Michael H posted,
> consider texas, kingpin of capital punishment, in last 30 years
> (since supreme
> court's ruling in _gregg v georgia_), about 20% of counties with
> trials in which
> death penalty could have been imposed have put no one on death row,
> on
> other hand, harris county (houston) alone, accounts for over 25% of
state's death row inmates...
>
Three things account for this horrible, but true, statistic.
1) Volume: Harris County (HC), containing the largest city and associated communities, has more cases to prosecute.
2) A desensitized juror pool: The legacy of years of death penalty assessments has made it easier for HC jurors to go with the needle, largely because this was the only option that they were given when dealing with the most heinous cases - life w/possibility of parole or death - until just this past legislative session when life w/parole was replaced with life w/o possibility of parole. In a county where a capital crime may only occur once every 10 or 20 years, the burden of assessing the death penalty is more obvious to the jurors and perhaps more foreboding; however in a county where capitol crimes lead the evening news almost every day, the perception that the death penalty is the only way to stem the flow of violence by making sure the defendant can never return to society is dominant.
3) A notoriously bloodthirsty DA's office: The last District Attorney, Johnny Holmes, started the death penalty trend in HC, but his former leuitenant, successor and the current DA, Chuck Rosenthal, has raised the bar for number of death penalty options requested in capital cases, going as far as firing state-appointed psychologists who determine a defendant is mentally retarded (and therefore not executeable under recent SCOTUS rulings). But what do you expect from a man who regularly sets off firecrackers in the stairwells of his office's building?
The statistic that I'm waiting for is one that determines how many defendants are given the death penalty now that jurors have the option of life w/o parole, the option that jurors have not had until now. One of the questions Texas jurors must answer in deliberating punishment is whether or not the convicted defendant would kill again. Under the former sentencing options, an answer of "yes" would all but mandate the death penalty for most jurors, because the option of parole was seen as a loophole. Well, that option is now gone, and now we get to see just how bloodthirsty the population really is.
- Deborah