Capital Punishment: It's Not Justice



March 6, 2009

Once again, Connecticut lawmakers are debating whether to abolish
this state's capital punishment statute. Once again, we say justice
is best served if those convicted of capital crimes are sentenced to
life in prison without parole instead of execution.

We say that while fully sympathizing with Dr. William Petit Jr., who
spoke movingly at a legislative hearing Wednesday about the loss of
his wife and two daughters, allegedly killed by two parolees during a
home invasion in Cheshire in July 2007, and his belief that "any
penalty less than death for murder is unjust." It is understandable
that one who has suffered such a grievous loss would feel that way.
The parolees charged in the crimes against the Petit family have yet
to go to trial. The state's attorney plans to seek the death penalty.

In truth, the death penalty doesn't work very well. There are 10 men
on Connecticut' s death row, but the last person executed was Michael
Ross in 2005, and he wanted to die. State Rep. Michael Lawlor, co-
chairman of the Judiciary Committee, says no convicted killer in
Connecticut is going to be executed "unless they want to be executed"
because of delays and appeals. But it would be wrong for the state to
take a life before the defendant exhausts all avenues of legal review.

Nationally, movement may be swinging toward repeal of death penalty
statutes. Capital punishment is inequitably visited on racial
minorities and poor defendants more than on whites and people who can
pay for a good defense. Nationwide, a large number of wrongly
convicted death row inmates have been released from prison in recent
years when new DNA evidence proved they had no connection to the
crimes for which they were found guilty.

Opponents of capital punishment also rightly point to the high costs
of fighting appeals. And putting a convicted killer in prison for
life allows for redemption if incontrovertible evidence of innocence
is discovered, at the same time that it spares the state the moral
burden of taking a life.