ACLU report: Los Angeles County sentences more inmates to death than Texas

Los Angeles County leads most of the nation in death row justice, trumping even Texas in the number of inmates who received capital punishment last year, according to an ACLU report released Tuesday.

With 13 death sentences, Los Angeles County sent two more criminals to death row than Texas, which leads the nation in the number of executions since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976.

Only Florida, with 14 capital sentences, and California itself, which led the country with 29, had more.

The American Civil Liberties Union said the Golden State - with Southern California bearing the brunt of death penalty sentences - lags behind a nation moving toward permanent imprisonment rather than lethal injection for the worst offenders.

"Nationwide, we are seeing a shift due to growing concerns about the wrongful conviction of innocent people and the high costs of the death penalty in comparison," said Natasha Minsker author of the report from the ACLU office in San Francisco.

While some criticized the report for its methodology - such as failing to account for the size of L.A. County and the violence of some of its criminals - others praised District Attorney Steve Cooley for pursuing the toughest punishment.

"I am in favor of Mr. Cooley's aggressive prosecution," said LaWanda Hawkins, founder of Justice for Murdered Children, a victims rights group in San Pedro, whose only son Reginald was gunned down during a carjacking. "We should give them the sentences they are due.

"There has to be some form of punishment."

Coincidentally, the ACLU report was issued the same day that serial killer Rodney Alcala was condemned to death for the 3rd time in Orange County for murdering four women and a 12-year-old girl in the L.A. region.

Among its findings:

California sentenced more felons to death in 2009 than in the 7 previous years.

Three counties - L.A., Orange and Riverside - accounted for 83 % of the state's death sentences but just 41 percent of its population.

Blacks, representing 7 % of California, comprise 35 % of the nearly 700 inmates on death row, while the proportion of Latinos condemned to to die for their crimes has grown.

The civil-rights advocacy group said the nation's largest death penalty system costs California taxpayers $137 million a year, with some cases like Alcala's taking decades to complete, through numerous trials and appeals.

In the next 5 years, it said, California is poised to spend $1 billion on its death penalty, including $400 million to build new death row facilities at San Quentin State Prison.

The last inmate executed in California was Clarence Ray Allen, 76, convicted of ordering the murders of three people in Fresno. On Jan. 17, 2006, the supposedly disabled, deaf and blind convict walked from his wheelchair to the gurney, where he received a lethal injection.

The ACLU blamed prosecutors such as Cooley, who have full discretion whether to seek the death penalty or life in prison for the most heinous of criminals.

"He's a politician. He's looking to run for attorney general. The death penalty is a political issue," said James Clark of the ACLU office in Los Angeles. "It's one factor of L.A. being so out of step with the rest of the country." But Cooley issued a statement citing Alcala's crimes - including the torture and sexual assault of his victims - as one example of the need for capital punishment.

"Anyone who doubts the appropriateness and necessity of the death penalty should acquaint themselves with Rodney James Alcala," Cooley said. "Society has suffered by his presence."

Robert Kaufman, a conservative professor of public policy at Pepperdine University, was critical of the ACLU report.

He said the organization has advocated legal procedures that have made it extremely difficult - and costly - to prosecute death penalty cases. And now it argues that cost is one reason to abolish the death penalty.

"Their conclusions go way beyond the conclusion of the data," he said. "I'm very dubious about its methodology, of them comparing California, Texas and Florida.

"It's not surprising we're going to have more capital cases, because we have more population (and) more violent offenders."

In its report, the ACLU raised questions about the growing number of Latinos sentenced to death, most of them in L.A. and Orange counties.

Of last year's death sentences, 31 % were Latino - double the rate of 2001. Still, Latinos comprise 37 % of the state's population.

"The increasing number of Latinos sentenced to death raises questions about the choices made by district attorneys in charging death penalty cases, and the composition of juries in these cases," the report said.

But Kaufman said the report fails to take into account the severity of each crime.

"It may not be politically correct, but it may be that certain people are committing more violent crimes than others," Kaufman said. "Maybe there are more Latinos (sentenced to death) because more Latinos committed violent crimes.

"We don't know from the data."

Source: ACLU, March 31, 2010