Full Text of SR0297 096th General Assembly
SR0297 96TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY
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| SENATE RESOLUTION
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| WHEREAS, In January of 2000, former Illinois Governor | 3 |
| George Ryan declared a moratorium on executions in Illinois; | 4 |
| before the moratorium, 13 death row inmates were exonerated and | 5 |
| found innocent of the crimes for which they were originally | 6 |
| sentenced to death; and
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| WHEREAS, Since 2000, six more death row inmates have been | 8 |
| exonerated and found innocent of the crimes for which they were | 9 |
| originally sentenced to death; most recently, Nathson Fields | 10 |
| was acquitted on April 8, 2009; the current number of | 11 |
| exonerations in Illinois is 19, and Illinois is second only to | 12 |
| Florida in the number of exonerations from death row; and
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| WHEREAS, There is no safeguard to ensure that an innocent | 14 |
| person will not be put on death row; the Illinois Commission on | 15 |
| Capital Punishment formed by Governor Ryan in 2000 to study the | 16 |
| death penalty in Illinois concluded that "no system, given | 17 |
| human nature and frailties, could ever be devised or | 18 |
| constructed that would work perfectly and guarantee absolutely | 19 |
| that no innocent person is ever again sentenced to death"; and
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| WHEREAS, Despite the implementation of reforms to | 21 |
| Illinois' death penalty system by both the Illinois General | 22 |
| Assembly and the Illinois Supreme Court, there remains no |
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| sufficient safeguard against additional innocent persons being | 2 |
| convicted of murder and sentenced to death; and
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| WHEREAS, The cost of the death penalty is prohibitive; the | 4 |
| average cost of a trial in a federal death case is about 8 | 5 |
| times that of a federal murder case in which the death penalty | 6 |
| is not sought; every state that has done a cost study has found | 7 |
| death penalty cases cost millions to hundreds of millions more | 8 |
| than non-death cases, including cases in which the defendant | 9 |
| receives life without parole; and
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| WHEREAS, A cost study done in the State of New Jersey found | 11 |
| the death penalty has cost New Jersey taxpayers $253 million | 12 |
| more than the costs that would have been incurred in a system | 13 |
| with a maximum sentence of life without parole; the study | 14 |
| examined the costs of death penalty cases to prosecutor | 15 |
| offices, public defender offices, courts, and correctional | 16 |
| facilities, and the report's authors wrote that the cost | 17 |
| estimate is "very conservative" because other significant | 18 |
| costs uniquely associated with the death penalty were not | 19 |
| available and, "from a strictly financial perspective, it is | 20 |
| hard to reach a conclusion other than this: New Jersey | 21 |
| taxpayers over the last 23 years have paid more than a quarter | 22 |
| billion dollars on a capital punishment system that has | 23 |
| executed no one" the report concluded; since 1982, there have | 24 |
| been 197 capital trials in New Jersey and 60 death sentences |
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| imposed, of which 50 were subsequently reversed; there have | 2 |
| been no executions, and 10 men are housed on death row; Michael | 3 |
| Murphy, former Morris County prosecutor, remarked: "If you were | 4 |
| to ask me how $11 million a year could best protect the people | 5 |
| of New Jersey, I would tell you by giving the law enforcement | 6 |
| community more resources; I'm not interested in hypotheticals | 7 |
| or abstractions, I want the tools for law enforcement to do | 8 |
| their job, and $11 million can buy a lot of tools"; and
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| WHEREAS, Death penalty cases are more expensive at every | 10 |
| stage of the judicial process than similar non-death cases; | 11 |
| death penalty cases cost more to try, hear, appeal, and | 12 |
| incarcerate than non-death cases; a new study in the State of | 13 |
| Maryland released by the Urban Institute on March 6, 2008 | 14 |
| forecasted that the lifetime expenses of capitally prosecuted | 15 |
| cases since 1978 will cost Maryland taxpayers $186 million; the | 16 |
| study estimates that the average cost to Maryland taxpayers for | 17 |
| reaching a single death sentence is $3 million - $1.9 million | 18 |
| more than the cost of a non-death penalty case; the study | 19 |
| examined 162 capital cases that were prosecuted between 1978 | 20 |
| and 1999 and found that those cases cost $186 million more than | 21 |
| what those cases would have cost had the death penalty not | 22 |
| existed as a punishment; at every phase of a case, according to | 23 |
| the study, capital murder cases cost more than non-capital | 24 |
| murder cases; the 106 cases in which a death sentence was | 25 |
| sought but not handed down in Maryland cost the state an |
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| additional $71 million and those costs were incurred simply to | 2 |
| seek the death penalty even though the ultimate outcome was a | 3 |
| life or long-term prison sentence; and
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| WHEREAS, The Cook County Public Defender routinely | 5 |
| depletes its annual funds to pay for capital cases before the | 6 |
| end of the fiscal year, and without the funds, the office is | 7 |
| unable to pay for the help of expert witnesses, as well as the | 8 |
| other additional costs of a death penalty case; the Cook County | 9 |
| Public Defender's 2009 allotment of $1.75 million was exhausted | 10 |
| this month, in large part because 60 percent of the money went | 11 |
| to cover unpaid bills from 2008; and | 12 |
| WHEREAS, The State's budget for Fiscal 2009 includes | 13 |
| $10,642,100 for the Capital Litigation Trust Fund, created by | 14 |
| the General Assembly in 2000; over the past six fiscal years, | 15 |
| the Fund has been allocated just under $89 million; | 16 |
| nevertheless, the Fund's expenditures account for only part of | 17 |
| the true cost of maintaining capital punishment in Illinois - a | 18 |
| cost that is difficult to estimate without conducting a | 19 |
| comprehensive cost study; therefore, be it
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| RESOLVED, BY THE SENATE OF THE NINETY-SIXTH GENERAL | 21 |
| ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that the Illinois Criminal | 22 |
| Justice Information Authority is directed to conduct a study of | 23 |
| the costs of the death penalty in Illinois, including but not |
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| limited to the costs of seeking the death penalty, the costs of | 2 |
| a capital trial, the costs of appeals, the costs of | 3 |
| incarceration, and the costs of execution; and be it further
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| RESOLVED, That the Illinois Criminal Justice Information | 5 |
| Authority is directed to conduct a parallel study of the costs | 6 |
| of sentencing persons convicted of first degree murder to life | 7 |
| imprisonment, so as to provide a direct cost comparison on the | 8 |
| same level of detail as the costs of the death penalty; and be | 9 |
| it further | 10 |
| RESOLVED, That the Illinois Criminal Justice Information | 11 |
| Authority is directed to provide to the Senate a preliminary | 12 |
| report of its study during the 2009 veto session and a final | 13 |
| report of its study and recommendations no later than January | 14 |
| 29, 2010; and be it further
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| RESOLVED, That the Illinois Criminal Justice Information | 16 |
| Authority is authorized to expend for this study any | 17 |
| appropriation or other funds that may be legally available for | 18 |
| this purpose.
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