On Monday, the Pennsylvania House Judiciary Committee passed two identical bills to potentially abolish the state’s death penalty. HB 99, sponsored by Rep. Chris Rabb, a Democrat, and HB 888, sponsored by Republican Rep. Russ Diamond, passed by a margin of 14-12. They would end capital punishment for defendants who had not yet been sentenced. The bills now move to the full House for debate.
Pennsylvanians Against the Death Penalty played a key role in advancing the bills, recently organizing a bipartisan meeting with legislators to address systemic failures in the death penalty. Attendees included Conservatives Concerned, Faith Leaders of Color Coalition, and the Death Penalty Policy Project.
Before the vote, Death Penalty Policy Project Director Robert Dunham told the Judiciary Committee he has testified before them since the 1990s, stating, “In that time, none of the systemic problems that plague the Commonwealth’s death penalty have been addressed. Our death penalty is still geographically arbitrary and racially discriminatory. Defense representation is still abysmal. Prosecutorial misconduct remains rampant. The punishment still contributes nothing to public safety and continues to fleece Pennsylvania taxpayers — now to the tune of approximately one billion dollars.”
Dunham, a longtime defense attorney, also noted that “Pennsylvania has a serious innocence problem. I have been a member of the defense teams that have exonerated four former Pennsylvania death-row prisoners, one each from Philadelphia, Dauphin, Delaware, and York counties.”
Even more devastating was Dunham’s statement that “Whether Pennsylvania could possibly execute an innocent person is not a hypothetical question. We already have. Research by the Death Penalty Policy Project has documented at least five instances in which Pennsylvania has executed innocent defendants, as well as more than two dozen other cases in which innocent people who were wrongfully convicted and condemned were later exonerated or died in prison.”