The death penalty is costly to Alameda County, arbitrary, and unfair.

In fact:

• Alameda County has wasted over $17.6 million seeking executions since 2000.
• The amount of money Alameda County spent sentencing 16 people to execution since 2000 could have funded the salaries of 33 teachers or 27 homicide investigators.
• Compared to Fresno, Alameda County sends ten times as many people to death row per murder charged.
• Compared to Los Angeles County, Alameda County sends more than twice as many people to death row per murder charged.
• Alameda County’s homicide rate is higher than the statewide average.
• Among Bay Area counties, Alameda County alone has sentenced more than three times as many people to execution since 2000 as Santa Clara, San Mateo, Sonoma and Napa combined. Three Bay Area counties have had no death sentences since 2000 (Solano, Marin and San Francisco).
• Only 10 counties (including Alameda) account for nearly 85% of state’s death sentences since 2000.
• Each death penalty trial costs the county $1.1 million more than a trial ending in permanent imprisonment.

What's new?

• When ACCADP launched in 2008, Alameda County had sentenced 14 people to execution since 2000. In 2008, Alameda County sentenced 2 more people to execution, wasting at least $2.2 million in 2008 alone.
• Alameda accounted for 10% of all death sentences in 2008.
• Since 2000 only 5 counties, including Alameda, have sentenced more than 10 people to execution. These 5 counties accounted for 90% of all death sentences in 2008.
• Alameda did solve a greater percentage of homicides in 2006 than in 2005 (the most recent years available), but has solved only 40% of homicides since 2000.
• Alameda's homicide rate jumped from 8.4 homicides per 100,000 residents in 2005, to 11.4 homicides per 100,000 residents in 2006. This is far greater than the California average of 6.6 homicides per 100,000 residents.
• Alameda now ranks 3rd in total death sentences statewide, and 3rd in death sentences per capita and death sentences per murder charged among the 26 largest counties.
• By all of these measures, Alameda leads Northern California in death sentencing.

For more information:

• Download the 2009 Alameda County Death Penalty Fact Sheet in English and in Spanish.
• Download The Hidden Death Tax: The Secret Costs of Seeking Death in California, a report by the ACLU of Northern California
• Download Death by Geography: A County by County Analysis of the Road to Execution, a report by the ACLU of Northern California

Other helpful websites:

• California Crime Victims for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
• Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights
• Murder Victims’ Families for Reconciliation
• Death Penalty Focus
• Death Penalty Information Center

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