Death sentences have dropped sharply after life without parole became possible

By AMAN BATHEJA

abatheja@star-telegram.com

While the debate over capital punishment rages anew in Texas, new inmates going to Death Row have hit a 35-year low as prosecutors are pushing for fewer death sentences and, many believe, juries have become less willing to give them.

Various factors have contributed to a stark decline in death sentences and a dramatic shake-up in the ranking of counties that use it the most.

The biggest game-changer appears to be the introduction of life without parole as an option for juries in 2005, according to several prosecutors and defense lawyers. The change in state law represented a huge shift for jurors in capital cases, who previously were responsible for choosing either the death penalty or a life sentence in which a convicted killer could be eligible for parole in 40 years.

"With life without parole being a viable option now, [juries] feel a lot more comfortable that that person is not going to be let out back into society," Tarrant County District Attorney Joe Shannon said. "We are probably waiving the death penalty more times than we used to because we’re trying to forecast the outcome of the case."

But because of the state’s growing list of exonerations via DNA evidence and other questionable convictions, some argue that juries are simply less willing to send someone to Death Row. State Sen. Eddie Lucio Jr., D-Brownsville, the author of the life-without-parole law, said prosecutors are trying to blame it for their troubles getting Texans to trust a scandal-ridden system.

"It isn’t life without parole that has weakened the death penalty," Lucio said. "It is a growing lack of belief that our system is fair."

In the four years since the introduction of life without parole, Texas death sentences have dropped 40 percent compared with the four years prior, state records show. The number of slayings each year in Texas stayed largely unchanged during that period, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety.

Texas juries sentenced 13 people to death in 2008. Nine others have received death sentences this year, including Erick Davila, who was sentenced in February for gunning down a 5-year-old girl and her grandmother during a birthday party in southeast Fort Worth.

It’s a far cry from 15 years earlier, when juries sent 49 people to Death Row.

"It’s a government program that’s putting a lot into a few cases," said Richard Dieter, director of the Death Penalty Information Center. "It’s meant to show something about toughness, but even in Texas, there are very few death sentences a year now."

Inmates added to Texas Death Row, by year

Access full data here

Life without parole

Before 1991, someone receiving a life sentence for capital murder in Texas could be eligible for parole in 15 years. State lawmakers increased the minimum to 35 years in 1991 and 40 years in 1993.

Activists spent years lobbying state lawmakers to give juries the option of life without parole. The law enforcement community pushed back, arguing that it would weaken the use of the death penalty as a punishment.

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