More than a decade ago, the American Bar Association called for a moratorium on Florida executions, based on a study that said the system was dogged by problems involving racial disparities, fairness and a lack of oversight.
More recent studies have provided additional evidence to bolster criticism of the death penalty in Florida, which leads the nation in Death Row exonerations.
Florida opponents of the death penalty, including many Democratic legislators, have renewed calls for a moratorium, seeking further review of geographic and racial inequities regarding who is charged with the death penalty and eventually executed.
But with Scott and Republican legislative leaders strongly supporting the death penalty, such a moratorium is unlikely.
“There’s no doubt, if you look at national trends, that the Florida Legislature’s and governor’s office insistence place them in a handful of states that are actively trying to devise a system which is going to produce death sentences,” said University of Miami law professor Scott Sundby, who has researched the behavior of juries in death penalty cases.
