California Bid To Resume Death Row Executions

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By Greg Milam, US Correspondent

Campaigners in California are calling on the state's government to resume executions on America's biggest death row.

More than 740 inmates live under the threat of death by lethal injection in a state that has not executed anyone for more than eight years.

California placed a moratorium on executions in 2006 over concerns about the cocktail of drugs used and earlier this year a federal judge declared the administration of it as "dysfunctional".

Judge Cormac Carney said keeping prisoners waiting for decades represented cruel and unusual punishment, a breach of the US Constitution's Eighth Amendment.

He wrote: "In California, the execution of a death sentence is so infrequent and the delays preceding it so extraordinary that the death penalty is deprived of any deterrent or retributive effect it might once have had."

It is estimated that the death penalty has cost the state more than $4bn (£2.6bn) since it was re-introduced in 1976.

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Gallery: Infamous Death Row Inmates

James Rose, aged 68. On death row in Florida since 13th May 1977. Crime: 1st degree murder of an eight year old girl on 22 October 1976. Pic: Florida department of corrections

William Zeigler, aged 69. On death row in Florida since 19th July 1976. Crime: Murdered his wife and parents-in-law on Christmas Eve 1975. Pic: Florida department of corrections

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Raymond Riles, aged 64. On death row in Texas since 2nd April 1976. Crime: Robbery and 1st degree murder on 11th December 1974. Pic:Texas Dept of Criminal Justice

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Henri Sireci, aged 66. On death row in Florida since 16th November 1976. Crime: Stabbed a garage owner to death on 3rd December 1975. Pic: Florida department of corrections

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Charles Foster, aged 68. On death row in Florida since 7th October 1975 for 1st degree murder of a 65 year old man on 15th July 1975. Pic: Florida department of corrections

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Since then, just 13 inmates have been put to death.

Across America, opinion is divided on the death penalty.

Some states have abolished it, while others have experienced shortages of execution drugs and botched procedures.

This week the execution of a man said to be mentally ill in Texas was put on hold.

But some victims' families say it is time to restart the executions in California.

American football legend Kermit Alexander's mother, sister and two nephews were murdered by a gang member who had gone to the wrong address in Los Angeles.

He remains on death row, 30 years after the killing.

Alexander is now leading the campaign to resume executions.

He told Sky News: "They won't allow me to do it so if society has it on the books they have to get it done.

"Don't make us suffer the anguish of waiting to see if it is going happen.

"I'm saddened because we can't get on with our lives because this is in the back of our minds. Our family has been badly mauled."

Lorrain Taylor, whose twin sons were murdered in a drive-by shooting in Oakland, disagrees.

She runs a support group for the family of murder victims and said: "Why use money to take another person's life - eventually, if it ever happens - when you can use those same funds to help law enforcement to stop violence, to provide counselling for children who are left behind.

"To me it makes no sense, I think that it is also an act of violence and it is sending the wrong message."

She agrees with this warning from Shujaa Graham, who spent 10 years on death row for a murder he did not commit.

He told Sky News: "Why do we kill someone to prove that killing is wrong - and we say life is the most sacred thing?"

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