Florida: $51,000,000
Louisiana: $15,000,000
California: $90,000,000
Pennsylvania: $46,000,000
These are the approximate yearly costs taxpayer burdens for that state’s capital punishment scheme.
If you’ve ever wondered why your kid’s school struggles to fund classroom trips, supplies, or even A/C and heating, look no further than your state’s annual legalized murder budget. Tired of those dangerous, pothole-ridden streets? Furious over vetoed health and safety programs in your community? Wish something could be done about those homeless folks downtown? How about your cousin Larry who’s sitting in jail wondering when his name on the waitlist for a public defender will come up? If you live in one of these states or any of the other 30 that haven’t fully abolished the death penalty, you can follow all those precious dollars to the doors of death row. And that total for Florida? That was for just two executions one year. Pennsylvania? They haven’t executed anyone since 1999; and California halted executions in 2006.
In 2019, Florida vetoed a youth crime prevention project citing a lack of funding. This was one of several youth programs cut or vetoed that year. Between 2021 and 2022, scores of youth and family programs aimed to reduce homelessness, crime, or provide juvenile justice assistance were cut or vetoed because of unavailable funding. Oh, and by the way, Florida has had, so far, thirty exonerations from death row.
In 2017, after a nearly decade-long lawsuit, the Kansas Supreme Court ruled that the Kansas public school system violated the state’s constitution for being inequitable and inadequate in meeting the needs of the state’s school children, citing “unreasonable, wealth-based disparities.” Two years later, the state increased funding to meet the court’s demands, however, sustaining the higher level of funding has proven difficult in the face of the coronavirus pandemic. Meanwhile, the state spends on average, $508,000 to try one capital case—sixteen times higher than a non-capital case. While nine sit on death row, no execution has taken place in Kansas since 1976.
Why does this matter?
Nearly three-quarters of a state’s revenue comes from taxes and typically go toward a number of projects and programming, including crime prevention and investigations, education, youth programming, healthcare, infrastructure, road maintenance, public parks and spaces, emergency services, environmental health, mental health services, our criminal justice system, and much more.
Many of the nation’s poorest states, such as Louisiana, Alabama, North Carolina, and Georgia have the death penalty, but also have the highest rates of poverty and hunger. Many are also only one natural disaster away from bankruptcy. And we know how real these are. Natural disasters (and global pandemics) often expose weaknesses and vulnerabilities in a state’s ability to provide care and services to their citizens. Texas, with its long legacy of capital punishment support, has been heavily criticized for its many years of underfunding public health that led to the state being woefully ill-prepared for the Covid-19 pandemic.
A 2020 study by the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO) found that more than 9 in 10 Americans are endangered by insufficient funding for local public health. The presence of non-profit community organizations are linked to lower crime rates, but these important local resources that service at-risk youth, the homeless, reentering former offenders, the mentally ill, and those with substance abuse disorders, rely in part, on state and federal funding that is already in short supply. Considering upwards of 650,000 individuals are released from prison each year, every effort needs to be made to rehabilitate these individuals and provide them the necessary tools and resources to be successful outside of prison. They may just be your neighbor.
Legal murder is expensive.
Depending on the state, the average cost of capital trials, the subsequent sentencings and appeals, and the housing of death row inmates, is double to seven-times that of non-capital murder cases.1 That’s why even states with moratoriums and those with only one or two executions since 1976, are spending tens of millions per year to maintain the death penalty in their state. Just housing death row inmates is 2-4 times the cost to house inmates serving life-without-parole (LWOP) because they are typically segregated and more correctional officers are assigned to death row inmates. Twenty-five years of research has dispelled the belief that death row inmates are a higher security risk when actually, condemned inmates have equivalent or lower rates of violent misconduct than LWOP inmates.2
So, because California still has nearly 700 capital inmates, you Golden Staters shell out close to $100 million to maintain your state’s death row. (Psst . . . Did you know, you’re the only state to have voter power to abolish the death penalty? For God’s sake, use it for your best interests.) As of January 2020, your homeless population, deemed a crisis, is estimated to be about 151,000.
Just saying.
