Executions in California cost $300 million each

[WildCat]

The numbers from the OP give us a figure 12,000,000 per year over 25 years for death row inmates.

Which can't possibly be true. To accrue that much in legal fees you'd have a lawyer working on your case 365 days a year, 24 hour a day at $1,370/hr for 25 years straight.

That number is complete, utter, 100%, bovine excrement.

 

[Biscuit]

And, lest we forget, people get convicted of things they provably did not do, and it's not a rare thing;

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-waukegan-dna-test-20110620,0,618583.story

Its because we make mistakes that the California system is running such high expenses. If we were certain in our right to execute people they would just be taken outside put against a wall and shot. Instead we hide them away for years spend hundreds of millions of dollars and then execute them in secret in the middle of the night. Even after all that we still make mistakes!

To carry out a death sentence takes an inordinate amount of time, money, and resources compared to life in a cell.

I stopped making the moral argument when discusses the death penalty years ago because morality is so subjective. Discussing it in terms of resources has convinced several friends to change their minds.

 

[WildCat]

Florida reports an average cost of $68.64 per day for Death Row inmate housing, and if I read this right $44.91 for the average male prisoner.

At Illinois' Stateville Correctional Center, a maximum security prison with ~3,600 prisoners, it cost $89.57 per prisoner per day. And not a single death row inmate to be had since Illinois no longer has a death penalty. 2010 figures.

http://www.idoc.state.il.us/subsections/facilities/information.asp?instchoice=sta

 

[Biscuit]

Which can't possibly be true. To accrue that much in legal fees you'd have a lawyer working on your case 365 days a year, 24 hour a day at $1,370/hr for 25 years straight.

That number is complete, utter, 100%, bovine excrement.

300 million dollars divided by 25 years...

Again I am not a rocket doctor nor did I provide these numbers these are the ones from the OP.

Also it isn't just the lawyers, its every single thing and person associated with the case from the judge to the guards at the prison.

 

[WildCat]

300 million dollars divided by 25 years...

Again I am not a rocket doctor nor did I provide these numbers these are the ones from the OP.

You don't have to be a "rocket doctor" to know BS when you see it. And the numbers cited in the OP are obvious BS.

Even if you are rabidly against the death penalty you have to admit these numbers don't pass the smell test.

 

[Emet]

The study has yet to be published. But from the LA Times:

The state's 714 death row prisoners cost $184 million more per year than those sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

A death penalty prosecution costs up to 20 times as much as a life-without-parole case.

The least expensive death penalty trial costs $1.1 million more than the most expensive life-without-parole case.

Jury selection in a capital case runs three to four weeks longer and costs $200,000 more than in life-without-parole cases.

The state pays up to $300,000 for attorneys to represent each capital inmate on appeal.

The heightened security practices mandated for death row inmates added $100,663 to the cost of incarcerating each capital prisoner last year, for a total of $72 million.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-adv-death-penalty-costs-20110620,0,3505671.story

 

[WildCat]

The study has yet to be published. But from the LA Times:



http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-adv-death-penalty-costs-20110620,0,3505671.story

California has a 3-strikes law, which makes these numbers highly misleading. A "life without parole" trial in California can be a shoplifting or drug possession prosecution under their idiotc rules, which will obvioulsy cost far less to prosecute than a murder charge, whether or not the death penalty is an option.

What's the difference between a non-death penalty 1st degree murder prosecution and a death penalty 1st degree murder prosecution?

This study reeks of bias.

 

[Alt+F4]

Re-read the OP story again and it really doesn't make sense.

EACH of the 13 prisoners executed in California over the past three decades has cost the state and federal governments more than $US300 million ($A284 million), a new study shows.

So each of the 13 already executed cost $300 million each? Then the story continues...

The study, by two senior legal figures, includes costs at both state and federal level in keeping 714 inmates on death row, as well as steering them through the tortuous judicial process all the way to the death chamber.

Now it's saying that the $300 million number is the for the 714 currently on death row? Which is it?​

 

[WildCat]

Looking through the cost per inmate of prisons in Illinois I'm struck by how much difference there is between prisons, even ones at the same security level. For example, Menard Correectonal Center costs $20,736 per inmate while Pontiac Correctional Center costs $33,031 per inmate. Both are all-male maximum-security prisons with the same average age of inmates.

Tamms Correctional Center, a newer "super max" reserved for those who keep causing trouble in other prisons, costs a whopping $64,116 per inmate!

I think the difference in costs at the other facilities is due more to the age, type, and layout of buildings as well as the revenue generated by the industry located in the prison. Local labor costs may also have something to do with it.

 

[WildCat]

Re-read the OP story again and it really doesn't make sense.​

So each of the 13 already executed cost $300 million each? Then the story continues...​

Now it's saying that the $300 million number is the for the 714 currently on death row? Which is it?​

They're clearly allocating costs incurred by the 714 who weren't executed to the 13 who were. As I said, it's an obviously biased study designed to give the most eye-popping results.

 

[Biscuit]

You don't have to be a "rocket doctor" to know BS when you see it. And the numbers cited in the OP are obvious BS.

