	0	0
Tennessee	68	33	32	1	0	2	0
Texas	254	109	68	71	0	6	0
Utah	9	1	5	2	1	0	0
Virginia	7	3	4	0	0	0	0
Washington	9	4	5	0	0	0	0
Wyoming	1	0	1	0	0	0	0
US Gov’t	62	28	25	7	1	1	0
US Military	6	3	3	0	0	0	0

* One member of Death Row's race is not currently identified

(In this table, the total of inmates on death row will be slightly higher than the national total of 2,902 because some inmates were sentenced to death in more than one state and hence will be counted twice.)

Figures from NAACP-LDF "Death Row USA (October 1, 2016)"

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