Shockingly, in 2020, amid peak pandemic levels, Arizona spent $1,500,000 on 1,000 1g vials of pentobarbital sodium salt; 5g are used to administer a fatal dose to an inmate. The Arizona department of corrections made the purchase secretly, instructing that the drug come in “unmarked jars and boxes,” seemingly aware they were violating state and federal law that prohibits the drug being dispensed without a prescription or to be used in executions. The money was spent at a time when it was estimated that 1 million Arizona citizens, including 300,000 children, were struggling with hunger.
(It’s worth noting that between 2015 and 2016, the price of lethal injection drugs in Virginia took a thirtyfold price hike from $525 to $16,500 per execution. Tennessee and Missouri also invested heavily in these drugs, spending between $16,000 to $100,000 per execution to use the three drugs in their lethal injection protocol.)
Law Enforcement’s Not a Fan
“Give a law enforcement professional like me those extra dollars and I’ll show you how to reduce crime. The death penalty isn’t anywhere on my list.” —West Orange, New Jersey Police Chief, James Abbott, 2021
Studies have shown that over the last decade, police departments in major cities in California, Missouri, Florida, Texas, and Oklahoma (each with costly death penalty schemes) were forced to stop hiring sworn officers and even civilian employees due to city budget shortfalls.3 Fifty-six police officer positions in Portland, Oregon were cut in 2012, a year before the state placed a moratorium on executions due to the exceedingly high costs, and in Pennsylvania, 200 officer positions went unfilled.4 At one time, due to budget constraints, police in Oakland, California and Tulsa, Oklahoma had to stop responding to burglary, theft, and fraud calls.5
Unfortunately, many crimes go unsolved due to the lack of investigative dollars. In California, 46% of murders and 56% of rapes go unsolved each year and between 2000 and 2009, there were over 10,000 unsolved murders in the state.6 Further, it is estimated that over 100,000 rape kits go untested in the U.S. because testing expenses range between $1000 and $1500, per kit, and the money simply isn’t there. Therefore, neither is justice.
Due Process? Due Not.
One area where these exorbitant costs are cited as particularly detrimental, is public defense funding. Gideon v. Wainwright (1963) guaranteed a defendant’s right to an attorney if she or he cannot afford one. According to Jonathan Rapping of Gideon’s Promise, a staggering 80% of those accused of a crime can’t afford an attorney, yet the majority of public defender offices are woefully underfunded, understaffed, overworked, and lack vital resources to provide a “reasonable effective defense” as the Constitution requires. (Check out Rapping’s excellent book.) In Louisiana, numerous budget cuts resulted in a 40% reduction to public defender offices in 2019, after a 20% reduction three years prior.7 This created a waiting list for indigent defendants, including four capitally charged individuals and nine charged with first degree murder.8
Covid closures effed it up more by pushing over half of Louisiana’s public defender offices into a budget deficit. While the state averages three capital cases per year, 83% of imposed death sentences in Louisiana have been overturned on appellate review. While Florida wins for most exonerations, Louisiana boasts the highest rate of exonerations per capita from death row.9 The costly litigation of those exonerated from death row are further costing states taxpayers, dearly. Pennsylvania just got hit with a $9.1 million settlement for a death row exoneree for his wrongful conviction.
While many prosecutor offices have access to unlimited funding to try a capital case, it comes at a cost to other cases, causing extensive backlogs due to a lack of time and resources. At one time, because of prison closures and attorney and investigator layoffs in Oregon, prosecutors were forced to abandon 130 drug possession, domestic dispute, and burglary cases.10 One researcher found that over a two-year period, judges and their support staff spent up to 691 extra days in the courtroom because of capital trials, which are 11.7 days longer than a non-capital trial.11 For courtrooms with extensive dockets, this is valuable time—over 63,000 hours—that could be devoted to processing other cases.
Corrections Aren’t Fans Either
Correctional staff face extreme budget constraints that lead to outdated facilities and low wages for an already limited and overworked staff. Coupled with the inherent danger and stress associated with the job, insufficient funding only worsens the prospects for correctional staff whose suicide rate is 39% higher than the average worker.12 Access to physical and mental health services for law enforcement and correctional staff is sorely needed but is restricted due to budget concerns. Not surprising, the correctional staff overseeing death row, including those involved in the execution process, suffer higher rates of depression and anxiety. In 2018, Florida cut prison funding by $28 million, eliminating vital programming and further limiting access to healthcare for both staff and inmates.
