Yes on Proposition 34 — End the Death Penalty in California

By Gil Garcetti, Jeanne Woodford and Jennifer Waggoner 

Evidence shows more than 100 innocent people have been sentenced to death in the U.S., and some have been executed!

(Proposition) 34 means we’ll never execute an innocent person in California.

Franky Carrillo was 16 when he was arrested and wrongly convicted of murder in Los Angeles. It took 20 years to show his innocence! Cameron Willingham was executed in 2004 in Texas for an arson that killed his children; impartial investigators have since concluded there was no arson.

“If someone’s executed and later found innocent, we can’t go back.”—Judge LaDoris Cordell, Santa Clara (Retired)

California’s death penalty is too costly and broken beyond repair.

• Only 13 people have been executed since 1967—no one since 2006. Most death row inmates die of old age.

• We waste millions of tax dollars on special housing and taxpayer-financed appeals that can last 25 years.

• Today, death row inmates can sit around doing nothing.

(Proposition) 34 makes convicted killers work and pay into the victims’ compensation fund, as ordered by a judge.

It keeps killers who commit heinous crimes in prison until they die.

It frees up millions of wasted tax dollars — to help our kids’ schools and catch more murderers and rapists — without raising taxes.

(Proposition) 34 saves money.

California is broke. Many think the death penalty is cheaper than life without parole. That’s just not true.

An impartial study found California will save nearly $1 billion in five years if we replace the death penalty with life in prison without possibility of parole. Savings come from eliminating lawyers’ fees and special death row housing.

Those wasted tax dollars would be better spent on law enforcement and our schools.

We cannot let brutal killers evade justice.

Every year, almost half of all murders and over half of all rapes go unsolved. Killers walk free and often go on to rape and kill again. Thousands of victims wait for justice while we waste millions on death row.

Killers who commit monstrous acts must be swiftly brought to justice, locked up forever, and severely punished.

(Proposition) 34 saves tax dollars and directs $100 million in savings for more DNA testing, crime labs and other tools that help cops solve rapes and murders.

(Propositon) 34 makes killers who commit horrible crimes spend the rest of their lives in prison with no hope of ever getting out. It makes them work so they can pay restitution to their victims.

That’s justice that works.

Every person justly sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole since 1977 is still locked up or has died in prison. Life without possibility of parole works and ensures we will never execute an innocent person in California.

“The death penalty doesn’t make us safer—better crime-solving does.”—Former Attorney General John Van de Kamp

“I am troubled by cases like Willingham’s—of innocent people who may have been executed. I support 34 because it guarantees we will never execute an innocent person in California.” —Bishop Flores, San Diego Diocese

Vote yes on 34. 

Garcetti was Los Angeles County district attorney from 1992 to 2000. Woodford was the warden of San Quentin from 1999 to 2004. Waggoner is president of the California League of Women Voters.

(Here is the Legislative Analyst’s assessment of the proposition’s impact. Opponents of the ballot measure issued the press release below September 26.)

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