Where Tax Money Goes
August 18th, 2009
Question: about what percent of a tax payers money goes to jails....death penalty good or bad?
about how much of the tax payers money goes to building new jails and paying the workers? or any way shape or form has to do with the jails?
i have to write an essay on the death penalty, so your opinion or thoughts about the death penalty would be greatly appreciated. also if you could say if your a citizan or in a lawful position. thanks
Answer: The death penalty is actually much more expensive than life in prison. This is not what most people expect. The death penalty costs much more. Extra costs have little to do with the costs of the actual execution, but with legal costs. I listed sources below.
Pre trial costs are much greater because, once a suspect is caught, the prosecutor must look into the mental health history of the suspect himself. If the prosecutor decides to seek the death penalty, the trial will have two separate phases, one to decide guilt, one to decide the penalty. Each phase has its own set of witnesses. The process of choosing jurors (they must be “death qualified) is much more complicated and takes longer in death penalty cases. Many more pre-trial motions are filed by both sides and have to be answered. Prosecution teams use more lawyers, and where the money is available, by the defense as well. Death penalty cases take much longer to try. States grant an automatic appeal in death penalty cases.
It is only at this point that appeals begin and the costs escalate. It is also important to note that the overwhelming number of cases where the death penalty is not on the table end in plea bargains.
Specific example: In New York State, the average annual cost to incarcerate someone not on death row is about $35,000 per year. On the other hand, in the years since 1995, when New York State brought back a death penalty law, 7 people were sentenced to death, none had more than one appeal and 3 had not even had their first appeal. New York shelled out well over $200,000,000 for its capital punishment system since 1995. Assuming each of the 7 men lives for 40 years the cost to incarcerate all of them for life would be under 10 million dollars.
You can also take a look at reports on costs in a variety of other states:
1. Final Report of the Death Penalty Subcommittee of the Committee on Public Defense, Washington State Bar Association, December 2006, http://www.wsba.org/lawyers/groups/committeeonpublicdefense.htm2. New Jersey Public Policy Perspective, Mary Forsberg http://www.njadp.org/forms/cost/MoneyforNothingNovember18.html
3. The Tennessee Comptroller of the Treasury Office of Research's Report, "Tennessee's Death Penalty: Costs and Consequences."
http://www.comptroller.state.tn.us/orea/reports/deathpenalty.pdf
4. Kansas: Performance Audit Report: Costs Incurred for Death Penalty Cases: A K-GOAL Audit of the Department of Corrections
5. National Bureau of Economic Research, The Budgetary Repercussions of Capital Convictions, by Katherine Baicker
http://papers.nber.org/papers/w8382
6. Indiana Criminal Law Study Commission, January 10, 2002)
7. Costs of Processing Murder Cases in North Carolina, http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/northcarolina.pdf
The actual numbers vary from state to state but the bottom line is the same: The cost of the death penalty is much greater than the cost of life in prison.
http://papers.nber.org/papers/w8382
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