On April 5, the state sen­ate in Connecticut approved (20 – 16) a bill to repeal the death penal­ty and replace it with a sen­tence of life with­out a parole. The bill is prospec­tive and would not affect the 11 inmates cur­rent­ly on death row. The sen­ate passed an amend­ment to the orig­i­nal repeal bill requir­ing future defen­dants con­vict­ed of mur­der with spe­cial cir­cum­stances to be sub­ject to the same con­fine­ment con­di­tions as cur­rent death row inmates. Sen. Gayle Slossberg, D‑Miford, a for­mer sup­port­er of the death penal­ty, remarked, ​“For me, the most com­pelling rea­son to reject the death penal­ty is to set our­selves on the path to the kind of soci­ety we real­ly want for our future,” she said. ​“I want some­thing bet­ter for our future,” Slossberg added. ​“We can­not con­front dark­ness with dark­ness and expect light.” Before the vote, Sen. Eric Coleman, D‑Bloomfield, (pic­tured) who led the debate in favor of repeal, said, ​“Today is a dra­mat­ic and poten­tial­ly his­toric day because the Senate has … an oppor­tu­ni­ty to cor­rect the arbi­trari­ness, the dis­crim­i­na­tion, the ran­dom hap­haz­ard approach to the appli­ca­tion of our death penal­ty in this state.” If passed by the House and signed into law, both of which appear like­ly, Connecticut would become the fifth state in five years to aban­don capital punishment. 

Connecticut has car­ried out only one exe­cu­tion since the death penal­ty was rein­stat­ed in 1976. In 2005, Michael Ross aban­doned his appeals and vol­un­teered for execution.

(D. Ariosto, ​“Connecticut may be lat­est state to repeal death penal­ty,” CNN Justice; D. Altimari, ​“Death Penalty Repeal Clears Biggest Hurdle; Senate Passes Bill, 20 – 16,” Hartford Courant, April 5, 2012). See Recent Legislative Activity and Connecticut.

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