Illinois has banned the death penalty, and it wasn't about morality:
Inmates like the serial killer John Wayne Gacy, whose guilt was never in question, were put to death and caused little controversy. But when a miscarriage of justice was discovered and a death row inmate was set free, the police and prosecutors contended that it was an isolated incident, an anomaly. They got little argument.
In November 1998, the Center on Wrongful Convictions at Northwestern University hosted 29 exonerated death row inmates at a conference, putting a human face to the death penalty's errors. Then, with Porter's case still in the spotlight, plus a series of stories in the Chicago Tribune later that year that illuminated deep frailties in the state's system of capital punishment, the debate over the death penalty was transformed.
Suddenly, it was about accuracy. No longer were the mistakes anecdotal. The problems were systemic.
I've written before about my mixed feelings on the death penalty. When unspeakable crimes are committed, no other punishment seems appropriate. When my misgivings come to the surface, it's usually with a conservative/libertarian argument against capital punishment: Sometimes we don't trust people in government to even fill a pothole competently. How in the world can we trust them with the ultimate power of life and death?
Comments
If it's undeserved, it's undeserved, whether it's a death sentence or an extended stretch in prison. There was a court case a year ot two back (seems to me it was SCOTUS) where the justices said that it's not sufficient that someone not have committed a crime to set him free, there needs to have been a mistake in the conviction procedure.
Maybe it's more important to make prison sentences less cruel. According to some recent books, most of the rape in prison is committed by prison staff members rather than by other inmates.
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2011/mar/24/prison-rape-and-government/?pagination=false