DEATH PENALTY OPPONENTS HAVE BEEN CONNING US ABOUT THE HIGH COSTS FROM SENTENCING TO EXECUTION

Dorina Lisson, my friend from Down Under and passionate human rights activist, sent me the following message: “Is it any wonder the USA is in deep financial poo-poo !!!” Dorina included the following information on the total cost of two Oregon executions:

OFFICIAL OREGON EXECUTION COSTS

Oregon corrections officials don't have a cost estimate for Gary Haugen's planned execution on December 6, 2011, but they released figures for the state's two executions since the death penalty was reinstated in 1984. Both were executed by lethal injection.

Douglas Franklin Wright - Sentenced to death in 1993 and executed in 1996 for killing three homeless men.

Total Cost: $196,170. Breakdown: $85,205 for overtime, $89,437 for the attorney general, $4,864 for facility alterations, $16,664 for travel, training, equipment and other expenses.

Harry Charles Moore - Sentenced to death 1993 and executed in 1997 for murdering his father-in-law and mother-in-law.

Total Cost: $57,656. Breakdown: $21,574 for personnel including overtime, $2,891 for office expenses, $3,030 for facilities and maintenance, $539 for medical supplies and services, $3,012 for other supplies and services, $1,557 for staff food, $25,053 for legal costs.

['Attorney General' and 'legal' costs refer to what it cost Oregon to fight numerous appeals.]
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The opponents of capital punishment have been bombarding us with claims that executions are costing taxpayers millions and millions of dollars. Some California legislators have even introduced legislation to abolish the death penalty because of these claims. But thanks to Dorina, I can now show that the high cost claims are nothing more than a big con job.

Take the case of Douglas Wright. When you spread the total cost of$196,170 over the three years he spent on death row, it amounts to only $65,390 a year.

Then take the case of Harry Moore. When you spread the total cost of $57,656 over the four years he spent on death row, it amounts to only $14,414 a year.

Those yearly amounts are a mere drop in the bucket of Oregon’s annual budgets.

Now in California where everything costs more – that is why people and businesses are locating to other states – the yearly execution costs are going to be higher. Oh, wait a minute! They’re not executing anyone in the Golden State. Due to endless appeals, some of its death row residents have been there for 20 to 30 years. But when you figure the yearly costs of keeping each individual inmate on death row, those amounts, like in Oregon, are a mere drop in the bucket of California’s multibillion dollar budget. Of course, when you total the yearly costs of all the inmates that have pile up on death row, it does add up, but it's still an insignificant amount of the state's total annual expenditures.

The Oregon figures do not include what it cost to try Wright and Moore. In California, capital cases are quite costly because they take weeks if not months to try. By contrast, capital cases in Texas usually last no more than a couple of weeks.

The bottom line is that the yearly cost of keeping a condemned murderer on death row is a rather insignificant part of any state’s total expenditures. Instead of a drop in the bucket, the opponents of capital punishment would have us believe the cost of executions is more like a flood and, unfortunately, they’ve conned a lot of people into believing that malarkey.