Justice Dept. Reports a 30-Year Low in Death Sentences and Fewer Inmates on Death Row

New York Times By Associated Press

November 15, 2004

WASHINGTON, Nov. 14 (AP) - The number of people sentenced to death reached a 30-year low in 2003, when the death row population fell for the third year in a row, the Justice Department reported Sunday.

The department said that 144 inmates in 25 states were given the death penalty last year, 24 fewer than in 2002 and less than half the average of 297 from 1994 to 2000.

Death penalty opponents say the report shows how wary the public is of executions, heightened by concerns about whether the punishment is administered fairly and publicity about those wrongly convicted. Illinois emptied its death row in 2003 after several inmates were found to be innocent.

"What we're seeing is hesitation on the death penalty, skepticism, reluctance," said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center. "I do think there is some concern about the death penalty, and it's reflected in death sentences from juries."

Opponents also point to other possible reasons, including continuing fallout from Supreme Court decisions requiring that juries be told that life in prison without parole is an alternative to death.

Mr. Dieter said 47 states now offered a sentence of life without parole as an option for at least some convictions, compared with 30 in 1993.

Supporters say they doubt the decline signifies a major shift in public opinion about the death penalty, which is in effect in 38 states and the federal justice system.

"I don't think the numbers mean a lot, quite frankly," said Dianne Clements, president of Justice for All, an advocacy group for crime victims. "I don't think it means a change in death penalty attitudes. I think it means the numbers change."

At the end of last year, 3,374 prisoners were awaiting execution, 188 fewer than in 2002, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Illinois accounted for 91 percent of the decline, the result of the decision by George Ryan, then the governor, to commute the death sentences of 167 inmates to life in prison and to pardon four others.

Nationally, 267 people were removed from death row last year. That was the largest drop since 1976, when the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty, according to the report by the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

Last year 65 people, all men, were executed. Texas again was the leader, with 24, followed by Oklahoma, with 14, and North Carolina, with 7. No other state had more than 3.

All but one were killed by lethal injection. The other was electrocuted.

From 1977 through 2003, 885 inmates were executed by 32 states and the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Two-thirds were in five states: Texas, Virginia, Oklahoma, Missouri and Florida.

The report also found that 56 percent of death row inmates were white and 42 percent were black. Hispanics, who can be of any race, accounted for 12 percent of inmates whose ethnicity was known.

The states with the largest numbers of death row inmates were California, with 629; Texas, 453; and Florida, 364.

Ten people died while awaiting execution in 2003, six from natural causes and four from suicide.