Jessica Bolker

Set aside the moral issue for a moment, if you can: oppose this bill because death penalty trials cost 5-10x more than life imprisonment trials, and police chiefs would rather have that money spent on fighting crime rather than paying lawyers. If you wish to acknowledge the moral issue, note that historically about 1 in 8 people on death row have been exonerated -- meaning that bringing back the death penalty will involve state taxpayers in funding and committing murder, ourselves, because while most of those who would face the death penalty are murderers - some are not.