Capital case cost concerns continue to inform reform debate

Today's newspapers show that folks keep buzzing about the economics of the death penalty and using costs concerns as a reason to support reforms.  For example, the Las Vegas Sun has this new article, headlined "Debating the cost of the death penalty," and the Kansas City Star has this new editorial, titled "Ending the burdensome cost of the death penalty."   

And Lance Lindsey, the executive director of Death Penalty Focus, has this new commentary titled simply "We Can’t Afford the Death Penalty." Here is how it starts and ends:

From California to New York, dozens of newspapers are declaring that state governments can no longer afford the death penalty.

The Death Penalty Information Center in Washington, D.C., recently reported that the death penalty is too costly.  Maryland spent $37 million per execution in the past 28 years.  In Florida, home to the second largest death row in the country, the cost estimates are $24 million per execution.  California’s cost is $250 million per execution, according to a Los Angeles Times article cited in the report.  These states are among 36 states that have the death penalty and, like nearly every state, are going through a financial crisis.

The outrageous price that taxpayers bear in order to kill a handful of prisoners has been thrown into sharp relief....

It is utterly irresponsible to invest hundreds of millions of dollars to expand death rows when our schools, our health care, our environment, and everything we value in our communities face a slow painful demise. We must reject as false the choice between public safety and human rights. And we must not give up the ideal that justice without violence and revenge can be achieved in our lifetime.

Some recent related posts about death penalty costs:

• Great new (though still dated) examination of the death penalty and plea bargaining
• CNN now talking about the costs of the death penalty and state reforms 
• States considering laying off the death penalty during tough economic times
• The economic case against the death penalty getting more and more attention
• More discussion of cost concerns in debates over the death penalty
• Death penalty abolition becoming more realistic in a few western states
• Interesting time for Time's discussion of death's demise
• DPIC releases year-end report on state of death penalty in 2008
• What might 2009 have in store for . . . the death penalty in the US?