Committee Advances Measure To Abolish Death Penalty
The full Nebraska Legislature will get a chance to debate whether to abolish the death penalty.
The Judiciary Committee voted 7-0 Tuesday to advance a bill (LB542) by Sen. Ernie Chambers of Omaha to change the death penalty to life in prison without the possibility of parole. There was one abstention.
Chambers, the most ardent death penalty opponent in the Legislature, was re-elected to his North Omaha seat in November after sitting out four years because of term limits. Each year from 1973 to 2008, he introduced a bill to abolish the death penalty.
In 1979, his bill passed but was vetoed by then-Gov. Charles Thone.
Among those supporting this year's effort at a recent hearing was the Nebraska Innocence Project, which is part of a national network that gives free legal representation to people wrongly convicted of crimes. It was founded in 1992 to help prisoners who could be proved innocent through DNA testing.
To date, 303 people in the United States have been exonerated by DNA testing, including 18 who served time on death row. They spent an average of 13 years in prison before exoneration and release.
According to a report by the Death Penalty Information Center, a Washington-based group critical of how capital punishment is applied, the use of the death penalty is in sharp decline.
Nine states executed people in 2012, compared with 13 the year before. The 43 executions in 2012 were 56 percent fewer than at the peak in 1999. The 78 people sentenced to death in 2012 represented a 75 percent decline since 1996, when 315 death sentences were handed down.
Among those speaking against the bill was Douglas County Attorney Don Kleine, who appeared on behalf of the Nebraska County Attorneys Association. Kleine said some murders were so heinous the death sentence was warranted.
Lancaster County Attorney Joe Kelly also spoke against the bill on behalf of the association.
This month, the Maryland Legislature passed a bill to replace the death penalty with life without parole. If signed into law, Maryland will become the sixth state in six years, and the 18th overall, to abandon capital punishment.
With that action, 32 states, the U.S. government and the U.S. military still have the death penalty.
Eleven men are on Nebraska's death row.
The Judiciary Committee voted 7-0 Tuesday to advance a bill (LB542) by Sen. Ernie Chambers of Omaha to change the death penalty to life in prison without the possibility of parole. There was one abstention.
Chambers, the most ardent death penalty opponent in the Legislature, was re-elected to his North Omaha seat in November after sitting out four years because of term limits. Each year from 1973 to 2008, he introduced a bill to abolish the death penalty.
In 1979, his bill passed but was vetoed by then-Gov. Charles Thone.
Among those supporting this year's effort at a recent hearing was the Nebraska Innocence Project, which is part of a national network that gives free legal representation to people wrongly convicted of crimes. It was founded in 1992 to help prisoners who could be proved innocent through DNA testing.
To date, 303 people in the United States have been exonerated by DNA testing, including 18 who served time on death row. They spent an average of 13 years in prison before exoneration and release.
According to a report by the Death Penalty Information Center, a Washington-based group critical of how capital punishment is applied, the use of the death penalty is in sharp decline.
Nine states executed people in 2012, compared with 13 the year before. The 43 executions in 2012 were 56 percent fewer than at the peak in 1999. The 78 people sentenced to death in 2012 represented a 75 percent decline since 1996, when 315 death sentences were handed down.
Among those speaking against the bill was Douglas County Attorney Don Kleine, who appeared on behalf of the Nebraska County Attorneys Association. Kleine said some murders were so heinous the death sentence was warranted.
Lancaster County Attorney Joe Kelly also spoke against the bill on behalf of the association.
This month, the Maryland Legislature passed a bill to replace the death penalty with life without parole. If signed into law, Maryland will become the sixth state in six years, and the 18th overall, to abandon capital punishment.
With that action, 32 states, the U.S. government and the U.S. military still have the death penalty.
Eleven men are on Nebraska's death row.
Courtesy: Fremont Tribune
