Sister Helen Prejean today at the conference.
The Assembly will vote next month on legislation to repeal New Jersey's never-used death penalty, Speaker Joseph Roberts (D-Camden) said today, adding he is "cautiously optimistic" the bill will pass.
At a Statehouse news conference with Sister Helen Prejean, whose ministry to death row inmates was described in her book "Dead Man Walking," Roberts said he is committed to making New Jersey "the first state to legislatively repeal the death penalty."
With support for capital punishment waning nationally, such a move would make New Jersey "a beacon on the hill" that other states will follow, Prejean predicted.
"I know you're known as the Garden State; it's going to be great to also be known as the life state," said Prejean, who has made a dozen trips to New Jersey to urge repeal of the death penalty.
Roberts said the Assembly will take up a bill (A-3716) http://www. by Assemblyman Wilfredo Caraballo (D-Essex) that would replace capital punishment with life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
"The bottom line of that bill is to lock murderers in jail and throw away the key," Roberts said. "The cost of having a death penalty that never gets used can no longer be tolerated."
New Jersey performed its last execution in 1963, nine years before all then-existing death penalty laws were struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1972. Since New Jersey reinstated capital punishment in 1982, no one has been executed. One death row inmate, John Martini, has exhausted all appeals but the state has no valid regulations for performing a lethal injection.
Under the timetable outlined by Roberts, the Assembly Judiciary Committee would consider Caraballo's bill on Dec. 6 and the full Assembly would vote a week later.
The Senate Judiciary Committee approved a bill to replace capital punishment with life imprisonment without parole in May. It is awaiting action by the Senate Budget Committee, where it was sent for consideration of whether repealing capital punishment would cost or save the state money.
Contributed by Robert Schwaneberg
At a Statehouse news conference with Sister Helen Prejean, whose ministry to death row inmates was described in her book "Dead Man Walking," Roberts said he is committed to making New Jersey "the first state to legislatively repeal the death penalty."
With support for capital punishment waning nationally, such a move would make New Jersey "a beacon on the hill" that other states will follow, Prejean predicted.
"I know you're known as the Garden State; it's going to be great to also be known as the life state," said Prejean, who has made a dozen trips to New Jersey to urge repeal of the death penalty.
Roberts said the Assembly will take up a bill (A-3716) http://www. by Assemblyman Wilfredo Caraballo (D-Essex) that would replace capital punishment with life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
"The bottom line of that bill is to lock murderers in jail and throw away the key," Roberts said. "The cost of having a death penalty that never gets used can no longer be tolerated."
New Jersey performed its last execution in 1963, nine years before all then-existing death penalty laws were struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1972. Since New Jersey reinstated capital punishment in 1982, no one has been executed. One death row inmate, John Martini, has exhausted all appeals but the state has no valid regulations for performing a lethal injection.
Under the timetable outlined by Roberts, the Assembly Judiciary Committee would consider Caraballo's bill on Dec. 6 and the full Assembly would vote a week later.
The Senate Judiciary Committee approved a bill to replace capital punishment with life imprisonment without parole in May. It is awaiting action by the Senate Budget Committee, where it was sent for consideration of whether repealing capital punishment would cost or save the state money.
Contributed by Robert Schwaneberg
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