Fugato

Here is a remarkable quotation from a recent New York Times article:

“The comment may sound a bit whimsical, but it’s literally true that the leading cause of death on death row is old age.”

— Ronald M. George, the chief justice of the California Supreme Court.

The difference, then, between death row and a life sentence is that in the former, it is conceivable that — through some random glitch in the bureaucracy, I suppose — the prisoner may really get executed at some point in his lifetime.

Why not just skip the whole idea then? Death row is more expensive per prisoner anyway.

Granted, Justice George was referring to the California Death Row specifically. Executions may well proceed more enthusiastically in, say, Texas. But even there, a death penalty case is still three times as expensive as a 40-years-in-prison case.

So what’s the point?

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 16th, 2005 at 3:40 pm and is filed under Misc. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.