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United States Death Row Executions at a 14-Year Low

by Tina Kells | December 11, 2008 at 02:10 pm

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The United States Supreme Court recently lifted a seven month moratorium on capital punishment but the overall rate of death row executions is at a 14-year low.

Have the courts grown soft on crime? Are less people committing capital offenses? Or is there some other factor contributing to the decline in death row executions?

A report out today cites financial constraints and a renewed interest in the human rights issues surrounding the death penalty as reasons for the record decline.

The number of executions nationwide dropped to 37 in 2008, a 14-year low that continues a trend away from use of the ultimate punishment, a report out Thursday showed.

The decline persisted despite a Supreme Court decision in April that ended a seven-month moratorium on executions and led several states to set new execution dates for condemned inmates. The justices voted 7-2 to reject a challenge to a standard lethal-injection method.

The Death Penalty Information Center, which opposes capital punishment and compiles annual statistics, reports that for the most part only Southern states resumed executions. Ohio, which carried out two, was the only state outside the South to impose the death penalty in 2008.

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Sara Bellum

at 17:15 on December 11th, 2008

This photo was taken at a closed prison in Nashville, Tennessee. The prison was used to film The Green Mile and The Last Castle, along with several other movies and music videos.

Sara Bellum has contributed a photo to this story.