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Cost of Death Penalty Gets National Examination

By Steve Hall

The widely-read Sunday magazine Parade has posted, "Debating the Cost of Capital Punishment," written by Joe Bargmann.As cash-strapped states consider the high cost of sentencing prisoners to death, capital punishment has fallen on hard times. In New Mexico, which voted to abolish the death penalty last year, State Rep. Gail Chasey (D., Albuquerque) specifically noted the tax dollars that would be saved. ?We can put that money toward enhancing law enforcement, public works, you name it,? she said. In 2009, 10 other states considered ending capital punishment. In New Jersey, which halted executions in 2007, a commission found that switching a single condemned inmate?s sentence to life without parole would save the state $1.3 million in incarceration costs alone, because death-row inmates receive special housing and security...continue to full post

Full post as published by StandDown Texas Project on January 29, 2010 (boomark / email).