Maryland on Thursday became the 18th US state to abolish the death penalty when Democratic Governor Martin O’Malley, an outspoken critic of capital punishment, signed the measure into law.
The death penalty will be replaced by life imprisonment without parole in the eastern US state, which borders the US capital Washington.
The European Union’s foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton quickly issued a statement supporting the move, saying she hoped it would “encourage other US States to follow suit.”
In March, when Maryland state lawmakers voted to end use of the death penalty, O’Malley hailed the development, calling capital punishment a policy “that is proven not to work.”
“Evidence shows that the death penalty is not a deterrent, it cannot be administered without racial bias and it costs three times as much as life in prison without parole,” the governor said in a statement.
The death penalty has been in use in Maryland since 1638, when the territory was a British colony.
However, Maryland has neither executed a prisoner nor issued a death penalty since 2005, before O’Malley took office, according to the non-profit Death Penalty Information Center.
The law signed on Thursday only applies to future cases. There are currently five prisoners on death row in Maryland, and O’Malley must decide what to do with them.
Death Penalty Information Center executive director Richard Dieter has said he expects O’Malley to commute their sentences to life in prison without parole.
According to a recent Washington Post opinion poll, 60 percent of Maryland residents nevertheless support use of the death penalty, against 38 percent who favor its abolition.
Last year, Connecticut had become the 17th of America’s 50 states to abolish the death penalty. Capital punishment is also forbidden in the District of Columbia.
US state of Maryland abolishes death penalty
