In 2009, Maryland changed its cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment law, sharply lim­it­ing when the death penal­ty could be sought. Prosecutors can only pur­sue the death penal­ty in cas­es of first degree mur­der when there is DNA or oth­er bio­log­i­cal evi­dence link­ing the defen­dant to a mur­der, a video-taped con­fes­sion by the defen­dant, or a video link­ing the defen­dant to the mur­der. As the first case test­ing this statute nears com­ple­tion, DPIC’s Executive Director, Richard Dieter (pic­tured), was inter­viewed on Maryland Morning with Sheila Kast about the new statute. Listen to full inter­view here. Dieter not­ed, ​“There’s cer­tain­ly a dan­ger that it doesn’t do what the death penal­ty is most designed to do, which is to get the ​‘worst of the worst’ — the most heinous crimes com­mit­ted by the most dan­ger­ous crim­i­nal. [The Maryland law] only requires the coin­ci­dence that there be DNA or that there be a cam­era rolling … It still doesn’t deal with the prob­lems of bias and geo­graph­i­cal dis­par­i­ties. It tries to deal with the inno­cence ques­tion and in doing so dis­cards the usu­al ratio­nale for the death penal­ty of … the worst get the worst pun­ish­ment.” The cur­rent case involves a prison inmate accused of killing a cor­rec­tion­al offi­cer. Blood drops from the offi­cer were found on the defen­dan­t’s cloth­ing, though defense attor­neys main­tain their client was mere­ly present at the scene along with oth­er inmates and did not kill the guard. Maryland leg­is­la­tors are cur­rent­ly con­sid­er­ing a bill to repeal the death penal­ty. Interview.

(S. Kast, ​“The Application of the Death Penalty,” WYPR 88.1 Baltimore, February 15, 2012). See Arbitrariness. Read more about Recent Legislative Activity relat­ed to the death penalty.

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