Which states perform death penalty?

38 of the American states carry out death penalty. Besides The Federal Government and the Military can sentence people to death.

Since 1976 558 executions have been carried out in the US. By April 1999 3565 people were currently on the death row.

Where are most death penalties given?

The great majority of death sentences take place in the southern states, which accounts for 447 of the 558 executions performed since 1976. 180 of these executions took place in Texas alone. In the western states the number of executions is 48, in the mid-western states it is 61, and in the north-eastern states only 3 people have been executed since 1976.

(www.essential.org/dpic/dpic5.html)


How long do people stay on the death row?

The prisoners who are sentenced to death await the execution of the sentence for a long time, sometimes it takes as much as 30 years before all possibilities of appeal or postponements have been tested. If it is likely that the prisoner is innocent, the case can be appealed. The court of appeal will then determine if the prisoner is really innocent, or if he will have to go back to death row.

The possibilities of appeal has been reduced

In April 1996 the possibilities of appealing death penalties were reduces, by the passing of the "Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996". One of the purposes of this law was to reduce the possibilities of the federal court to overrule decisions made in the national courts.

What is the racial distribution of the death sentenced in the US?

Blacks: 43 % (1516 persons)

Hispanics: 8 % (299 persons)

Whites: 46 % (1657 persons)

Native Americans: 3 % (93 persons)

What is the racial distribution of the executed persons in the US?

Blacks: 35 % (193 persons)

Hispanics: 7 % (38 persons)

Whites: 56 % (416 persons)

Native americans: 2 % (11 persons)

The above numbers must be viewed in this context:

83 % of the murder victims in cases of death penalty are white, even though only 50 % of the victims in ordinary cases involving murder are white. This means that you are more likely to be sentenced to death if you have killed a white man than in you killed a black man

Since 1976 only 9 white people have been senteced to death for the murder of a black man, while 131 black people have been convicted for the murder of white people.

(source: www.essential.org/dpic/dpicrace.html)


How are people executed?

In the US people are executed by the following methods:

• Lethal injection
• Electroshock (The electric chair)
• Gassing
• Hanging
• Shooting

(Source: www.essential.org/dpic/methods.html)

In four states electroshock is the only type of execution, in the other states at least lethal injection is also used.

13 states allow family members of the murder victim to attend the execution of the murderer: