Today, December 21, 2010, the Death Penalty Information Center (DPIC) released its year-end report on death penalty developments nationwide.
Here’s an excerpt from DPIC’s press release:
The country experienced a 12 percent decrease in executions in 2010 compared to 2009 and a more than 50 percent drop compared to 1999, according to a report released today by the Death Penalty Information Center (DPIC). Texas had 29 percent fewer executions in 2010 than the previous year.
DPIC projects that the number of new death sentences will be 114 for 2010, remaining near last year’s number of 112, which was the lowest number since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. Death sentences declined in all four regions of the country over the past ten years, with a 50 percent decrease nationwide when the current decade is compared to the 1990s.
“Whether it’s concerns about the high costs of the death penalty at a time when budgets are being slashed, the risks of executing the innocent, unfairness, or other reasons, the nation continued to move away from the death penalty in 2010,” said Richard Dieter, DPIC’s Executive Director and the report’s author.
Although the recent elections brought a dramatic shift in political alliances, candidates who questioned the death penalty were elected across the country, including governors in California, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Kansas, and Illinois.
Read the full press release.
Read the full report from DPIC.