California's capital punishment rate varies by geography

SAN FRANCISCO -- California now has 638 inmates awaiting death, some of them for more than one murder. But some of the state's counties have condemned many more inmates than others of similar size, according to an Associated Press review of Corrections Department data.

The disparities between some counties are so pronounced that legal experts say capital punishment is being unfairly applied in California.

The reasons are complex -- for one, crimes happen more frequently in some places than others. But prosecutorial zeal and the attitudes of jurors also are factors. The bottom line, according to the data, is that the death penalty sometimes depends on where the crime was committed.

"Capital punishment should not depend on an accident of geography," said defense lawyer Robert Sanger, who prepared a lengthy analysis of California's death penalty system in the current issue of Santa Clara Law Review.

The death penalty is getting renewed scrutiny in California, where Tuesday's scheduled lethal injection of Kevin Cooper, who was sentenced for hacking four people to death, will be the state's first execution in two years.

Percentage of blacks

Often, the debate focuses on questions about race, the reliability of evidence and arguments about cruel and unusual punishment -- all issues raised by Cooper's defenders. And like other states, California's death row is disproportionately black.

Statewide, about 39 percent of inmates awaiting execution are white, 35 percent black and 18 percent Hispanic. About 47 percent of California's population is white; 6 percent black and 33 percent Hispanic.

But geography plays a role -- if the death penalty were applied evenly, there would be one death sentence for every 54,700 people in each county. That ratio was calculated by dividing California's 35.3 million population by 645, which is the number of death sentences handed out to the 638 men and women now awaiting execution.

San Francisco and Kern counties each have roughly 700,000 people, but liberal San Francisco has just one person now on death row, 13 fewer than the per capita ratio. Kern, where conservatives hold sway, has applied 23 death sentences, 10 more than the norm.

Riverside County, with 54 people on death row, had the most death verdicts beyond its statistically proportionate number, which would be 30. "Death penalty laws were implemented to use," said Grover Trask III, Riverside County's district attorney, noting his community's conservative bent.

Los Angeles is the only county with more condemned inmates, but it also has the state's highest population. It has sentenced people to death 193 times, 11 more than the ratio.

San Mateo County, now hosting Scott Peterson's double-murder trial, has issued 16 death sentences, three more than the ratio. Stanislaus County, where the trial was moved from, has 9 current death row residents, equal to the ratio.