Death Penalty News

DPI’s ​“What to Know” series exam­ines cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment from mul­ti­ple angles, one top­ic at a time. Each install­ment pro­vides essen­tial facts and data on spe­cif­ic aspects of the death penal­ty. This install­ment looks at the costs asso­ci­at­ed with pur­suit of death sen­tences and executions. Why it mat­ters: The ques­tion at the heart of this issue is whether the assumed ben­e­fits of the death penal­ty are worth its costs and whether oth­er sys­tems might pro­vide sim­i­lar ben­e­fits at less cost. "It is a sim­ple fact that seek­ing the death penal­ty is more expen­sive. There is not one cred­i­ble study, to our knowl­edge, that presents evi­dence to the contrary." —  From An Analysis of the Economic Costs of Capital Punishment in Oklahoma, Prepared for the Oklahoma Death Penalty Review Commission, 2017

When Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry and Attorney General Liz Murrill took office in January 2024, they moved aggres­sive­ly to restart exe­cu­tions in the state. Gov. Landry signed bills that autho­rized nitro­gen suf­fo­ca­tion and elec­tro­cu­tion as exe­cu­tion meth­ods, increased his own pow­er over the state cap­i­tal defense sys­tem, and lim­it­ed post-con­vic­tion appeals , while AG Murrill moved to take over cap­i­tal appeal chal­lenges from local dis­trict attor­neys. In March 2025, the state con­duct­ed its first exe­cu­tion in 15 years.