JEFFERSON CITY — A Missouri House committee held a public hearing Monday for a bill that would repeal the death penalty.
Missouri is one of 27 states with a death penalty, and uses it, or life imprisonment without parole, as punishment for first-degree murder or other class A felonies.
House Bill 2153, sponsored by Rep. Jim Murphy, R-St. Louis, would eliminate the death penalty. The bill would not modify the sentences of anyone currently sentenced to death unless otherwise allowed by law.
Murphy acknowledged that the bill is controversial, and said he had changed his opinion on the issue years ago.
“At a time when violence continues to plague our society, the state should lead by example and demonstrate that justice should not be driven by revenge,” he said.
Archbishop Mitchell T. Rozanski spoke in support of the bill. He believes the church teaches the death penalty is inadmissible because it attacks the “inviolability and dignity” of the person.
“Modern society has the means of protecting itself without definitively denying criminals the chance to reform,” Rozanski said, quoting Pope John Paul II.
Rozanksi also said the justice system is capable of making mistakes and should not impose punishments that can’t be undone. He said that in the United States since 1973, over 200 people sentenced to death have later been exonerated.
“Missouri now has the opportunity to move towards a more just and humane criminal justice system,” he said. “One that protects society while respecting the value of every human life. Replacing the death penalty with life imprisonment without parole ensures accountability while avoiding the moral and practical harms of capital punishment.”
Another witness, Brian Kaylor, a Baptist minister and president of Word&Way, testified in support of the bill because of his religious beliefs as well. He said the death penalty is not fiscally responsible, not a deterrent to acts of violence and not just.
Rep. Keith Elliott, R-Doniphan, asked Kaylor how he processes Genesis 9:6-7 — “whoever sheds human blood, by humans shall their blood be shed.”
Kaylor said they should look to Jesus’ moral and ethical teachings in scripture as well.
“We can look at, well how does God actually act in these very cases like Cain, Moses and David?” he asked. “God doesn’t impose the death penalty, God doesn’t demand it. Quite the alternate.”
Matthew Crowell, director of the state public defender system, testified in support of the bill because of the death penalty’s cost to his agency.
“When death penalty cases go up, we have to further increase those offices, or the staffing of those offices, and we again lose our most experienced attorneys to handle a few cases,” Crowell said.
Rep. Kimberly-Ann Collins, D-St. Louis, asked Crowell about the execution of individuals who have mental illnesses. Crowell testified that it is cruel and unusual punishment to execute someone who is mentally ill, which Rep. Barry Hovis, R-Whitewater, disagreed with.
“To me, as a victim, it makes no difference if they’re mentally ill, or mean or evil or whatever if they kill me or kill my daughter, kill my wife, kill my neighbor,” Hovis said. “I have no regard for people that do that.”
Hovis asked witness Heidi Moore, the executive director of Missourians to Abolish the Death Penalty, how many people who are sentenced to life in prison without parole killed someone else while they were in prison.
“I don’t know (the number), but I don’t believe it’s probably as high as those that have a death sentence as those that are just serving life without parole,” Moore said.
Former Rep. Tony Lovasco, who introduced similar legislation during his time as a representative, testified in support of the bill. He said he does believe that some people deserve to be executed, but the law needs to focus on protecting everyone’s individual rights.
“Unfortunately, that means that the cost of that is some bad people get it a little better than they probably should. It means that the guy gets to grow old and die in prison when his victim didn’t get to grow old, and that’s very uncomfortable,” Lovasco said. “But it doesn’t matter. Because what matters is that we preserve a system that looks out for everybody.”
In a news conference after the hearing, Murphy said that the chairman has guaranteed the bill will get a vote in committee. Similar legislation last year died without a hearing or committee vote.