By PATRICK D. HEALY

ALBANY, Feb. 10 — A sol­id major­i­ty of Democrats in the State Assembly now oppose res­ur­rect­ing the death penal­ty, includ­ing key lead­ers who vot­ed for the law in 1995, mak­ing it more like­ly that it will not be revived, accord­ing to law­mak­ers on both sides.

After two months of hear­ings into the issue, the chair­man of the Assembly Codes Committee, Joseph R. Lentol, said on Thursday that he now sup­port­ed life with­out parole instead of restor­ing the death penal­ty, for which he vot­ed in 1995. The Assembly speak­er, Sheldon Silver, said he would not be cowed into hav­ing the Assembly vote on restor­ing the death penal­ty, despite pres­sure from Republicans.

Their remarks come as a debate has erupt­ed in the Capitol over whether the mea­sure should reach the Assembly floor. Gov. George E. Pataki and Republican lead­ers in the Senate want a vote as a last oppor­tu­ni­ty to restore the death penal­ty, which was vir­tu­al­ly sus­pend­ed last June by a state court.

The Democrats have delayed action on the issue by tak­ing more than 40 hours of intense, often emo­tion­al tes­ti­mo­ny at the pub­lic hear­ings, which have been decid­ed­ly opposed to the death penal­ty. The hear­ings are to con­clude on Friday, after which pres­sure from all sides is expect­ed to start increas­ing on Mr. Silver.

Many of his Assembly allies — par­tic­u­lar­ly lib­er­al, black and Hispanic Democrats who helped save him from a coup in 2000 — strong­ly pre­fer the alter­na­tive of life with­out parole and want Mr. Silver to bot­tle up any death penal­ty bill and avoid risk­ing a floor vote.

Yet if Republicans do not get a vote in the full Assembly, they may turn the death penal­ty into the first test — and a poten­tial­ly embar­rass­ing one — of Mr. Silver’s new­ly avowed com­mit­ment to
democ­ra­tiz­ing the Legislature.

In an inter­view on Thursday, Mr. Silver said that the hear­ings would be used as a guide to decide whether there would be a floor vote, but that in the end the Democratic cau­cus would deter­mine if the full Assembly would vote.

Echoing sev­er­al col­leagues, Mr. Silver added that he had grow­ing doubts about the prac­ti­cal need, expense and infal­li­bil­i­ty of the death penal­ty, espe­cial­ly since defen­dants can now be sen­tenced to life with­out parole. He also argued that since 1995 — when Mr. Pataki took office on a wave of sup­port for the death penal­ty that helped to sweep out his pre­de­ces­sor, Mario M. Cuomo — pub­lic sen­ti­ment appeared to have shift­ed against cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment.

​“It clear­ly seems to be mov­ing in a direc­tion away from the death penal­ty in the last 10 years, now that you have life with­out parole gain­ing more accep­tance,” said Mr. Silver, who remains a sup­port­er of the death penal­ty. ​“Maybe it just should­n’t be,” he added, refer­ring to the death penal­ty.

Significantly, Mr. Lentol, a Brooklyn Democrat, pre­dict­ed that the three com­mit­tees spon­sor­ing the pub­lic hear­ings would rec­om­mend stick­ing to life with­out parole, giv­ing Mr. Silver and the Democratic lead­ers a chance to side­line the death penal­ty.

​“My guess is that there will nev­er be an Assembly floor vote on this issue — that if we did any­thing, it would be noth­ing, and that would kill the death penal­ty,” said Mr. Lentol, whose Codes Committee reviews death penal­ty bills.

A pow­er­ful chair­woman lead­ing the hear­ings, Helene E. Weinstein of the Judiciary Committee, who has in the past sup­port­ed the death penal­ty, indi­cat­ed in an inter­view that she, too, was lean­ing toward a shift on the issue.

​“My vote 10 years ago was 10 years ago,” said Ms. Weinstein, a Brooklyn Democrat. ​“There’s a lot of new infor­ma­tion, impor­tant infor­ma­tion, about DNA test­ing, about inno­cent peo­ple being con­vict­ed, and so on.“

The third leader of the death penal­ty hear­ings, Assemblyman Jeffrion L. Aubry of Queens, strong­ly oppos­es the death penal­ty.

Of the 104 Democrats in the 150-mem­ber Assembly, between 60 and 70 favor shelv­ing the death penal­ty, accord­ing to law­mak­ers who have been infor­mal­ly polling mem­bers.

But Charles H. Nesbitt, the Republican leader in the Assembly, said he was cer­tain the death penal­ty would pass in a vote before the full Assembly, with sup­port from vir­tu­al­ly all 46 Republicans and more than 30 Democrats. He said he hoped Mr. Silver, in the spir­it of reform, would allow a vote. If not, he said, Republicans would prob­a­bly use pro­ce­dur­al tac­tics to try to force a vote this spring.

​“We may find our­selves in a posi­tion where it takes some pub­lic pres­sure, as in oth­er times, to bring this up for a vote,” Mr. Nesbitt said on Thursday.

Still, he added, ​“Last year I would have said restor­ing the death penal­ty was going to hap­pen, but right now, I don’t know.“

New York became the 38th state with cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in March 1995, after the Assembly vot­ed 94 to 52 in favor, with 41 Democrats join­ing 53 Republicans to vote yes. Since then, near­ly half those 41 Democrats have left office and 5 oth­ers said in inter­views they now pre­fer life with­out parole. More death penal­ty oppo­nents have been elect­ed, and the Republican minor­i­ty has shrunk.

Since 1995, an esti­mat­ed $175 mil­lion or more has been spent on death penal­ty cas­es, but there have been no exe­cu­tions. Prosecutors have sought death against at least 55 defen­dants, and juries have sen­tenced sev­en to death. Of those, five sen­tences were reversed by the Court of Appeals, and two are still on appeal.

Last June, a 4 to 3 major­i­ty of the Court of Appeals ruled that a cen­tral pro­vi­sion of the law, deal­ing with jury instruc­tions, was uncon­sti­tu­tion­al, and it issued a de fac­to mora­to­ri­um until defects were cor­rect­ed.

Mr. Pataki and Senate Republicans are sup­port­ing amend­ments to cor­rect these flaws. There is fear among Assembly lead­ers that Mr. Pataki, who has called the hear­ings ​“obstruc­tion­ist,” could try to whip up inter­est among vot­ers over the issue.

In the Assembly, in dis­trict attor­neys’ offices, and else­where, offi­cials on both sides have raised sev­er­al con­cerns: that some pros­e­cu­tors will seek death when oth­ers do not, that racial and eth­nic dis­par­i­ties in cap­i­tal cas­es raise con­sti­tu­tion­al ques­tions, and that crime has fall­en in New York with­out any exe­cu­tions.

​“A mora­to­ri­um on the death penal­ty, or doing noth­ing to restore it, seems the best way to go, because there’s very lit­tle evi­dence the death penal­ty has helped New York these 10 years,” said Assemblyman Ron Canestrari of Albany County, who sup­port­ed the 1995 law.

​“Look at what’s hap­pen­ing over in Connecticut; it’s a cir­cus over there with all those delays in a death penal­ty case,” added Assemblywoman Sandy Galef of Westchester County, who also vot­ed for the law and now oppos­es it. ​“Why do we need that?“

Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company