Skip to main content

Utah Wants Answers About the Cost of Capital Punishment

Utah is pissed. They have figured out that capital punishment is just to damn expensive and who can afford to waste money in this day and age?
Usually Utah has about 10 death penalty cases a year. Those 10 cases alone  cost the state approximately $690,800 over and above the projected legal costs if they were prosecuted without the death penalty. They also cost local governments an estimated $460,000 per year for prosecutors and public defenders.

"Capital cases were 0.0008 percent of my total caseload, but yet it was probably 10 percent of my budget,"  said Patrick Anderson, of the Salt Lake Legal Defenders Association. "That’s just talking about the trial. That’s not the appellate aspect of it."


Why on earth would anyone knowingly do something so horrendously stupid?

The state representatives realize how asinine this is but they also realize how people get caught up in the specifics of the case and decide that death is the only solution. We all know that human beings are fickle and frail beings ruled by emotion. Can we really sit around and watch our own economy go down the toilet so we can kill someone?


It's expensive. It's irreversible. It's morally questionable for many reasons (and not just the obvious one). It's not a deterrent and it is often the worst form of racial discrimination. 


Seriously, people.



Comments

  1. You had me until you brought up race.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ah well, I am sorry facts confuse you. Since 1973 140 people in 26 states have been exonerated from death ow with DNA evidence. The majority are black. Blacks are the largest population on death row and the largest population exonerated. Not rocket science.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

What Are Your Thoughts? Remember, you don't have to read this blog if it makes you mad. Name-calling and temper tantrums have no place here.

Popular posts from this blog

Darlie Routier Texas

I was contacted by a penpal of Darlie Routier's who gave me some of the most recent advances in her case to share with you all. I began writing to Darlie in December of 2005 and she is one woman whom I will never understand how she got behind bars. Really. You know what else? With all the information ALREADY out there about this case, in addition to the newly discovered info, I think if you can't see this poor woman's innocence, you may just be an asshole. So many legal flubs, so much question and police innuendo that turned out to be nothing. So many fingers pointed and road blocks thrown up, I am surprised this case isn't used in other countries to point to the clusterfuck we call a justice system.  I believe Darlie could have been released ages ago if the state had done the necessary DNA testing. Sadly, Texas has tried to stop it in every unconstitutional way they could pull out of a bull's ass. BUT- there is hope on the horizon. This from Camp Darlie ...

Heather Birden Connecticut

Holly Aeschlimann Holly Aeschlimann, 19 was murdered in Connecticut in April of 2015. This case is amazingly close to that of Rachel Wade. Holly and her killer, Heather Birden, 20, had a longstanding dislike for each other. Heather had stabbed another girl, a juvenile, once before in 2014. She was  held in Niantic Correctional Facility for next three months before the murder as a result of a violation of her probation, and was then released to an in-patient substance abuse rehabilitation facility. Reports state that Birden asked her boyfriend for his knife and then left his house to find Holly stating "I have to end this tonight." Witnesses say Heather arrived and the two began to fight, ending in Holly being stabbed in the head and neck at a crosswalk outside an apartment complex in Torrington, CT.  Her friends rushed her to the hospital where she died.  Heather was hiding under a vehicle a short distance away and feigned confusion when police found her. She spen...

Brenda Andrew Execution date

     Brenda Andrew is the only woman on Oklahoma death row. She is there for the murder of her husband by her and her boyfriend James Pavatt.      Brenda does not answer letters. It seems she may still have a bit of that pretentious attitude left over from her days as a respected deacons wife. Those days are over, hun.      There is no scheduled execution date for Brenda yet. Oklahoma lists its dates of execution for the prison she is in here .      Every time I read about this case I am utterly amazed at how stupid these two people were. She may as well have advertised their guilt on a billboard in front of the house. Both Andrew's and Pavatt's appeal were systematically denied without comment in 2008. The little Scorned episode "The Sunday School Killers" at the top of this post is about Brenda and James and its only $1.99 so its worth the money. Appearance White Female; 5 ft. 3 in. tall; 110 pounds; Bro...