Nevada and death penalty delays

In response to your editorial after Scott Dozier’s suicide: I shook my head at the implication that switching the method of execution will solve the problem. As a defense attorney for two decades, I know better.

The method of execution should not be central to the debate, and the cost won’t be eliminated with the use of rope or a firing squad.

The Legislature’s 2014 audit found that simply filing for the death penalty adds a half-million dollars, the lion’s share spent to prepare for a penalty hearing that might never happen. These front-end costs are a necessary consequence of fundamental rights such as the presumption of innocence and the right to counsel.

Dozier’s case was unique, as was the endgame fight over the means. It was driven by Dozier’s demand that the state make good the promise of execution.

Not unique is the push-pull nature of the litigation, taking a toll on everyone, including the victim’s families. This, too, is a necessary evil of due process and will continue so long as there is a death penalty.

Lawmakers have tinkered with capital punishment for more than 40 years, but they have failed. History has proven Nevada’s death penalty costly and unworkable. Implying a system that is broken beyond repair can be fixed by switching from lethal injection is, to steal your term, “disingenuous.”