A new attempt has been launched to abolish capital punishment in California with claims it is an expensive failure.
Supporters of Senate Bill 490 include the author of a 1978 ballot initiative that greatly expanded what constituted a capital crime, and a former San Quentin warden who oversaw four executions.
Testifying before a Senate committee in support of the bill were Don Heller, who wrote the 1978 ballot measure that expanded capital punishment, and Jeanne Woodford, a former San Quentin warden and former director of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Both pointed to the enormous costs of capital punishment.
If the Senate approves the bill by Sen. Loni Hancock, D-Berkeley, it will be sent it to the Assembly for approval.
The Assembly Public Safety Committee voted 5-2 along party lines in favor of the bill after hearing testimony from Heller, a Sacramento attorney and former prosecutor, and Woodford, who is executive director of Death Penalty Focus, an anti-death penalty group.
Hancock told the Marin Independent Journal, “Capital punishment is an expensive failure and an example of the dysfunction of our prisons.”
The IJ cited Arthur Alarcon of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and Loyola Law School professor Paula Mitchell claiming that the capital punishment system is “a multibillion-dollar fraud on California taxpayers.”
Their findings, soon to be published, estimate that California has spent more than $4 billion on capital punishment since the death penalty was reinstated in 1978. In that time, California has executed 13 prisoners, which they say equate to about $308 million per execution.
Opponents of the measure, represented at the hearing by numerous law enforcement organizations and the victims advocacy group Crime Victims United of California, said cost should not matter when punishing the worst criminals who commit heinous crimes. They also raised concerns about whether sentences would continue to be reduced and said not having a death penalty puts law enforcement officers in particular danger.
Ron Cottingham, president of the Peace Officers Research Association of California, said passing the bill “will put a target on the back of my members and every peace officer in California” because criminals will know they will face only “three hots and a cot” for killing an officer.
Opponents also said that the Legislature could take steps to speed up the execution process instead of abolishing the death penalty.
District Court Judge Jeremy Fogel halted California’s executions in 2006 because of complications in the lethal injection method. Subsequently, a shortage of the execution drugs further delayed carrying out death sentences.
There are currently 714 prisoners condemned to death and awaiting execution in California.