The Fewest Death Sentences in the Modern Era

by Matt Kelley · 2009-12-18 15:51:00 UTC
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The Death Penalty Information Center released its annual report on the state of capital punishment  in the United States today, and while it finds that the number of executions was slightly higher in 2009 than 2008, new death sentences were at their lowest level since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976.

This is big news. The uptick in executions is less important, partly because there was a de facto moratorium on executions nationwide for four months in 2008.

Even Texas and Virginia are cooling to the cruel practice of capital punishment. According to the report, Texas averaged 34 death sentences per year during the 1990s and Virginia averaged six. This year, Texas had nine and Virginia just one. It's a new day.

View the full report at DPIC's website.

The demise of the death penalty seems to be getting more attention than it has in previous years, as well. Among MSM outlets picking up today's report from DPIC were Time, the LA Times, AFP, CNN, the NY Times and many, many more.

Eleven states considered legislation in 2009 to abolish the death penalty, and there's momentum going into 2010. I'll be posting more in the next few weeks on the prospect for abolition in various states and around the world in the year ahead. Let's keep this fight alive.

Matt Kelley is the Online Communications Manager at the Innocence Project and a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. Follow him on Twitter @mattjkelley.
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