Studies

Items: 351 — 360


Mar 25, 2009

STUDIES: Costs of Death Penalty in California

An update of a study by the ACLU of Northern California on the costs of the death penal­ty found addi­tion­al expens­es due to a net increase in the size of death row. The analy­sis found, The 11 new addi­tions to death row add almost $1 mil­lion to the annu­al cost of hous­ing peo­ple on death row, now total­ing $61.2 mil­lion more each year than the cost of hous­ing in the gen­er­al pop­u­la­tion. … The recent­ly approved state bud­get also includes $136 mil­lion in funds…

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Mar 25, 2009

STUDIES: Amnesty International Reports World Moving Away from Death Penalty

A new report released by Amnesty International reveals that the world is mov­ing away from cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Amnesty’s annu­al report showed that only 59 nations retain the death penal­ty, and of those nations, only 25 used it in 2008. Among the nations still employ­ing the death penal­ty, China was the most pro­lif­ic with 1,718 exe­cu­tions, fol­lowed by Iran with 346, Saudi Arabia with 102, United States with 37, Pakistan with 36, and Iraq with 34. Argentina and Uzbekistan…

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Mar 23, 2009

New Mexico to Save Money After Abolition of Death Penalty

A cost assess­ment pre­pared for the New Mexico leg­is­la­ture pri­or to its vote on repeal­ing the death penal­ty indi­cat­ed some of the mon­ey that would be saved if the bill was passed. The state will save sev­er­al mil­lion dol­lars each year, accord­ing to the fis­cal impact report by the Public Defender Department. For exam­ple, in the case of State v. Young, the pub­lic defend­er office expend­ed $1.7 mil­lion. They esti­mat­ed that the total cost to the state would be three times…

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Feb 26, 2009

Death Penalty Reform Bills Introduced in Tennessee

A Tennessee leg­isla­tive study com­mit­tee has end­ed its 16-month analy­sis of the state’s cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment process and has made rec­om­men­da­tions for achiev­ing a more fair and accu­rate sys­tem: . Require defense attor­neys in cap­i­tal cas­es to be high­ly qual­i­fied; . Mandate that defense attor­neys have uni­form access to evi­dence against their clients; . Require police offi­cers to record all inter­ro­ga­tions relat­ed to a homicide…

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Dec 31, 2008

Number of Police Officers Killed by Gunfire is Lowest in 50 Years

The num­ber of police offi­cers killed by gun­fire in 2008 dropped by 40% from 2007, down to its low­est lev­el in more than 50 years, accord­ing to a report by the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund. The report attrib­uted the decline to a new empha­sis on offi­cer safe­ty train­ing and equip­ment. In addi­tion to increased train­ing, more offi­cers are wear­ing body armor and using stun guns to pro­tect them­selves. The over­all num­ber of offi­cers killed in the…

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Dec 31, 2008

Executions Slowed in 2008, But Numbers May Increase in Coming Year

The Death Penalty Information Center’s Year End Report for 2008 record­ed 37 exe­cu­tions for the year that ends today. That is a 12% drop from the 42 exe­cu­tions in 2007. However, based on exe­cu­tions already sched­uled for 2009, the com­ing year may see an increase. There are 23 exe­cu­tions sched­uled for the first five months of 2009, and more dates are like­ly to be added. As was true in 2008, almost all the exe­cu­tions sched­uled are in the south and about half (12 of 23) are in…

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Dec 16, 2008

NEW RESOURCES: Death Qualification and Prejudice

Research on death qual­i­fi­ca­tion – the selec­tion of jurors who are qual­i­fied to serve on a cap­i­tal case because they are will­ing to sen­tence some­one to death – has revealed addi­tion­al char­ac­ter­is­tics among such jurors. Professor Brooke Butler of the University of South Florida in Sarasota has stud­ied such jurors and pub­lished her results in the jour­nal of Behavioral Sciences and the Law. Her study, Death qual­i­fi­ca­tion and prej­u­dice: the effect of implic­it racism, sex­ism, and homophobia on…

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Dec 12, 2008

Maryland Commission Recommends Abolition of Death Penalty in Final Report

The leg­isla­tive com­mis­sion estab­lished to exam­ine the death penal­ty in Maryland has rec­om­mend­ed abo­li­tion of the pun­ish­ment by a vote of 13 – 9. The Maryland Commission on Capital Punishment released its final report on December 12, detail­ing the rea­sons for its rec­om­men­da­tion. There is no good and suf­fi­cient rea­son to have the death penal­ty,” Chairman Benjamin R. Civiletti said at a news con­fer­ence. Regarding the com­mis­sion’s rec­om­men­da­tion of repeal rather…

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Dec 09, 2008

Tennessee Death Penalty Committee Recommends Changes in Representation Standards

A leg­isla­tive com­mit­tee cre­at­ed to study the death penal­ty in Tennessee has rec­om­mend­ed ways to ensure cap­i­tal cas­es are han­dled fair­ly and effec­tive­ly. The com­mit­tee approved a res­o­lu­tion that asks law­mak­ers to cre­ate a statewide author­i­ty whose duties would include iden­ti­fy­ing lawyers expe­ri­enced in cap­i­tal cas­es, rais­ing the stan­dard pay for such attor­neys, and mon­i­tor­ing their case­loads. Thomas Lee, a Tennessee attor­ney on the com­mit­tee, said such an author­i­ty would help…

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Dec 05, 2008

STUDIES: Higher Murder Rates Related to Gun Laws

States with soft­er gun laws have high­er rates of hand­gun killings, fatal shoot­ings of police offi­cers, and sales of weapons that were used in crimes in oth­er states, accord­ing to a study due out in January 2009. The study’s 38-page report, under­writ­ten by a group of over 300 may­ors and obtained by the Washington Post, focused on track­ing guns used in crimes back to the retail­ers that first sold…

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