World Congress on Abolition 2

In a recent survey of US death penalty practice CCR (Centre for Constitutional Rights) and FIDH (Federation Internationale des Droits Humains) report:
In California, the state with the largest death row population – 752 people – prisoners spend an average of two decades on an overcrowded death row as they wait for attorneys to be assigned and courts to rule on their post-conviction claims.  In Louisiana, death row prisoners face blistering heat over 100 degrees, scalding hot water and solitary confinement, and they receive little rehabilitation or recreation.  African Americans are overrepresented on death row in both states. While they make up only 32 percent of the general population in Louisiana, they represent 65 percent of the state’s death row. In California, African Americans make up 6.7 percent of the general population, but 36 percent of those on death row. Juries in death penalty cases are overwhelmingly white in both states.