and the costs to hold those prisoners for the rest of their lives? to feed them, to provide them a habitable bed, cleaning supplies, medical health as they age and start to need more care?
[1] https://ballotpedia.org/Fact_check/Is_the_death_penalty_more...
Probably a good thing considering (what I perceive to be) a rise in political violence that seems to push for and/or celebrate summary executions with little to no due process.
The US is also the only "first world" nation that still has the capital punishment.
Our justice system is flawed by bias and careerism (the same is true anywhere, and the US is no exception). The fact that innocent people sometimes exonerated for crimes years or decades later is reason enough to ban the death penalty forever, IMO. Every time an innocent person is put to death, that's horrible itself, but it also means the real offender is still out there somewhere. Even if it happens 1% of the time that's still dozens of people over the years.
I would rather let the worst criminals stay alive in prison if it means one innocent person isn't put to death so they can appeal their case.
This doesn't excuse the immorality of the death penalty.
Edit: after reading the article seems like a no-brainer, CA is not executing anyone anyway, so why maintain the fiction:
> The decision to spare death row inmates is largely symbolic in a state that has not executed an inmate since 2006, though experts say it could save millions of dollars in court costs each year. Only 13 inmates have been executed since voters reinstated the death penalty in 1978.
The state is usually paying for the prosecution and defense as well as the court staff in these hearings.
Imagine using _just saving some money_ to justify the death of a person. What a country.
- provide housing, education and medical coverage to people who are trying their best to make a living
- support a person who has killed atleast one more person for reasons that a jury of 12 people found unreasonable
Money unfortunately is zero sum.
No, it's not. You don't get the right to audit where "your" dollars go. Where the government should better use EVERYBODY's money, sure. But when an USian says "I don't want MY tax dollars to be used in this", is usually because they'd rather apply a fast revenge against any criminal for any crime, not caring if the person is maybe innocent (and trusting their judgement magically will allow them to have perfect knowledge of culpability), or they just don't want those dollars they believe they have the right to audit go to something as, for instance, socialized health care, where "their" dollars accidentally could benefit someone with the wrong skin color.
The speed at which USians classify people they don't like in the "unworthy of human rights" category is truly frightening.
Relative to California's law enforcement and judicial budgets required to investigate, arrest, try and convict them in the first place? Irrelevant noise. That's just a silly argument.
(There's also the whole moral thing about "we should kill people because it's too expensive to keep them alive", but even so, the financial thing just doesn't logic.)