Even if you are rabidly against the death penalty you have to admit these numbers don't pass the smell test.

I think this line from the OP clears it up a little bit,

Since 1978, California and the US government have together spent some $US4 billion on the state's death row, yet only 13 prisoners have been executed, an average of $US308 million for each one.

That is, in my opinion, a rather stupid way of saying that each execution cost 300 million.

 

[BenBurch]

At Illinois' Stateville Correctional Center, a maximum security prison with ~3,600 prisoners, it cost $89.57 per prisoner per day. And not a single death row inmate to be had since Illinois no longer has a death penalty. 2010 figures.

http://www.idoc.state.il.us/subsections/facilities/information.asp?instchoice=sta

Which argues that it was more expensive that even that.

The several million saved came from a Tribune story... I'll try to find it in the next few days.

 

[Muldur]

And please, no "a bullet costs a quarter" posts. We are talking about the administration of justice in a first world country.

The Death Penalty is entirely consistent with both justice AND a "first world country".

It is in fact imprisonment that is inherently UNjust. The murderer gets a guaranteed 3 meals a day, a home, health care, etc...all paid for in some part by crime victims (including the survivors of that person's crime). He gets to live, to laugh, to have visits with friends and family, etc.

The dead person has none of that. Nor do the relatives and friends of the dead person.

Death for death is the ONLY just sentence. It is proportional to the crime committed.

 

[BenBurch]

The Death Penalty is entirely consistent with both justice AND a "first world country".

It is in fact imprisonment that is inherently UNjust. The murderer gets a guaranteed 3 meals a day, a home, health care, etc...all paid for in some part by crime victims (including the survivors of that person's crime). He gets to live, to laugh, to have visits with friends and family, etc.

The dead person has none of that. Nor do the relatives and friends of the dead person.

Death for death is the ONLY just sentence. It is proportional to the crime committed.

And of course it doesn't matter if we execute innocent people, right?

Does this sum up your opinion? "Better 1000 innocent men die than one killer go free."

 

[Emet]

The Death Penalty is entirely consistent with both justice AND a "first world country".
<snip>
Death for death is the ONLY just sentence. It is proportional to the crime committed.

Yeah... so many first world countries share your view:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment#Contemporary_use

 

[Biscuit]

The Death Penalty is entirely consistent with both justice AND a "first world country".

Actually it is barbaric relic from the 18th century B.C.

The first established death penalty laws date as far back as the Eighteenth Century B.C. in the Code of King Hammaurabi of Babylon, which codified the death penalty for 25 different crimes.

It should have no place in modern civilized nations. from here

It is in fact imprisonment that is inherently UNjust. The murderer gets a guaranteed 3 meals a day, a home, health care, etc...all paid for in some part by crime victims (including the survivors of that person's crime). He gets to live, to laugh, to have visits with friends and family, etc.

Well I can see that you have never been to prison.

The dead person has none of that. Nor do the relatives and friends of the dead person.

And killing another person does not change that.

Death for death is the ONLY just sentence. It is proportional to the crime committed.

Well than lets have public executions, right outside the courthouse. We can select an executioner from the voting roles, invite school kids (so they can learn not to kill people), and make a day of it.

 

[JamesDillon]

Well than lets have public executions, right outside the courthouse. We can select an executioner from the voting roles, invite school kids (so they can learn not to kill people), and make a day of it.

I used to think that this would be the best way to sway public opinion against the death penalty-- force people to see what it actually entails. I've lost a lot of faith in humanity since then; now I think it would be the next big reality show.

 

[Biscuit]

I used to think that this would be the best way to sway public opinion against the death penalty-- force people to see what it actually entails. I've lost a lot of faith in humanity since then; now I think it would be the next big reality show.

I believe the reason we carry out executions in the middle of the night with as few witnesses as possible is because we don't want anyone to see what we have done. We are ashamed of our behavior so we try our best to hide it.

Somewhere in us we know capitol punishment is wrong and flawed. There is too much at stake but we do it anyway and yell, "JUSTICE!" Then we sneak off to a secret room when everyone is asleep and commit our crime in the shadows. The rest of us can wake up refreshed having slept through the whole affair.

 

[dtugg]

There is nothing inherently wrong with ridding the world of pieces of garbage. I would do it myself and not lose any sleep. The only problem is that some innocent people will also get executed.

 

[Alt+F4]

According to this article it costs about $50,000 a year to house a prisoner in california. The numbers from the OP give us a figure 12,000,000 per year over 25 years for death row inmates.

Ok, let's go with that number, which is on the high end. So we have a death row inmate incarcerated for 25 years at $50,000 a year. That comes to $1.25 million.

This report from the ACLU of Northern California (well worth the read) says that a death penalty trial in California costs about $2 million.

http://www.aclunc.org/docs/criminal_justice/death_penalty/the_hidden_death_tax.pdf

Let's say another $2 million for the initial appeal, $2 million for the appeal to the State Supreme Court and $2 million for everything else and that comes to a total of $7.25 million each. Where are the authors of this report getting $300 million for each execution?