"On death penalty, researchers differ with the police," is the title of Annmarie Timmins' report in the Saturday edition of the Concord Monitor.
There may be reasons for New Hampshire to keep the death penalty, but
statistics show deterrence shouldn't be one of them, a criminologist
testified yesterday before a legislative group weighing the future of
capital punishment here.
"Our research doesn't mean that punishing homicide offenders is a bad
idea," said Tom Kovandzic of the University of Texas. "What we are
saying is that increasing punishment by having the death penalty doesn't
decrease the number of homicides."
Another statistician from Dartmouth College agreed. Police officers,
however, did not.
"I think we need to send a message that we are willing to take extreme
action for an extreme act," said Belknap County Sheriff Craig Wiggin,
representing the state's 10 sheriffs. "I don't know if we will truly
ever know if (having the death penalty) is a deterrent factor. But I
think it's common sense that it must be for some."
Brad Whitney, a commission member whose father, Robert Whitney of
Penacook, was killed in 2001, agreed. How, Whitney asked, do you count
the number of capital murders that weren't committed because a criminal
was deterred by fear of execution?
Lawmakers created the 20-member death penalty study commission last year
after the state tried two death penalty cases, winning a death sentence
in one and life without parole in the other. The commission has until
later this year to assess several difficult questions, including whether
the life without parole is a suitable option; if the state's death
penalty law covers the appropriate crimes; and whether it is applied
arbitrarily.
Yesterday, the commission's focus was deterrence. Groups against the
death penalty, including the New Hampshire Association of Criminal
Defense Lawyers and the New Hampshire Coalition to Abolish the Death
Penalty, paid the expenses of some who testified.
John Lamperti, a retired math professor from Dartmouth College, has
reviewed the many statistical studies of the death penalty. He said most
of those studies have found no evidence the death penalty deterred
crime. Nor did those studies show that the existence of death penalty
laws make police officers and prison guards safer, Lamperti said. And:
Kovandzic did his own study to reach his conclusion that capital
punishment does not deter capital crime. He did so, he said, because of
the range of outcomes from the other studies. Some said the death
penalty caused more crime while another said an execution could save 18
other lives.
"Criminals aren't as rational as some of these statisticians assume," he
said. More information is at the New Hampshire Death Penalty Study Commission website. Earlier coverage from New Hampshire is here; more on the study Kovandzic and UT Dallas researchers, here and here. Related posts are in the deterrence index.
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