WASHINGTON (AFP) - Fewer convicts are being sent to death row in the United States, though 3,254 still faced death by execution by the end of 2005, according to an annual US Justice Department report.
At the end of 2000, 3,601 prisoners sat on US death rows, a figure that fell largely because fewer death sentences were handed down.
In 2005 US courts delivered 125 death sentences, far below the 325 in 1995.
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"Prosecutors are seeking it less, and life without parole became a real alternative," he said.
There were 128 new arrivals on death row in 2005, while 194 left. Sixty inmates were executed, 21 died of natural causes, three committed suicide and one died by overdose.
Death sentences of 109 were modified on appeal, commuted to life in prison or rendered inapplicable by a March 2005 Supreme Court decision forbidding execution of prisoners who were minors at the time of the crime.
Of those executed in 2005, 98 percent were men, 42 percent were African Americans, who represent only 13 percent of the US population.
The youngest person executed was 20, the eldest, 90.
I'm glad the death penalty is being used less and less. I don't think it's a necessity.
Only 2% of executed prisoners are women. Is this sexism? Should we contact SOW? ;) Maybe we should start an American Status of Men agency to look into this.
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