"Death penalty cases on decline," is the Augusta Chronicle report by Wesley Brown. It appeared in the Sunday edition.
After Richmond County’s most recent execution – Mark McClain in 2009 – Augusta District Attorney Ashley Wright noticed a trend taking shape in capital murder trials.
“Our juries are reserving the death penalty only for those cases which are the most hideous,” said Wright, who is encountering juries more willing to sentence convicted killers to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
With a national movement to abolish capital punishment spreading across the United States, enthusiasm for the death penalty is on the decline.
In May, Maryland became the 18th state – and the first south of the Mason-Dixon Line – to repeal death-penalty laws. Since 2007, five states have abolished the death penalty, and last year, 43 prisoners were executed, down from 98 in 1999.
In Georgia, the trend is much the same. For the third time this century – and the first time in five years – the state had no executions in 2012.
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