Quote:
Originally Posted by Iginla
This isn't my math, it's been studied to death and it is a fact. Death rown inmates cost the system more than regular life sentence prisoners.
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/costs-death-penalty
1) Does it cost more to sentence someone to execution than to sentence them to permanent imprisonment?
Yes. At every step of the process, the death penalty costs more.
- Death penalty trials cost an estimated $1.1 million more than a trial where the District Attorney seeks a sentence of permanent imprisonment. Unlike post-conviction costs funded by the state budget, trial expenses are borne largely from county budgets.
- Housing on death row costs at least$90,000 more per inmate per year than housing in the general prison population, where those sentenced to permanent imprisonment are housed.
- Funding for post-conviction prosecution and defense attorneys costs $85,000 per death row inmate per year. Inmates sentenced to permanent imprisonment are not afforded mandatory appeals.
As of 2009, California taxpayers spend an estimated $117 million each year at the post-conviction level seeking the execution of the 680 inmates on death row.
Death penalty trials cost local taxpayers an additional $20 million per year, at the current death sentencing rate of 20 sentences per year.
In total, the death penalty system cost California taxpayers $137 million each year, the California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice found, whereas permanent imprisonment for all those currently on death row would cost just $11 million. |
While this is all fair enough, it's not inherent to capital punishment that it absolutely must cost more. The implementation is more expensive. If an argument against capital punishment is premised on cost, then all the other side has to do is figure out a feasible way to make it cheaper to do. Easier said than done, perhaps, but hardly impossible or even improbable.