Capital punishment in America is some sort of idiosyncratic...

Capital punishment in America is some sort of idiosyncratic lottery. Only one in 15 convicted murderers is sentenced to death, and one-third of those sentenced to death have either their sentence or their conviction overturned. How does the judicial system decide which of the convicted felons are to be given the death penalty? The death penalty is inflicted disproportionately on minorities and the poor. Those who can afford quality representation are much more likely to receive a lesser sentence than those who cannot. In addition, a murder sentence in the USA - prison time or the death penalty -often depends not only on the nature of the crime itself but on where it was committed. The odds that a convicted killer will be sentenced to death vary dramatically from state to state and even from county to county within states. The willingness of the local prosecutor to seek the death penalty seems to play, by far, the most significant role in determining who will eventually be sentenced to death. In many states, experts have noted differences between urban and rural areas. For example, a study showed that the death penalty was far more likely to be pursued against defendants in counties outside of New York City than those in the city. The result nationwide has been a strange hodgepodge. Opponents have raised legal challenges to death penalty laws in at least 4 states by arguing that geographic imbalances show capital punishment to be arbitrary and, thus, unconstitutional. None of the lawsuits succeeded.