Throughout its history, New York executed inmates with a startling efficiency. Executioners have put 695 people to death, second only to Texas. New York has not carried out any executions since the law was reinstated in 1995. Convicted murderer Eddie Lee Mays was the last person put to death, in 1963.
Despite the new opposition to capital punishment, the Republican-controlled state Senate still supports the death penalty. Assembly leaders acknowledge that if they put the measure to a vote -- rather than letting it die with a floor debate -- the margin would be thin.
"The governor believes that a strong death penalty law is a critical deterrent to crime," spokesman Todd Alhart said. "The assembly leadership should stop their delaying tactics and bring this to a vote."
Assemblyman Ryan Scott Karben (D) represents a suburban district north of the city and spoke of wrestling with the issue late into the night, reading books and reports. He would not argue that the death penalty is anything but brutal. Yet he believes it's a weapon the state must possess.
"I believe there are some crimes so horrific that it irrevocably rends the social contract," Karben said. "I think there's a place for collective disgust with morally reprehensible acts."
Dalsheim, the retired superintendent, is a political liberal but no naif. He readily acknowledges the state's maximum-security prisons hold many exceedingly dangerous men. But he came to know some of those men, including death row inmates, and he spoke of the cumulative impact of the death penalty -- on the inmates who live in its shadow and the guards who lead them to their deaths.
Two former executioners committed suicide after many years of such duty.
"There was this big old-line committed officer, a well-liked fellow, and he oversaw the executions," Dalsheim said. "Afterwards, he'd get very, very drunk and not come in for several days."
Dalsheim paused in the telling, swallowing twice. "It's terrible, terrible -- I get very emotional thinking about it. I certainly don't like terrorism or murder but there has to be a better way than putting men to death."
