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HEADLINE: A Death Penalty Bellwether? N.H. Lawmakers Set to Vote for Repeal, but Governor Vows a Veto

BYLINE: Pamela Ferdinand , Special to The Washington Post

DATELINE: BOSTON

BODY:


New Hampshire's legislature is expected today to become the first in the nation to vote to abolish capital punishment since the U.S. Supreme Court allowed executions to resume in 1976.

Gov. Jeanne Shaheen (D) has vowed to veto the bill, and it is considered unlikely that state legislators will be able to muster the two-thirds majority required to override her rejection of the measure, which would replace the death penalty with a sentence of life in prison without parole.

Nevertheless, political observers contend that the repeal measure--which passed the 400-member House in March and is expected to narrowly pass the Senate today--reflects a subtle shift in public attitudes nationwide toward capital punishment and adds momentum to an election-year dialogue over its fairness and accuracy.

After years in which legislatures reenacted death penalty statutes, expanded eligible capital crimes and hastened appeals processes, many capital punishment observers find it oddly significant that New Hampshire, which last executed a prisoner in 1939 and has one of the nation's lowest murder rates, has taken a dramatic stand. Last year, bills to abolish the death penalty were introduced in New Hampshire and 11 other states, but none passed. "For a state to take a totally different direction and vote to abolish it is an indication of legislative and popular change," said Richard C. Dieter, executive director of the nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center in Washington. "There's a longer road ahead, but New Hampshire might be a bellwether of where the country is going."

That prospect outrages capital punishment supporters. "What they are doing in New Hampshire is a moral victory for abolitionists, no matter how many people are on death row," said Dudley Sharp, director of Death Penalty Resources, a division of Houston-based Justice for All, a criminal justice reform organization. "People like me are paying attention, and what we're seeing is a decision not based on reason and fact."

Thirty-eight states impose the death penalty, and about 3,600 inmates remain on death rows nationwide, according to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics. Last year, a record 98 prisoners were executed, one-third of them in Texas, but more death row inmates were exonerated and released than in previous years.

Concerns about unfair trials landing innocent people on death row have mounted, fueled by the well-publicized release of inmates often as a result of DNA testing. A Gallup poll in February showed that public support for capital punishment has reached its lowest level in more than a decade. Proposed federal legislation would end executions and forbid death sentences for violations of federal law.

Illinois halted executions pending review of its criminal justice system after an investigation found that 13 innocent people were almost executed. Other states may follow suit. Maryland ordered a study of racial disparities in sentencing, and Virginia, the state that executes prisoners the fastest after their convictions, recently made it easier for them to introduce new evidence.

Texas leads the country in the number of executions, with 214 since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. In his Republican presidential campaign, Gov. George W. Bush has said he is "absolutely confident" that the death penalty in his home state works fairly. But unlike Texas or these other states, New Hampshire, which reinstated capital punishment in 1991, has not figured as a symbol in the death penalty fight.

New Hampshire does not have anyone on death row or charged with capital murder. Its definition of eligible crimes is narrow and includes such offenses as murder of a police officer in the line of duty or in retaliation and murder committed during a kidnapping or rape.

Last year, the state House rejected an effort by Shaheen to expand the list of crimes eligible for the death penalty. Several officials said they felt the time was ripe now to make another attempt to abolish it, citing the hard-won adoption of Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a holiday as evidence of a newfound progressiveness.

Added to that, a recent Northeastern University poll showed that 55 percent of New Hampshire residents endorsed legislation to replace capital punishment with life in prison without parole. Thirty-five percent opposed it.

"We have an opportunity to really change the dialogue of the country," said state Rep. Jim Splaine, the lead Democratic sponsor of the abolition bill and the author of New Hampshire's 1975 statute giving it first-in-the-nation primary election status. "The harm [of the death penalty] is that it gives a terrible message to kids that the state has a right to kill people, and, except in times of war, I don't think the state should assume that right."

State Sen. Debora B. Pignatelli (D), who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, changed her mind about capital punishment after listening to testimony at an April 24 hearing. Among others, Kirk Bloodworth of Cambridge, Md., told legislators how he spent nearly a decade in prison for a brutal murder and rape before being freed in 1993 as a result of post-trial DNA testing.

"I thought about how I personally would want to extract some kind of revenge if someone in my family or someone I cared about was brutally murdered," Pignatelli said. "But having the state do it in my name was something else."

State Sen. Mary Brown (R) was the only one of six Judiciary Committee members to vote against the bill. "Just because some people classify it as vengeance, I don't think it is," she said. "I think it's a penalty, and if you commit that kind of crime, then you have to be prepared to pay for it."

Shaheen, meanwhile, has remained steadfast in her support of capital punishment. Pamela Walsh, a spokeswoman, said the governor's "strongly held conviction is that there are some murders so heinous that the death penalty is an appropriate punishment."

Even with the law on the books, New Hampshire has seen so little capital crime that defense lawyer Richard B. McNamara said he had to call prosecutors in the South for advice in handling a 1982 murder-for-hire case. His client was acquitted. These days, especially with falling crime rates and rising criminal justice costs, 12 jurors are unlikely to find unanimity on an issue on which the government cannot, he said.

"The reality is that you could never get a New Hampshire jury to sentence anyone to death," said McNamara, the author of "New Hampshire Criminal Practice and Procedure." "It's almost inconceivable that it could happen today."



Death Penalty States

States with capital punishment

WASHINGTON

OREGON

IDAHO

MONTANA

WYOMING

CALIFORNIA

NEVADA

UTAH

ARIZONA

COLORADO

NEW MEXICO

SOUTH DAKOTA

NEBRASKA

KANSAS

OKLAHOMA

TEXAS

MISSOURI

ARKANSAS

LOUSIANA

ILLINOIS

MISSISSIPPI

INDIANA

KENTUCKY

TENNESSEE

ALABAMA

OHIO

CONNETICUT

NEW JERSEY

PENNSYLVANIA

DELAWARE

MARYLAND

VIRGINIA

NORTH CAROLINA

SOUTH CAROLINA

GEORGIA

FLORIDA

NEW YORK

NEW HAMPSHIRE

States without

ALASKA

HAWAII

NORTH DAKOTA

MINNESOTA

IOWA

WISCONSIN

MICHIGAN

WEST VIRGINIA

MAINE

VERMONT

RHODE ISLAND

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA







GRAPHIC: IG,,TWP; MAP

LOAD-DATE: May 18, 2000