STUDIES: High Percentage of Death Sentences in North Carolina Later Deemed Excessive

Most of those orig­i­nal­ly con­demned to death in North Carolina even­tu­al­ly received less­er sen­tences when their cas­es were con­clud­ed, accord­ing to Professor Frank Baumgartner, a researcher at the University of North Carolina. Many of those sen­tenced to death received a new tri­al because their first tri­al was seri­ous­ly flawed. At their sub­se­quent tri­als, the vast major­i­ty were sen­tenced to a pun­ish­ment less than death, typ­i­cal­ly a life sen­tence. Only about 20% of the cas­es that were final­ly resolved result­ed in an exe­cu­tion. Baumgartner used infor­ma­tion from the state’s Department of Corrections to exam­ine what hap­pened to those sen­tenced to death between 1977 through 2009. He found that of the 388 peo­ple sen­tenced to death, 43 were exe­cut­ed. Of the remain­ing cas­es, 158 were still on death row, 5 had been cleared of their charges, 6 com­mit­ted sui­cide, 19 died of nat­ur­al caus­es, and 12 are in jail pend­ing a new tri­al, but no longer on death row. Of the defen­dants who received new tri­als, 130 were sen­tenced to life, 10 to a sen­tence less than life, and 5 were found not guilty. Another 5 received com­mu­ta­tions to life with­out parole from the governor.

According to Baumgartner, this rever­sal rate in North Carolina fol­lows a nation­wide trend. In 2000, Columbia Law Professor James Liebman and col­leagues reviewed thou­sands of case in all death-penal­ty states and found a rever­sal rate of 68%. Speeding up exe­cu­tions would only pro­duce worse prob­lems, Baumgartner warned, ” We could cer­tain­ly go back to the days where indi­vid­u­als were exe­cut­ed more quick­ly; we could increase the ​‘effec­tive­ness’ of the death penal­ty by increas­ing the rate of actu­al exe­cu­tion from the cur­rent 20 per­cent. But before we do that, let us remem­ber Ed Chapman, Levon Jones, Johnathan Hoffman and the oth­ers, wrong­ly con­vict­ed, wrong­ly sen­tenced to death and alive today only because of time-con­sum­ing and expen­sive efforts to prove their inno­cence. The need to ensure against wrong­ful exe­cu­tion demands extreme care.”

(F. Baumgartner, ​“In NC, only 20 per­cent of con­demned are exe­cut­ed,” Charlotte Observer, March 5, 2010). Click here for more Studies. See also Arbitrariness and Sentencing.