New York's Death Penalty: Did you know?

Executing the innocent

Since 1973, at least 116 death row inmates have been released after evidence proved they were innocent.
Bobby McLaughlin, an innocent man convicted of murder in New York and sentenced to life in prison, put it most powerfully when he said: "If there was a death penalty in New York [when I was convicted], I would now be ashes in an urn in my parents' living room."
Commissions in both Illinois and Massachusetts studied the death penalty and made dozens of recommendations to reduce the risk of executing the innocent. The Illinois Commission added that even if all 85 of its recommendations were put in place, the risk would not be eliminated completely. Yet New York's death penalty law lacks many of the recommended reforms.

Racial and geographic bias

In New York, those accused of murdering white victims are more than twice as likely to face the death penalty than those who murder black victims, according to a recent study by the Center for Law and Justice in Albany.
Six counties account for the majority of the cases where the death penalty has been sought.

New Yorkers prefer life without the possibility of parole

Most New Yorkers (53%) prefer life without parole to the death penalty. Only 38% prefer the death penalty. Among registered Democrats in New York, only 25 percent prefer the death penalty. (March 2003 Quinnipiac University poll)
When New York's death penalty statute was enacted, our state did not have life without the possibility of parole on the books. Now that such an option is available, the death penalty is not needed to keep those convicted of murder off the streets for good.
Hundreds of organizations across New York have called for a moratorium on executions while the system's many problems are examined. The "quick fix" passed by the Senate does nothing to address the death penalty's flaws.

Expensive and inefficient

Since New York reinstated the death penalty in 1995, New York taxpayers have spent at least $170 million pursuing capital cases without a single execution taking place.
Most state studies have found that a system of life without parole is significantly cheaper than the death penalty system, even when including the costs of long-term imprisonment. The death penalty's cost diverts resources from other areas, including crime prevention and victims' services.
Yet the death penalty is not a deterrent. In Rochester, for example, where prosecutors have sought the death penalty a number of times, the crime rate has gone up, while the crime rate in Manhattan, where the death penalty has never been sought, has dramatically declined.

What you can do

The Court of Appeals overturned New York's death penalty in June. But the Assembly could vote to bring it back anytime. If they bring it back without considering all of the evidence, another $170 million and another 10 years will go by, only to have the Courts throw out the statute again or to find that dozens of innocent people have been sentenced to die. Wouldn't New York's resources be better spent preventing crime and serving the needs of victims with real assistance?
Contact your Assemblymember and tell him/her to "let the death penalty die." For more information, visit our take action page.
Join Equal Justice USA by making a gift or signing up for our alerts, so that you can receive more information and action alerts at critical moments during the campaign. We need your support now, more than ever, to take advantage of this unprecedented opportunity to improve our criminal justice system.
Download our action flyer (or call us for copies) and pass it around at your church, synagogue, civic group, or to family and friends.
Write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper, saying that the New York should let the death penalty die.

Equal Justice USA
P.O Box 5206, Hyattsvillle, MD 20782
tel: 301-699-3443 fax: 301-864-2182
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