 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
Breaking News
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
DEATH PENALTY:
California Bishops support the SAFE CA ACT
Pope Benedict XVI encourages "political and legislative initiatives being promoted in a growing number of countries to eliminate the death penalty and to continue the substantive progress made in conforming penal law both to the human dignity of prisoners and the effective maintenance of public order." November 30, 2011
www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/audiences/2011/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20111130_en.html
watch the video of Pope Benedict XVI making his statement in support of legislative initiatives to eliminate the death penalty.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qg-S3mnNYEY&feature=youtu.be
DPIC's Year End Report was just released and the findings are stunning:
· Nationally, there were 78 new death sentences in 2011, the lowest level since reinstatement in 1976 and the first time this number dropped below 100.
· In California, there were only 10, the lowest level since the death penalty was reinstated here in 1978. The year before there were 29.
The full report and press release can be found here:
DPIC 2011 Year End Report
Death penalty costs California $184 million a year, study says
Los Angeles Times
Monday, June 20, 2011
Death Penalty Realism: Do Executions Make Us Safer?
Los Angeles Times
Monday, October 2, 2011
Study: Death penalty costlier than life sentences
San Francisco Chronicle
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Cameron Todd Willingham, who was
executed in Texas in 2004, was innocent (download the pdf Trial by Fire)
"The New Yorker's investigation lays out
this case in its totality and leads to the
inescapable conclusion...
Join the 1000 Congregations Campaign Today!
| |
|
 |
|
 |
|
|
|
|
Death Penalty Background
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
The Death Penalty System in America is Still Broken.
The capital punishment system in this country remains deeply and desperately flawed. We are sentencing innocent Americans to death because they can't hire brand-name lawyers - which means that the real killers too often remain free.
Consider the evidence:
Nearly seven of every ten death penalty appeals are reversed for serious reasons; to date, 139 people have been exonerated from death row.
California is at risk of executing an innocent person, according to a study by the bipartisan California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice. The Commission concluded that the only way to "fix" the system is to spend $95 million more in taxpayer dollars.
Murderers and rapists need to be held accountable and brought to justice, yet a shocking 46% of all murders and 56% of all rapes go unsolved in California every year, on average . We need to use our limited funds to solve crimes and increase community safety rather than spend hundreds of millions of dollars on a select few individuals who are already behind bars for life.
A study by Judge Arthur L. Alarcon found we have spent $4 billion on the death penalty since 1978.
Reports indicate California's death penalty costs $184 million/year more than life without parole.
Just for death row housing, California taxpayers pay approximately $100,000 more per death row inmate each year compared with one prisoner serving life without parole.
Our resources would be more effectively spent on law enforcement, violence prevention, and our children's education.
Murder cases involving African American and Latino victims are less likely to be solved than cases with white or Asian victims, making some communities safer than others.
The rich don't get sentenced to death - the poor and those who can't hire brand-name lawyers do. A good death penalty defense relies on access to DNA evidence and experts - which cost money. If you can't afford the tests to prove you weren't there, you may be sentenced to death - regardless of what the evidence would have shown. |
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
