Executions in the U

Executions in the U.S. dropped for the second consecutive year to their lowest level in 5 years according to a report from the Death Penalty Information Center. With no more scheduled this year, there were 66 executions in 2001, down from 85 in 2000 and 98 in 1999. The Bureau of Justice Statistics, in a report on the year 2000, also noted a significant drop in death sentences in 2000 as compared to 1999 and 1998. This is the lowest number of death sentences in 20 years. 25 states and the U.S. government meted out 214 death sentences last year. That represented a 29% drop in death sentences from 1998. Several factors are behind the trend, says Richard Dieter, director of the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington. Among them: scores of cases in which death-row inmates have been deemed innocent, studies indicating that minorities are far more likely than whites to receive death sentences, and the increased availability of sentences of life without parole as an alternative to the death penalty. The decline in death sentences has followed a steep drop in the nation's murder rate, which fell nearly 21% from 1996 to 2000. The FBI reported 15,517 homicide victims last year. That's about 4,100 fewer than in 1996. DPIC's report noted that public support for the death penalty has declined, from a high of 80% in 1994 to 65% in 2001, according to a Gallup Poll in May. Nationwide, the death-row population had fallen to 3,709 by Oct. 1 from 3,726 at the start of the year.