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September 15, 2015 02:06 PM UTC

Coloradans Not So Bloodthirsty After All?

  • 13 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols
Lethal injection chamber.
Lethal injection chamber.

A new poll from Public Policy Polling, which is generally considered a Democratic-aligned polling outfit but has won many plaudits for accuracy over the years, has a new poll out challenging the conventional wisdom that Colorado voters overwhelmingly favor capital punishment. As the Denver Post’s John Frank reports:

Colorado voters appear split on whether the death penalty should remain in place, a new poll finds, a result that may indicate support for capital punishment is softening in the state.

The survey comes amid a conversation about the future of the death penalty in Colorado after juries in two high-profile trials opted against imposing it.

Public Policy Polling, a Democratic firm, asked voters last week whether the state should replace the death penalty with life in prison without the possibility of parole. The survey found 47.2 percent favor keeping the death penalty and 42.9 percent want to replace it — a difference that is essentially within the margin of error of 4.3 percentage points.

An additonal 10 percent remained undecided, according to the poll, which was commissioned by the Better Priorities Initiative, a Colorado-based group that opposes the death penalty.

Boulder County DA Stan Garnett.
Boulder County DA Stan Garnett.

A press release from the Better Priorities Initiative quotes Boulder DA Stan Garnett:

“This poll shows that Coloradans have grown weary of this wasteful government program that prolongs victims’ suffering, provides little to no deterrent effect, and ultimately yields no executions,” said Stan Garnett, District Attorney for the 20th Judicial District. “As Coloradans continue to have this statewide conversation about the death penalty, they are concluding they can live without it.”

These findings come on the heels of the state’s two highest profile death penalty cases in many years. In both cases, the death-qualified juries determined that life in prison without the possibility of parole was the appropriate sentence for the perpetrators instead of death by lethal injection. The juries’ rejection of the death penalty in both the Aurora theatre shooting and the Fero’s Bar stabbing fall in line with national trends that show a marked decrease in the number of death sentences handed down by juries, which reached a 40-year low nationwide in 2014.

Garnett went on to say, “As a District Attorney who has the responsibility of managing a large office of lawyers and staff, I always focus on what is efficient and what keeps my community safe. The reality is that the death penalty is wasteful and does nothing to make our communities safer. Tough and focused prosecutors across Colorado are coming to the same conclusion.”

The poll stands in marked contrast to another poll taken during the recently-concluded trial of the Aurora theater shooter, in which over 60% percentage of respondents indicated they favored the death penalty in that case. The most recent round of debates over the death penalty has raged in Colorado since well before this summer, however, after Gov. John Hickenlooper granted a reprieve to the so-called “Chuck E. Cheese killer” who had been scheduled to be executed in 2013.

It was widely assumed that Hickenlooper’s decision to grant a reprieve in that case would cost him politically. In last year’s gubernatorial election, GOP opponent Bob Beauprez used Hickenlooper’s decision in campaign ads to paint the incumbent as “soft on crime”–a similar tactic to what Beauprez had unsuccessfully tried against Bill Ritter in 2006. It didn’t work, in part because Beauprez’s ugly negative campaign had begun to backfire on a variety of issues.

Or maybe the issue just doesn’t have the purchase with voters that we all thought?

Today’s poll asked Coloradans what they think would be the most important issue in deciding how to vote for their state legislator next year. The death penalty barely registered, with only 5% of voters saying the issue would guide their vote, and other issues like the economy and health care scoring far higher. This again would seem to indicate that the death penalty is not nearly the marquee issue that Republicans have claimed–against Hickenlooper, or in support of either the policy or politicians like George Brauchler who have significant political capital invested in support for capital punishment.

The death penalty is one of those emotive issues where polling can swing wildly based on contemporary issues. When it seemed likely that the Aurora shooter would receive it, polling suggests voters liked it better. Now that the death penalty has failed to be applied in our state, in two cases where conventional wisdom would surely suggest the law warranted it?

It’s possible this debate has entered a new phase.

Comments

13 thoughts on “Coloradans Not So Bloodthirsty After All?

  1. Put your money where your mouth is, Colorado Pols! Tell the Democrats to run in 2016 on abolishing the death penalty. Tell the candidates only 5% of voters care. See what happens.

    This poll isn't worth its weight in cowpies.

    1. Do you have to foam at the mouth over everything, Modster?  It's just common sense that, without a strong majority feeling one way or the other, it's not going to be as important as any number of other issues. 

      It's like somebody pulls your string and you go nuts on command. Over anything and everything. Checked your blood pressure lately? It's like you're some sort of talking Rush Limbaugh doll. Relax.

    1. I agree with Dave Barnes.   Contrast the above wording with"  "Should the death penalty be an option for criminals convicted of especially cruel and heinous crimes if there is no reasonable doubt about their guilt?"  That would yield about 3-1 in favor of capital punishment which was roughly the result of the Aurora movie killing jury  9 for death, 1 against, 2 undecided.  

       

      1. Any guess as to the support for capital punishment if it were phrased:

        "Should the death penalty be an option if it results in a lengthy, costly trial that even if convicted and sentenced to death, there is virtually no chance of the sentence being carried out?"

        Being in favor of a hypothetical meets reality…

      2. I still don't think using the death penalty as a litmus test issue is going to yield much in the way of results for most offices up for election in the 2016.  Don't think many are going to be basing campaigns on opposing or supporting it as their central issue.  For one thing plenty of Dems support it so it isn't like choice.  And that's an awful lot of qualifiers to put on a poll question about the death penalty. Especially since the death penalty has never and is not today imposed in accordance with all those qualifiers. Far from it. I don’t see how a fantasy scenario makes for a more accurate poll. Do know that you're a death penalty fan but, sorry Voyageur, I'd be very surprised if it's still an option 20 years from now.  

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