Leave it to a prosecutor to try and put a pro-death spin on it:

Joshua Marquis, the district attorney in Astoria, Ore., who is spokesman for the National District Attorneys Assn. on death penalty issues, said he thought that executions were down because of the overall decrease in violent crime around the country. He also said that he thought that tough sentencing laws — such as three strikes, mandatory minimums and death sentences — "have had a clear deterrent effect."

But even Marquis conceded that when life without parole is an available option, juries are less likely to impose a death sentence.

Support also has dropped for the death penalty due to the number of death row inmates later found to be innocent:

Dieter said that although a significant majority of Americans — 64% in the latest Gallup poll, down from 80% in 1994 — supported the death penalty, there was growing skepticism about the fairness of its use. He said that was attributable, at least in part, to the growing number of death row inmates released after it was established that they were wrongfully convicted. That number now stands at 122.

In Illinois and New Jersey, moratoriums on the death penalty continue to gain acceptance by legislatures and Governors:

llinois continued a death penalty moratorium for the sixth year.

And in November, the New Jersey senate passed a bill that would suspend executions and create a commission to study the state's capital punishment law. The bill is set to be considered in the state Assembly in January. If the measure passes, New Jersey would become the first state to legislatively impose a death penalty moratorium.

California will consider a moratorium bill in January.

Other states that don't have the death penalty saw a rejection of attempts to resume it: Iowa, Massachusetts, Michigan and Wisconsin.

Supreme Court decisions have also helped:

In March, the Supreme Court concluded that there was a national consensus against executing individuals for murders committed as juveniles, and the justices barred the practice. The ruling meant that 71 death row inmates had their sentences commuted to life.

The high court issued two other significant pro-defendant rulings in capital cases, one involving racial bias in jury selection and another dealing with poor representation during a trial. The Supreme Court has three major death penalty cases on its docket in the current term.

Yet another factor is the high cost of the death penalty. It is far cheaper to maintain an inmate in prison for life than to seek to kill him.

Let's hope this is the beginning of a national trend. We need a moratorium everywhere now, and abolition in the future.