USA - Pennsylvania. Gov. Ed Rendell: Death Penalty Is Broken

Gov. Ed Rendell: Death Penalty Is Broken. In one of his final acts as governor, Governor Edward G. Rendell today wrote to the General Assembly to urge legislators to review the effectiveness of Pennsylvania's death penalty. Earlier today, the Governor signed 6 execution warrants, bringing to 119 the number of warrants he has signed during his 8 years in office. No executions were carried out during his time as governor. Rendell said the death penalty can be a deterrent, but only when it is carried out relatively expeditiously. A 15- to 25-year lapse between sentencing and the actual execution, he said, is no deterrent. The governor said in the letter that if legislators cannot expedite the process, they should examine the merits of continuing to have the death penalty on the books - as opposed to the certainty of a life sentence without any chance of parole, pardon or commutation. 3 executions have been carried out since the death penalty was reinstated in Pennsylvania in the late 1970's; 2 in 1995 and 1 in 1999. Those 3 men – Keith Zettlemoyer, Leon Moser, and Gary Heidnik – had waived their appeals and asked that their sentence be carried out.