[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ucp/jlstud/v33y2004p255-282.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Who Shall Live and Who Shall Die? An Analysis of Prisoners on Death Row in the United States

Author

Listed:
  • Laura M. Argys
  • H. Naci Mocan
Abstract
Using data on the entire population of prisoners under a sentence of death in the United States between 1977 and 1997, this paper investigates the probability of transition from death row to various possible outcomes (execution, death by other causes, commutation, and overturned sentence or conviction) in any given year, as well as the probability of commutation when reaching the end of death row. The analyses control for personal characteristics and previous criminal record of death row inmates and a number of characteristics of the state where the inmate is in custody, inculding variables that measure the degree to which the political process enters into the final outcome in a death penalty case. The results show that who lives and who dies on death row depends on the race and gender of the inmate, the race and political affiliation of the governor, and whether the governor is a lame duck.

Suggested Citation

  • Laura M. Argys & H. Naci Mocan, 2004. "Who Shall Live and Who Shall Die? An Analysis of Prisoners on Death Row in the United States," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 33(2), pages 255-282, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jlstud:v:33:y:2004:p:255-282
    DOI: 10.1086/421570
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/421570
    Download Restriction: Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1086/421570?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Marvin E. Wolfgang & Marc Riedel, 1973. "Race, Judicial Discretion, and the Death Penalty," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 407(1), pages 119-133, May.
    2. Kubik, Jeffrey D & Moran, John R, 2003. "Lethal Elections: Gubernatorial Politics and the Timing of Executions," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 46(1), pages 1-25, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Loureiro, Paulo R.A. & Mendonça, Mário Jorge Cardoso de & Moreira, Tito Belchior Silva & Sachsida, Adolfo, 2009. "Crime, economic conditions, social interactions and family heritage," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 202-209, September.
    2. Mariana Martínez & Fabio Sánchez T. & Holly Kosiewicz, 2007. "Is justice blind? An examination of disparities in homicide sentencing in Colombia, 1980-2000," Documentos CEDE 4460, Universidad de los Andes, Facultad de Economía, CEDE.
    3. Sarah Marx Quintanar, 2017. "Man vs. machine: An investigation of speeding ticket disparities based on gender and race," Journal of Applied Economics, Universidad del CEMA, vol. 20, pages 1-28, May.
    4. Briggs Depew & Ozkan Eren & Naci Mocan, 2017. "Judges, Juveniles, and In-Group Bias," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 60(2), pages 209-239.
    5. Wayne Geerling & Gary Magee & Vinod Mishra & Russell Smyth, 2018. "Hitler's Judges: Ideological Commitment and the Death Penalty in Nazi Germany," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 128(614), pages 2414-2449, September.
    6. Naci Mocan & Kaj Gittings, 2010. "The Impact of Incentives on Human Behavior: Can We Make it Disappear? The Case of the Death Penalty," NBER Chapters, in: The Economics of Crime: Lessons For and From Latin America, pages 379-418, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Naci Mocan & Erdal Tekin, 2010. "Ugly Criminals," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 92(1), pages 15-30, February.
    8. Samantha Bielen & Wim Marneffe & Naci H. Mocan, 2018. "Racial Bias and In-group Bias in Judicial Decisions: Evidence from Virtual Reality Courtrooms," NBER Working Papers 25355, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Ozkan Eren & Naci Mocan, 2018. "Emotional Judges and Unlucky Juveniles," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 10(3), pages 171-205, July.
    10. Alberto Alesina & Eliana La Ferrara, 2014. "A Test of Racial Bias in Capital Sentencing," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(11), pages 3397-3433, November.
    11. Mocan, H Naci & Gittings, R Kaj, 2003. "Getting Off Death Row: Commuted Sentences and the Deterrent Effect of Capital Punishment," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 46(2), pages 453-478, October.
    12. H. Naci Mocan & R. Kaj Gittings, 2001. "Pardons, Executions and Homicide," NBER Working Papers 8639, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. William M. Landes & Richard A. Posner, 2009. "The Economics of Presidential Pardons and Commutations," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 38(1), pages 61-88, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Spyros Skouras & Nicos Christodoulakis, 2014. "Electoral misgovernance cycles: evidence from wildfires and tax evasion in Greece," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 159(3), pages 533-559, June.
    2. Hanson, Andrew, 2009. "Local employment, poverty, and property value effects of geographically-targeted tax incentives: An instrumental variables approach," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(6), pages 721-731, November.
    3. Andrew Hanson & Shawn Rohlin, 2011. "The Effect of Location-Based Tax Incentives on Establishment Location and Employment across Industry Sectors," Public Finance Review, , vol. 39(2), pages 195-225, March.
    4. Spyros Skouras & Nicos Christodoulakis, 2011. "Electoral Misgovernance Cycles: Evidence from wildfires and tax evasion in Greece and elsewhere," GreeSE – Hellenic Observatory Papers on Greece and Southeast Europe 47, Hellenic Observatory, LSE.
    5. repec:ebl:ecbull:v:11:y:2004:i:2:p:1-9 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Pi-Han Tsai, 2014. "State Fiscal Rules and Composition Changes in Public Spending before the Election," Public Finance Review, , vol. 42(1), pages 58-91, January.
    7. Gebhard Kirchgässner, 2009. "Direkte Demokratie und Menschenrechte," CREMA Working Paper Series 2009-18, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    8. Radha Iyengar, 2011. "Who's the Fairest in the Land? Analysis of Judge and Jury Death Penalty Decisions," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 54(3), pages 693-722.
    9. De Witte, Kristof & Geys, Benny & Schönhage, Nanna Lauritz, 2018. "Strategic public policy around population thresholds," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 46-58.
    10. Bernd Süssmuth, 2004. "A note on death penalty executions and business cycles in U.S. federal states: Is there any nexus?," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 11(2), pages 1-9.
    11. James M. Poterba, 2005. "Steven D. Levitt: 2003 John Bates Clark Medalist," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 19(3), pages 181-198, Summer.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • K4 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior
    • J18 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Public Policy

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ucp:jlstud:v:33:y:2004:p:255-282. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Journals Division (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/JLS .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.