Colorado May Abolish the Death Penalty

My home state of Colorado may abolish the death penalty and use the money saved to fund the Colorado Bureau of Investigation's Cold Case Unit.

From the AP Story:

Supporters of the bill say it's more important to find and prosecute killers still on the loose than to execute the ones already convicted.

"The death penalty is not relevant without a murderer brought to trial," said Laurie Wiedeman, the older sister of 17-year-old Gay Lynn Dixon, whose 1982 slaying remains unsolved. "I would like to see the person who killed my sister put to death. But to have that person free to run around and committing other crimes?"

Abolishing Colorado's death penalty would save an estimated $1 million a year that now is spent on prosecutors' time, public defenders' fees and appeals, according to a legislative analysis.

Colorado Attorney General John Suthers and all but one of the state's district attorneys oppose the bill. Even if the savings were applied to a cold case unit, which Suthers and other said isn't guaranteed by the bill, many cases may remain unsolved.

"I think it's a sad situation," Suthers said. "You have hundreds of ... parents of murdered children, sitting there being led to believe that if they abolish the death penalty in Colorado their child's death will be solved.

"A million dollars doesn't buy you a lot of cold case investigation," he said.

He and other prosecutors say additional DNA testing, including a proposal pending in the Legislature to take samples at the time of a felony arrest, could do more than expanding the state's cold case unit to solve old cases.