Before you mention victims’ families
“Claims that the death penalty brings closure to survivors appears inappropriately homogenous and more reflective of society’s agenda for survivors as an indirect way to increase popular support for the death penalty than what survivors themselves may say they need.”13 Indeed, studies have revealed what’s called the “closure myth,” the idea that victims’ families will automatically receive closure from an execution, when in actuality, the death penalty produces more negative effects on families. The average length of time on death row is 18.9 years according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics with many condemned prisoners spending 20 to 40 years on death row. In fact, more death row inmates die of natural causes and suicide than execution thus, drag victims’ families along for potentially decades. Many families have expressed resentment that prosecutors and legislators use this argument to promote maintaining the death penalty or are angry that prosecutors promised an execution that never occurred. Unless a prisoner volunteers for execution, carrying out a death sentence is never guaranteed, but the trial, housing, and appeal expenses are non-recoverable. The promise of an execution can hinder survivors from seeking closure in other ways and in many cases where the execution did take place, family members of victims have expressed experiencing little to no closure.14 We often don’t account for the opinions of family members who don’t want to see their loved one’s murderer put to death; they, too, have various reasons they oppose capital punishment.
Finding Closure Elsewhere
Many families of capital crime victims have said they would prefer financial compensation over a death sentence.15 Victim compensation funds which are dependent upon paid fines and penalties and are meant to ease the financial burdens experienced by crime victims, can’t meet the monetary needs of all crime victims. The death of a spouse, parent, or caregiver due to crime can lead to enormous financial strain for these victims’ families and dependents. Even injuries sustained as a crime victim can negatively affect one’s livelihood and require extensive medical and mental health care, but victim compensation funds can help offset these burdens but are at the mercy of available funding.
Just because a crime has been labeled a “capital crime” shouldn’t make it worthy of increased funding at the expense of public health.
If nothing else, consider this . . .
Decades of research have revealed no conclusive evidence that the death penalty acts as a deterrent. In fact, states with the death penalty have higher rates of murder than states without it.
1 in 8 executions have shown to be that of an innocent person.
The death penalty is arbitrarily administered and fraught with racial disparities.
The concept of an eye for an eye is literally written in stone. The Code of Hammurabi, written around 1780 B.C.E. in ancient Babylon, put forth this idea of retributive justice but in this modern society, with all of our gained knowledge and understanding, that perhaps we should place more credence in “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind,” a contention attributed to Mahatma Gandhi.
Steiker, Carol S.; Steiker, Jordan M. (2010). Costs and Capital Punishment: A NewConsideration Transforms an Old Debate. University of Chicago Legal Forum. Vol. 2010, Issue 1. Pp. 117-164.
Cunningham, M.D.; Sorensen, J.R.; Reidy, T.J. (2015). Wasted Resources and Gratuitous Suffering: The Failure of a Security Rationale for Death Row. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law. Vol. 22, No. 2, 185-199.
Gascón, G. & Fogleson, T. (2015). Making Policing More Affordable, Managing Costs, and Measuring Value in Policing. Journal of Current Issues in Crime, Law, and Law Enforcement. Vol. 8, No. 1.
Kaplan, Aliza B. (2013). Oregon’s Death Penalty: The Practical Reality. Lewis & Clark Review. Vol. 17, Issue 1. Spring 2013.
See 4.
Alarcon, Arthur L.; Mitchell, Paula M. (2012). Costs of Capital Punishment in California: will voters choose reform this November? Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review. Vol. 46, Issue 1. P. 221-255 https://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/llr/vol46/iss0/1/
Cohen, Ben; Johnson, Calvin; and Quiglry, William P. (2019). An Analysis of the Economic Cost of Maintaining a Capital Punishment System is the Pelican State. Loyola Journal of Public Interest Law. Vol. 21, Issue 1, 52 p.
See 7.
See 7.
See 4.
Cook, Philip J. (2009). Potential Savings from Abolition of the Death Penalty in North Carolina. American Law and Economics Review. Vol. 11, Issue2. p. 498-529
DeAmicis, Albert. (2016). A Real Tragedy: Suicide by Correctional Officer. American Jails. Mar/Apr2006, Vol. 30, Issue 1, p.26-30
Armour, M. P. and Umbreit, M.S. (2007). The Ultimate Penal Sanction and "Closure" for Survivors of Homicide Victims. Marquette Law Review. Vol. 91 No. 17.
See 13.
See 13.