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Failed Federal Death Penalties

By Melody Evans and Kirk Redmond

Today, the New York Times has an excellent article about the repeated failures of federal death penalty prosecutions in New York. A couple of selections:[F]ederal prosecutors in New York State have asked juries to impose death sentences 19 times since 1988. In only one case did a jury rule for execution.Nationwide, federal prosecutors win death penalties about one-third of the time, according to the group?s statistics. Federal judges in New York have gone so far as to call some death penalty cases a waste of time and money. Last week, Judge Jack B. Weinstein of Federal District Court in Brooklyn told prosecutors that their chances of obtaining a death sentence against a drug dealer charged with dismembering two rivals were ?virtually nil? and issued an order in which he said he was waiting for the Justice Department to reconsider whether to pursue an execution...continue to full post

Full post as published by Kansas Federal Defender on March 10, 2008 (boomark / email).