Articles

La apli­cación de la pena de muerte sigue su ten­den­cia a la baja en EE.UU. En 2010 fueron eje­cu­tadas 46 per­sonas, un 12% menos que el año pasa­do y casi la mitad de la can­ti­dad de ajus­ti­ci­a­dos que hubo al comien­zo de la década.

Following the release of the report from the New Hampshire Commission to Study the Death Penalty, New Hampshire​’s Concord Monitor called for an end to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the state. The Commission con­clud­ed a year of pub­lic hear­ings and care­ful study and chose by a 12 – 10 vote to rec­om­mend nei­ther expand­ing nor abol­ish­ing the death penal­ty. However, the Monitor point­ed out that the evi­dence pre­sent­ed to the com­mis­sion was pri­mar­i­ly in favor of repeal­ing the death penal­ty. One of the many argu­ments against the death penal­ty con­sid­ered by the Commission…

In a recent edi­to­r­i­al, the Chicago Sun-Times sup­port­ed the abo­li­tion of the death penal­ty in Illinois dur­ing the cur­rent leg­isla­tive ses­sion. The paper not­ed its past sup­port for cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment: ​“In the past, we’ve sup­port­ed the death penal­ty as long as the legal sys­tem gives the accused a fair tri­al that results in a ver­dict of guilt beyond res­on­able doubt. Sadly, in light of expe­ri­ences in recent years, that goal seems unre­al­is­tic.” Among the rea­sons for favor­ing abo­li­tion, the paper wrote that, ​“The death penal­ty is arbi­trary — hand­ed down…

On October 29, a New York Times edi­to­r­i­al raised many con­cerns regard­ing the recent exe­cu­tion of Native American Jeffrey Landrigan in Arizona. The Times said ​“the sys­tem failed him at almost every lev­el, most dis­turbing­ly at the Supreme Court.” Landrigan’s exe­cu­tion gar­nered nation­al atten­tion because a nation­wide short­age of sodi­um thiopen­tal forced the state to seek the drug from for­eign sup­pli­ers. Despite repeat­ed orders from a fed­er­al District Court judge, Arizona refused to divulge the source of their lethal drug sup­ply. The judge stayed the exe­cu­tion based on these concerns,…

A recent edi­to­r­i­al in the Connecitcut Post called for the end of the death penal­ty in the state even as the tri­al began in a cap­i­tal case cncern­ing hor­rif­ic mur­ders in Cheshire in 2007. In 2009, the Connecticut General Assembly vot­ed to repeal the death penal­ty but Governor M. Jodi Rell vetoed the bill, cit­ing the Cheshire crimes. The edi­to­r­i­al cit­ed a vari­ety of rea­sons for repeal­ing the death penal­ty, includ­ing its inabil­i­ty to deter crime, high costs, and the dan­ger of exe­cut­ing inno­cent defen­dants. The edi­to­r­i­al said, ​“To be…

A recent edi­to­r­i­al in the Greensboro, NC, News & Record indi­cat­ed that cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment may be ​“on its last legs” in North Carolina. ​“In prac­tice,” the edi­to­r­i­al stat­ed, ​“the death penal­ty near­ly is erad­i­cat­ed. It is com­pli­cat­ed, cost­ly and no longer trust­ed.” According to the paper, use of the death penal­ty has been in steady decline. In 1999, 25 defen­dants were sen­tenced to death and anoth­er 16 were added the fol­low­ing year. In 2009, there were only two new death sen­tences in the state and only two so far in…

Recently, a California man pled guilty to the 2006 mur­der of Highway Patrolman Earl Scott. The defen­dant, Columbus Allen Jr., whose pre-tri­al pro­ceed­ings took more than four years, will now spend the rest of his life in prison, hav­ing waived his appeals. The Stanislaus County dis­trict attor­ney orig­i­nal­ly sought the death penal­ty against Allen, but there were no guar­an­tees that ver­dict would have been reached. Additionally, when the death penal­ty is imposed in California, years of appeals often fol­low, and it is not unusu­al for con­vict­ed mur­der­ers to out­live the…