The cost of capital punishment

[Forkboy]

IT MAY BE too soon to call it a trend, but two states have abolished the death penalty in the past three years, and 10 others have legislation pending. States and voters are reconsidering capital punishment, and many have a new reason: money.
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A recent study by the Urban Institute found that an average death penalty trial costs a state about $2 million more than a murder trial where no death penalty is sought. The Death Penalty Information Center estimates that keeping an inmate on death row costs $90,000 a year in extra security. Almost every state is facing a deficit, and getting smart about corrections budgets is an unexpected side benefit.

Abolitionists will take whatever argument they can, but money isn't the only, or the best, reason to stop executions. The death penalty is not a deterrent to most deadly crimes. It is applied unevenly. It places the United States among the world's most brutal regimes. And there are 130 other reasons: the 130 death-row inmates who were exonerated by new evidence. Their deaths would have carried an awful price tag.

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2009/04/15/the_cost_of_capital_punishment/